Children suffer rates of conventional crime victimization, like rape, robbery and assault, that are substantially higher than the general adult population. They also suffer a considerable burden of victimizations that are specific to being children – child maltreatment, neglect and emotional abuse.
Unfortunately, crimes against children are considerably less likely to come to police attention than crimes against adults. Even so, the police see more children in the role of crime victim than in the role of crime offender. It is thus ironic that crimes committed by children -- juvenile delinquency – receive considerably more official attention than crimes committed against children. This is reflected in courses in college curricula devoted entirely to Juvenile Delinquency or the Federal government’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, which is concerned about juvenile victims, but only has delinquency in its title.
Sources:
David Finkelhor & Dick Ormrod (2000). Characteristics of Crimes Against Juveniles. Juvenile Justice Bulletin – NCJ179034 (pgs. 1-11).
David Finkelhor (2007).Developmental Victimology: The Comprehensive Study of Childhood Victimization. In R.C. Davis, A.J. Lurigio, & Herman, S. (Eds.), Victims of Crime (3rd ed., pp. 9-34). , Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
