The Bloods are a primarily African-American street gang founded in Los Angeles, California. The gang is widely known for its rivalry with the Crips. It is identified by the red color worn by its members and by particular gang symbols, including distinctive hand signs.
Juvenile delinquency, also known as "juvenile offending", is the act of participating in unlawful behavior as a minor or individual younger than the statutory age of majority. For example, in the United States of America a juvenile delinquent is a person who is typically below 18 years of age and commits an act that otherwise would have been charged as a crime if they were an adult. Juvenile crimes can range from status offenses, to property crimes and violent crimes.
Incarceration in the United States is a primary form of punishment and rehabilitation for the commission of felony and other offenses. The United States has the largest prison population in the world, and the highest per-capita incarceration rate. In 2018 in the US, there were 698 people incarcerated per 100,000; this includes the incarceration rate for adults or people tried as adults. In 2016, 2.2 million Americans have been incarcerated, which means for every 100,000 there are 655 who are currently inmates. Prison, parole, and probation operations generate an $81 billion annual cost to U.S. taxpayers, while police and court costs, bail bond fees, and prison phone fees generate another $100 billion in costs that are paid by individuals.
Prison rape commonly refers to the rape of inmates in prison by other inmates or prison staff. In 2001, Human Rights Watch estimated that at least 4.3 million inmates had been raped while incarcerated in the United States. A United States Department of Justice report, Sexual Victimization in Prisons and Jails Reported by Inmates, states that "In 2011–12, an estimated 4.0% of state and federal prison inmates and 3.2% of jail inmates reported experiencing one or more incidents of sexual victimization by another inmate or facility staff in the past 12 months or since admission to the facility, if less than 12 months." However, advocates dispute the accuracy of the numbers, saying they seem to under-report the real numbers of sexual assaults in prison, especially among juveniles.
Ephebiphobia is the fear of youth. First coined as the "fear or loathing of teenagers", today the phenomenon is recognized as the "inaccurate, exaggerated and sensational characterization of young people" in a range of settings around the world. Studies of the fear of youth occur in sociology and youth studies. It is distinguished from pedophobia by being more so focused on adolescents than prepubescent children.
The Crips are a gang based in the coastal regions of southern California. It was founded in Los Angeles, California, in 1969, mainly by Raymond Washington and Stanley Williams. Once a single alliance between two autonomous gangs, it is now a loosely connected network of individual "sets", often engaged in open warfare with one another. Its members traditionally wear blue clothing, a practice that has waned somewhat due to police crackdowns targeting gang members. Historically, members have been primarily of African American heritage.
The California Division of Juvenile Justice (DJJ), previously known as the California Youth Authority (CYA), is a division of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation that provides education, training, and treatment services for California's most serious youth offenders. These youths are committed by the juvenile and criminal courts to DJJ's eleven correctional facilities, four conservation camps and two residential drug treatment programs. The DJJ provides services to juvenile offenders, ranging in age from twelve to 25, in facilities and on parole, and works closely with law enforcement, the courts, district attorneys, public defenders, probation offices and other public and private agencies involved with the problems of youth. The DJJ is undergoing reorganization as required by a court agreement and the California State Legislature after widespread criticisms of conditions at its youth prisons. The agency's headquarters are in Sacramento, California.
The American juvenile justice system is the primary system used to handle minors who are convicted of criminal offenses. The system is composed of a federal and many separate state, territorial, and local jurisdictions, with states and the federal government sharing sovereign police power under the common authority of the United States Constitution. The juvenile justice system intervenes in delinquent behavior through police, court, and correctional involvement, with the goal of rehabilitation. Youth and their guardians can face a variety of consequences including probation, community service, youth court, youth incarceration and alternative schooling. The juvenile justice system, similar to the adult system, operates from a belief that intervening early in delinquent behavior will deter adolescents from engaging in criminal behavior as adults.
Troy Smith Duster is an American sociologist with research interests in the sociology of science, public policy, race and ethnicity and deviance. He is a Chancellor’s Professor of Sociology at University of California, Berkeley, and professor of sociology and director of the Institute for the History of the Production of Knowledge at New York University.
