Building Knowledge

The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Justice Canada.

April 2013

Building Knowledge Issue 3 – Violent Victimization of Children and Youth Highest Among 15 to 17 Year Olds

Violent offences, as defined in the Incident-based Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR2) Survey, include, among other offences, homicide, sexual assault, assault, and criminal harassment.

As can be seen in the figure below, in 2011, with the exception of a higher number of victims under one year of age, as the age of the victim increased, the number of victims of violent crime also increased. In fact, the rate of violent victimization was higher among youth aged 15 to 17 than among younger youth, as well as those between 18 and 24 years old. The rate of violent victimization among youth aged 15 to 17 was 2,584 per 100,000 in 2011, while the rate of violent victimization among youth 14 and under was 661 per 100,000. The rate of violent victimization among youth 15 to 17 was higher than among young adults aged 18 to 24 (2,439 per 100,000).

These data indicate that violent victimization appears to increase as children and youth become older and that older youth are among the most vulnerable populations for experiencing violent victimization.

Figure 1: Number of victims of police-reported violent crime by age of victim, 2011

Text equivalent of Figure 1 below

Figure 1 - Text equivalent

This is a vertical bar chart that illustrates the number of victims of police-reported violent crime by age of victim. The Y axis is measured in number of victims and increases in increments of 2,000 from 2,000 to 14,000. The X axis lists the age of victims by year from 0 to 17, from left to right.

At age 0, there were 831 victims; at age 1, there were 358 victims; age 2, there was 610 victims; age 3, there were 931 victims; age 4, there were 1,104 victims; age 5, there were 1,211 victims; age 6, there were 1,316 victims; age 7, there were 1,412 victims; age 8, there were 1,625 victims; age 9, there were 1,905 victims; age 10, there were 2,395 victims; age 11, there were 3,177 victims; age 12, there were 4,657 victims; age 13, there were 6,725 victims; age 14, there were 8,742 victims; age 15, there were 10,456 victims; age 16,there were 10,876 victims; age 17, there were 11,443 victims.

Source: Incident-based Uniform Crime Reporting Survey 2011