US: Prosecutors Push Back on Enduring “Superpredator” Label (Commentary)
Imprint – August 19, 2021
Since political scientist John DiIulio Jr. coined the term “superpredator” in a 1995 magazine article, the word has come to represent an era of panic about young people of color, particularly Black youth. DiIulio was among the public commentators warning of a looming crime wave committed by violent youngsters devoid of empathy, “who pack guns instead of lunches,” he wrote in his fear-mongering, but widely digested work. Yet instead of more than 270,000 youth predators roaming the streets in 2010, as DiIulio predicted, violent crime actually declined through most of the 1990s. Since 1996, the juvenile arrest rate has dropped by 75%, according to data from the federal Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. Still, state laws nationwide made it easier to try children as adults, including sentences of life in prison without the possibility of parole. Black youth have faced the worst consequences of “tough-on-crime” laws of the era.
https://imprintnews.org/justice/juvenile-justice-2/prosecutors-push-back-on-enduring-superpredator-label/58009