Gangs in the United States include several types of groups, including national street gangs, local street gangs, prison gangs, motorcycle clubs, and ethnic and organized crime gangs. Approximately 1.4 million people were part of gangs as of 2011, and more than 33,000 gangs were active in the United States.
This page is primarily concerned with juvenile delinquency in the United States. For information on juvenile delinquency in general, see juvenile delinquency. In addition, although the term juvenile delinquency often refers to juvenile as both the victims and the aggressors, this page only refers to juveniles as the actual delinquents. The information and statistics for juveniles as victims rather than offenders is much different. For information about juveniles as the victims of violent attacks, see trafficking of children, child abuse, child sexual abuse, or prostitution of children.
Race in the United States criminal justice system refers to the unique experiences and disparities in the United States in regard to the policing and prosecuting of various races. There have been different outcomes for different racial groups in convicting and sentencing felons in the United States criminal justice system. Experts and analysts have debated the relative importance of different factors that have led to these disparities.
California Proposition 6, also known as the Safe Neighborhoods Act and The Runner Initiative, is a statutory initiative that appeared on the November 2008 ballot in California. This proposition was rejected by voters on November 4 of that year.
The United States incarcerates more of its youth than any other country in the world through the juvenile courts and the adult criminal justice system, which reflects the larger trends in incarceration practices in the United States. In 2010, approximately 70,800 juveniles were incarcerated in youth detention facilities alone. Approximately 500,000 youth are brought to detention centers in a given year. This data does not reflect juveniles tried as adults. Around 40% are incarcerated in privatized, for-profit facilities.
This article refers to crime in the American state of California.
Meda Chesney-Lind is a feminist criminologist and an advocate for girls and women who come in contact with the criminal justice system. She works to find alternatives to women's incarceration and she is an advocate for humanitarian solutions to crime and criminal justice problems in Hawaii. Chesney-Lind is concerned about the treatment of youth and women in the criminal justice system. Specifically, she focuses on and teaches courses on girls' delinquency and women's crime, issues of girls' programming and women's imprisonment, youth gangs, the sociology of gender, and the victimization of women and girls. She has spent more than two decades attempting to develop a better correctional system in Hawaii through publishing countless newspaper articles, books, and journal articles, as well as working with community-based agencies and giving talks to local organizations and legislators. She has also been credited with helping to direct national attention to services for delinquent girls.
The criminal stereotype of African Americans in the United States is an ethnic stereotype according to which African Americans, and African American males in particular, are dangerous criminals. The origin of this stereotype is that as a demographic they are proportionally over-represented in the numbers of those that are arrested for committing crimes: for example, according to official FBI statistics, in 2015 51.1% of people arrested for homicide were African American, even though African American people account only for 13.4% of the total United States population. The figure of the African-American man as a criminal has appeared frequently in American popular culture, further reinforcing this image in the collective unconscious.
California Proposition 19 was a ballot initiative on the November 2, 2010 statewide ballot. It was defeated, with 53.5% of California voters voting "No" and 46.5% voting "Yes." If passed, it would have legalized various marijuana-related activities, allowed local governments to regulate these activities, permitted local governments to impose and collect marijuana-related fees and taxes, and authorized various criminal and civil penalties. In March 2010, it qualified to be on the November statewide ballot. The proposition required a simple majority in order to pass, and would have taken effect the day after the election. Yes on 19 was the official advocacy group for the initiative and California Public Safety Institute: No On Proposition 19 was the official opposition group.
Proposition 47, also known by its ballot title Criminal Sentences. Misdemeanor Penalties. Initiative Statute, was a referendum passed by voters in the state of California on November 4, 2014. The measure was also referred to by its supporters as the Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act. It recategorized some nonviolent offenses as misdemeanors, rather than felonies, as they had previously been categorized.
The Anti-Recidivism Coalition (ARC) is a Los Angeles-based non-profit organization founded by Scott Budnick. ARC is a support network for formerly incarcerated individuals and advocates for criminal justice reform. ARC’s mission is to reduce incarceration, improve the outcomes of formerly incarcerated individuals, and to build healthier communities.
