Race, Ethnicity, and Structural Variations in Youth Risk of Arrest

• Author: Tia Stevens Andersen
• DOI: 10.1177/0093854815570963
• Published date: 01 September 2015
• Date: 01 September 2015
• Subject Matter: Articles

CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND BEHAVIOR, 2015, Vol. 42, No. 9, September 2015, 900 –916.

DOI: 10.1177/0093854815570963

© 2015 International Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology

900

RACE, ETHNICITY, AND STRUCTURAL

VARIATIONS IN YOUTH RISK OF ARREST

Evidence From a National Longitudinal Sample

TIA STEVENS ANDERSEN

University of South Carolina

Missing from the considerable body of literature on disproportionate minority contact is an examination of the factors that

influence risk of juvenile arrest. Using the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997, the author examines racial/ethnic

disparities in youth arrest, net of self-reported delinquency. Drawing from research using a minority threat perspective, this

study examines whether disparities are exacerbated by macro levels of the relative size of the minority population and minor-

ity economic inequality. The results indicate Black youth have a higher risk of arrest than White youth in all contextual cli-

mates, but this disparity is magnified in predominantly non-Black communities. Differences between Hispanic and White

youths’ risk of arrest did not reach statistical significance or vary across communities. The findings failed to yield support

for the threat perspective but strongly supported the benign neglect thesis. Implications for theory and future research are

discussed.

Keywords: race and ethnicity; arrest; juvenile justice; disproportionate minority contact; racial threat; benign neglect; hier-

archical linear modeling

Despite being only 17% of the U.S. juvenile population ages 10 through 17, in 2012,

Black youth comprised 32% of all arrests of juveniles (Puzzanchera, 2013; Snyder &

Mulako-Wangota, 2015), 36% of cases handled in juvenile courts (Sickmund, Sladky, &

Kang, 2014), and 40% of youth in residential placement (Sickmund, Sladky, Kang, &

Puzzanchera, 2013). Over the past three decades, studies of juvenile justice system process-

ing have shown that controlling for relevant legal factors, youth of color experience more

severe treatment in the juvenile justice system, relative to their White counterparts (for

AUTHORS’ NOTE: This research was supported in part by an award from the National Institute of Justice

(2012-IJ-CX-0018). The opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this research are

those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Justice. The author thanks Merry

Morash, Miriam Northcutt Bohmert, the anonymous reviewers, and the editor for their helpful suggestions on

the previous version of this article. The author would also like to thank the staff at the Bureau of Labor Statistics

(BLS) for allowing access to the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (NLSY97) Confidential Geocode

Data. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Tia Stevens Andersen, Department of

Criminology and Criminal Justice, University of South Carolina, 1305 Greene Street, Columbia, SC 29208,

USA; e-mail: tstevens@mailbox.sc.edu.

570963CJBXXX10.1177/0093854815570963Criminal Justice and BehaviorAndersen / Race, Ethnicity, and Structural Variations in Youth Risk of Arrest

research-article2015

Andersen / RACE, ETHNICITY, AND STRUCTURAL VARIATIONS IN YOUTH RISK OF ARREST 901

reviews, see Bishop, 2005; Bishop, Leiber, & Johnson, 2010; Engen, Steen, & Bridges,

2002; Leiber, 2002, 2003; Leiber & Peck, 2013; Paternoster & Iovanni, 1989; Pope &

Feyerherm, 1990a, 1990b; Pope, Lovell, & Hsia, 2002). Race significantly predicts the

arrest decision (Tapia, 2010, 2011), intake (Leiber & Fox, 2005; Leiber & Johnson, 2008;

Leiber, Johnson, Fox, & Lacks, 2007; Leiber & Mack, 2003), pretrial release (Rodriguez,

2007, 2010), diversion (Leiber & Johnson, 2008; Leiber & Mack, 2003; Rodriguez, 2010),

petition (Leiber & Mack, 2003; Rodriguez, 2010), adjudication (Leiber et al., 2007), and

disposition (Rodriguez, 2010). This recent research clearly supports the conclusion that

race plays an important role in the processing of youth.

Despite the accumulation of empirical and theoretical research documenting the effects

of extralegal variables on police behavior and juvenile justice processing, the overwhelm-

ing majority of studies include only Black and White youth. Only a handful has examined

the impact of ethnicity on arrest and court processing (see, for example, Cicourel, 1967;

Dannefer & Schutt, 1982; DeJong & Jackson, 1998; Huizinga, Thornberry, Knight, &

Lovegrove, 2007; Kempf-Leonard & Sontheimer, 1995; Leiber, Peck, & Rodriguez, 2013;

MacEachern & Bauzer, 1967; Maupin & Bond-Maupin, 1999; Tapia, 2010, 2011; Terry,

1967). The few studies that do include Hispanic youth have shown mixed findings. Early

researchers found no evidence of bias against Hispanic youth (Cicourel, 1967; MacEachern

& Bauzer, 1967; Terry, 1967). More recently, researchers have found evidence that Hispanic

youth have a higher risk of justice system contact than their White counterparts but have

disagreed about whether the level of bias against Hispanic youth exceeds (Kempf-Leonard

& Sontheimer, 1995) or falls below the level of bias against Black youth (Dannefer &

Schutt, 1982; DeJong & Jackson, 1998; Huizinga et al., 2007; Maupin & Bond-Maupin,

1999; Tapia, 2010, 2011).

In addition to the effects of race and ethnicity, research has begun to examine the macro-

level characteristics that influence variation in juvenile court processing (Armstrong &

Rodriguez, 2005; DeJong & Jackson, 1998; Feld, 1991, 1995; Freiburger & Jordan, 2011;

Leiber et al., 2013; Rodriguez, 2007, 2010; Sampson & Laub, 1993; Tittle & Curran, 1988).

Recent studies that have incorporated structural indicators have shown that court processing

outcomes are influenced directly by macro-level urbanism, geographic region, population

composition, underclass poverty, racial economic inequality, residential mobility, structural

disadvantage, and the percentage of female-headed households (Armstrong & Rodriguez,

2005; DeJong & Jackson, 1998; Freiburger & Jordan, 2011; Leiber et al., 2013; Rodriguez,

2010; Sampson & Laub, 1993).

Despite repeated calls for research to consider racial/ethnic disparities within the context

of broader racialized social structures (see, for example, Peterson, 2012), few studies have

examined how contextual climate may indirectly influence the effects of race and ethnicity

on likelihood of contact with the justice system. Focusing on different decision points in

particular court jurisdictions, these studies have shown mixed results. A small group of

studies demonstrate the interactive effects of racial ethnic group and contextual climate on

the juvenile justice decisions. For example, using data from Maricopa County in Arizona,

Rodriguez (2007) found that higher levels of county unemployment and poverty reduced

the probability of preadjudication detention for Latino/a youth and increased the probability

of detention for White youth. A similar study of the preadjudication detention decision

using 9 years of data on criminal incidents perpetrated by juveniles in one Southeastern

state showed that the differential treatment of Black youth was magnified in communities