Distinguishing Antecedent Traits of Juvenile Sex Offenders Essay examples

The trauma related with the abuse leads to negative effects mentally and harmful behavior. Adolescent are less likely to repeat offenses. They are nevertheless more likely to participate in other delinquent acts. When trying to figure out where to place these adolescents you must focus on the dangerousness, most appropriate way to treat them, recidivism and the amount of violence. If there are patterns, if they show aggression and have a support system or if they tried other programs for sex that failed. During the court of law usually where it ends up if they are guilty or not also determines their consequences.

Roughly 79.4% of adolescent sex offenders experienced sexual abuse while only 46.7% of nonsexual offenders reported abuse (Burton, Miller, & Shills, 2002).

Sex offenders have been a serious problem for our legal system at all levels, not to mention those who have been their victims. There are 43,000 inmates in prison for sexual offenses while each year in this country over 510,000 children are sexually assaulted(Oakes 99). The latter statistic, in its context, does not convey the severity of the situation. Each year 510,000 children have their childhood's destroyed, possibly on more than one occasion, and are faced with dealing with the assault for the rest of their lives. Sadly, many of those assaults are perpetrated by people who have already been through the correctional system only to victimize again. Sex offenders, as a class of criminals, are nine times more likely to repeat their

Countless attacks of child sexual abuse goes underreported due to fear and shame. That number only increases if the aggressor is a female. Deering & Mellor, estimated that 79% of children they interviewed did not report the abuse and of the children that did come forward about the sexual abuse only one was believed (2011). Due to the fact that female sexual offenders are less likely to be reported the period of abuse seems to last for a longer period of time. Deering and Mellor, (2011) stated that “the average age of onset of the female-perpetrated child sexual abuse was age 7, and the average age of cessation of the abuse was approximately age 12.

About ninety five percent of people who are unwilling being forced into sex are usually young women. Many people tend to stereotype women being caring, harmless, and trusting compared to men. While the rates of sexual acts being forced by women are lower compared to men, they do still commit the illegal activity upon others. Many female sex offenders tend to be younger aged compared to male sex offenders. The average age of female sex offenders is about thirty six years old and tend to be friends, family, or acquaintances of the victim. Female sex offenders tend to persuade their victims easier than male sex offenders since females are usually motherly and nurturing, making them seem more trustworthy. It tends to be more difficult to distinguish a female sex offender compared to female sex offenders. Female sex offenders are usually under reported, unrecognizable and considered more ethically acceptable than male abuse, according to an article on

In a commentary written by Gregory K. Fritz, M.D. FBI data from 1995, for example, indicate that individuals under the age of 18 years old comprised almost 16 percent of those arrested for forcible rape and 17 percent of those arrested for all other sex offenses. Studies of adults convicted of sex offenses suggest that approximately half began their sexually abusive behavior as juveniles. According to an article by Michele McNeil, at least 32 states have laws requiring juvenile sex offenders to register with local law enforcement. The laws however, greatly vary from state to state about who is informed, and whether the names are listed on public sex offender registries.

According to the Center for Sex Offender Management “It is estimated that one in every five girls and one in every seven boys are sexually abused by the time they reach adulthood”. The United States has many laws aimed to reduce sexual offenders but the annual percentages for sexual offenses have stayed the same ever since the laws were established. This research is not intended to lessen the gravity of sexual offenses but to understand that our laws against sex offenders are not preventing the sexual offenses. The main problem with the laws against sex offenders, are the sex offender registries, the registries fail to act as a deterrent for sexual offenses and they encourage vigilante justice. Also, people convicted of a minor sexual offense face harsh punishments and sex offenders face many restrictions.

