Sociology

Delinquency is the way of acting against criminal law. One of the three major methods of measuring delinquency is the self report method (Agnew, 2004). According to this method the individual are asked in first place whether they have engaged in any delinquent or criminal behavior. In case of affirmative reply the individual is enquired how often he or she indulged in to such kind of behavior. In this method attention is paid to the reliability and validity of the data. The quality of the work done under this method has increased gradually, however this method has certain limitations. Like the reliability of the respondents reply.  Most of the people never welcome questions regarding their personal self. People feel shy revealing their inner self. It focuses on the delinquencies committed in the previous year.   This technique is multi-method technique to check the validity of the data (Agnew, 2004).

Official statistics is the second method to measure it. It takes data from the police and other law enforcement agencies. The crime data shows data on crimes, number of crimes known and reported and cleared by arrest. Arrested people and their characteristics and it shows information on trends. This provides long term information on crimes through which moderator measures can be taken.  Draw back in this method is that if police provides wrong information to central department, the whole statistics and trends can transform.  

The third in line is the victimization data method to measure the trends in delinquency. This method includes the surveys conducted on victimization. Respondents are asked to provide information regarding crimes and victimization. This method provides information of the unreported crimes as well along-with the information regarding personal characteristics and experiences of the respondents. This has limitations as it is bound the data available or the survey conducted. The researcher has to limit itself in the limitations of the already reported and conducted survey. It has very narrow focus.

Why did the juvenile arrest rate for murder decline sharply from 1994 to 2004
The United States Supreme Court reviewing its decision of 1989 capital punishment to the juveniles remarked in Simon versus Roper case in 2004 that the execution of persons committing murder before reaching the age of eighteen is unconstitutional (Agnew, 2004). Thus putting a bar on the capital punishment of the juveniles, it considered the culpability and innocence of the offender.

The rate of the juvenile arrest in murder declined sharply from 1994 when twenty juveniles were executed on the charges of murder. In 2004 the ratio came to two, out of which one was the revised sentence of the capital punishment (Agnew, 2004).

Following were the reasons of this sharp fall in the juvenile arrests the strong position of the economy was the big reason. As a lot of employments were created thus lowering the rate of the crime. The milestone step was the laws banning the transportation of the guns and ammunition. The buy back programs of the guns added to it as well. The changing demographics were another factor. The aging became the normal phenomenon of the decade. The population of the blacks rose to the level of 12.9 percent (Agnew, 2004). Government adopted the better policing strategies. Number of police personnel increased to three times unprecedented high. The legalization of the abortion was another policy step which ended in low crime rate in juveniles and adults. The rising population of prisons has deep impacts on the minds of the juveniles. Along-with all the things the execution of the twenty juveniles in the year 1994 have deep imprints on the raw minds of juveniles and the society (Agnew, 2004). This generated debates among the social circles which consequently ended up in the ban on the capital punishment of the juveniles. According to the uniform crime report by office of the juvenile justice and delinquency prevention statistical book 2003 this ratio has also decreased sharply.