Steven Graham was just 14 when he was shot and killed Nov. 18 while riding his bicycle in front of a fire station in Brooklyn. A few days later, 14-year-old Perrish Parker died after being shot with a handgun he and a friend were wrestling over. And on Dec. 7, Ronnie Jackson, also 14, was fatally shot near his home as he was delivering fruit to an elderly neighbor.
Baltimore ended 2008 with a total of 234 homicides for the year, the lowest number in decades and a significant drop from last year's 282 deaths. Police attribute the decline primarily to an aggressive crime-prevention strategy that targets the most violent offenders, especially those with prior handgun violations. Officials hope further reductions eventually will begin to reverse Baltimore's lamentable reputation as one of the nation's most violent cities.
Yet the progress made last year also highlights a worrisome trend exemplified by the deaths of youngsters like Steven Graham, Perrish Parker and Ronnie Jackson: Homicides in which juveniles were either victims or perpetrators actually increased as a proportion of killings in the city.
Last year, there were 26 homicides in Baltimore involving youngsters ages 14 to 17. That was a slight drop from the 27 juvenile homicides recorded the previous year. But because there were nearly 50 fewer homicides overall last year, the proportion of homicides involving juveniles increased, from 9.5 percent in 2007 to just over 11 percent in 2008.
Although that's still a relatively small proportion of total homicides committed in the city, the fact that one in 10 murders involved a juvenile should give pause to city officials hoping to recast Baltimore's image as an attractive place to live and work.
The growing proportion of gun violence involving juveniles either as victims or as perpetrators reflects a national trend. Even as cities such as Washington, Philadelphia, Boston and New York have watched their overall homicide rates decline, the number of juvenile homicide victims increased 54 percent between 2002 and 2007, while the number of juveniles charged with homicides rose 47 percent over the same period.
Nationally, experts link the increase to various factors, including a growth in gang membership, cuts in social programs for young people and the diversion of police resources away from poor communities to prosecute the war on terror. Experts are particularly concerned by a growing racial disparity in which the biggest increases in juvenile homicides are occurring mainly among inner-city African-American youths.