Furthermore, people need to understand that women could be offenders of the same sex crimes just as male offenders. The majority of the public has a gender bias that women could not possibly commit sex crimes. The gender bias leads female sex offenders to become obscure due to prevalent social cultural norms that define female sexual behavior (Duncan, 2010). In fact, victims are considered to be less protected because females are less likely to be identified due the majority of people having a hard time believing women could be a sexual predator. Victimization is more unlikely to be reported, prosecuted, and convicted because of the prevalent gender stereotypes (Duncan, 2010). Victims of sexual assault are already reluctant to face their abuser in court and with male social norms being classified as being dominant in relationships. More importantly very few males will admit to being victimized by a women sexual predator. There are stereotypes, which include women who fit the role of nurturing caretakers and mothers, that are difficult to view women as potential sexual predators and other crimes committed against children (Mallicoat, 2012). Because of this gender bias, women could never commit such a vile act against their ward; it leads to preventions of recognizing and reporting of

Juvenile sexual offenders more frequently experienced internalizing problems, had poor self esteem, social isolation and more frequently experienced sexual abuse in their early childhoods than non-sexual offenders. In addition, juvenile sexual abusers also exhibited more problems in their peer relationships. There is other research that has shown substantial evidence for a relationship between juvenile sexually abusive behavior and family dysfunction, and violence. Typically speaking abusers grew up in dysfunctional families characterized by inconsistent care, known parental criminal behavior and substance use. They

The authors discusses the results of the first known study to employ three control groups when researching female sex offenders. The study reviewed 31 female sex offenders (FSO), 31 male sex offenders (MSO), 31 female violent offenders (FO), and 31 male violent offenders (MO) using a 2 (female or male ) by 2 (sex or violent offender) design. Although the number of female sex offenders are increasing in infamy not much research is done. Overall, there are significant differences between female sex offenders and other criminal offenders, the majority of female sex offender victims are adolescents, between the ages 11-17 years, bulk of female sex offenders are acquainted with their victims by means of biological relation, and more female sex offenders

One such study was done by Kaplan and Green (1995), where a comparison was made of 11 incarcerated female sex offenders (four of which committed the offense without a male counterpart) to 11 incarcerated females without known sex offenses. This study found that the characteristics of the two female groups were alike except that the sex offender group was more likely to report a history of sexual and physical abuse. The sex offender group gave responses that included suggestions of pedophilia (2), voyeurism (3), and masochism (1). The data supported the findings that females do have paraphilic interests and do sexually offend based on these interests, it in not only limited to the male population. The author of this literature review believes that more studies need to be done on women sex offenders as it is a pertinent group to research

Prospective data has been successfully collected on 182 adolescent males with institutionally documented histories of sexual offending. Structural equation modeling was used to assess theorized relationships between developmental risk factors, personality mediators, and sexual offense characteristics in predicting whether sexual offenses were committed against pubescent females or prepubescent children. Follow-up univariate regression analyses were conducted in support of more refined assessment of differences between the studied offender groups. Consistent with study hypotheses, offenders of children showed greater deficits in psychosocial functioning than offenders of pubescent females, were less aggressive in their sexual offending, and

According to (Lovell, 2002) there are troubles with characterizing sexually unsafe conduct attributable to the absence of reduction to what is ordinary adolescence sexual conduct. As I was analysis the article roughly 20 to 35 for each penny of sexual offenses youngsters to be conferred by other kids and teenagers. (Lovell 2002 and Fortune and Lambie 2006). Female sexual abusers highlight a great deal less in sexual guilty party measurements. It is not clear if this identifies with absence of reporting of female sexually hurtful conduct because of the sexual practices of females being socially seen as less unsafe or the more youthful youngsters whom teenagers females tend to mishandle less ready to report their encounters as a result of the oppressive practices being seen

Many studies have examined the perceptions of the “sexually abused-abuser hypothesis.” There is a long-standing belief that sexually abused victims have an increased chance of becoming sexual offenders themselves in the later future. The topic I chose to study involves the relationship between male and female victims of previous sexual abuse and the likelihood of reoffending. I decided to explore this topic since there does not appear to be much research that compares the gender aspects of sexual abuse and if there is a significant difference between genders and reoffending. Most studies compare both male and female victims of sexual abuse and the risk of them reoffending but studies rarely ever focus on male and female

There are a number of varied factors under the individual level that present themselves as risk factors for male juvenile offenders. Most authors however have divided these broad factors under the prenatal and perinatal factors and under psychological, behavioral and mental characteristics of the individual.