Assessing the Race–Crime and Ethnicity–Crime Relationship in a Sample of Serious Adolescent Delinquents
Open accessAbstract
Official record studies consistently show that Blacks exhibit higher levels of involvement in criminal offending than Whites do. Although self-report studies suggest somewhat lower levels of Black overrepresentation in criminal offending activity (especially with less serious forms of crime), there appears to be considerable evidence that Blacks are disproportionately involved in serious crime. Yet most of this evidence is based on data from broad cross-sections of the general population. To date, there is little evidence on which to base inferences about the relationship between race and criminal involvement within serious offender populations. In this article, the authors use both official record and self-report data on samples of serious adolescent offenders in Philadelphia and Phoenix to reach a better understanding of the relationship between race and criminal activity. The analysis suggests that consistent race differences of the kind normally seen in the criminological literature are not evident in our sample of serious offenders.
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These disparities cannot be explained by the belief that Black people supposedly commit more crimes, including violent crimes.
“These disparities exist even though they cannot be explained by the belief that Black people supposedly commit more crimes, including violent crimes”
From A call to dismantle systemic racism in criminal legal systems. (2022) · cites this paper as Piquero & Brame, 2008
The paper does not reject differences in offending as an explanation for the disparities. In Prior Empirical Research (page unavailable), it says both police records and self-reports show disproportionate Black involvement in serious violence, and that differences in arrests for imprisonable crimes account for much—but not all—of minority overrepresentation in prison. The citing sentence’s categorical rejection of that explanation is contrary to the paper’s mixed account. (LLM, conf=0.86)
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Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredResearch reveals no racial or ethnic differences in actual offense rates for all types of crime, with the exception of serious violent crime.
“Overall, research reveals no racial or ethnic differences in actual offense rates for all types of crime, with the exception of serious violent crime”
From A call to dismantle systemic racism in criminal legal systems. (2022) · cites this paper as Piquero & Brame, 2008
The Results (page unavailable) find no significant racial or ethnic difference in median self-reported offense frequency in this sample of serious juvenile offenders, and Prior Empirical Research reports disproportionate involvement in serious violence among Blacks. But Extending Prior Research explicitly cautions against generalizing the sample findings to juvenile offenders overall, and the Discussion says differences by specific crime type need further study. The paper therefore does not establish no differences for all other types of crime. (LLM, conf=0.90)
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- Authors
- Piquero, A. R., & Brame, R. W.
- Affiliations
- University of Maryland, College Park (US)
- University of North Carolina at Charlotte (US)
- ORCID
- Piquero, Alex R.
- Venue
- Crime & Delinquency
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2008-04-14
- Volume
- 54
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 390-422
- ISSN
- 0011-1287 (ISSN-L)
- 1552-387X
- PMC
- PMC2782848
- OpenAlex
- W2142174821
- Cited by
- 150
- References
- 92
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 5 · 2022: 9 · 2021: 4 · 2020: 9 · 2019: 7 · 2018: 11 · 2017: 13 · 2016: 10 · 2015: 11 · 2014: 13 · 2013: 7 · 2012: 9
- FWCI
- 28.83
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Crime & Delinquency (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute on Drug Abuse (R01DA019697)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Crime Patterns and Interventions
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis
- Social Sciences › Education › Education Discipline and Inequality
- Keywords
- race and crime, black-white disparities, juvenile offenders, Philadelphia, Phoenix
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