SURGE IN YOUTH CRIME FEARED; TEENS' RANKS TO RISE 14%.

Byline: Sherry Joe Crosby Daily News Staff Writer

Even as Los Angeles enjoys the lowest crime rate since the 1970s, the city faces the prospect of a new crime wave, as the children of baby boomers move through school and onto the streets, police and criminologists say.

Anti-crime programs are in place that could help, but the state now is spending only $21.2 million a year on juvenile crime prevention programs - and that's not nearly enough, according to police and city officials.

``There's never enough money for anti-crime programs, and that's what we have to turn around in this state,'' Los Angeles police spokesman Lt. Anthony Alba said.

``It's a lot cheaper to deal with these kids on the front end rather than putting them through the court system constantly and putting them in jail,'' Alba said.

Los Angeles City Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas called for a ``massive coalition of prevention resources'' to curb juvenile crime.

``I don't think the policy makers have come to grips with the consequences of this anticipated onslaught of juvenile offenders,'' said Ridley-Thomas, chairman of the ad hoc Committee on Gang Violence and Juvenile Justice. ``We have to shift our policy focus to do precisely that at every level of government, and that has yet to happen.''

Across the nation, the crime rate has fallen dramatically, including in Los Angeles, which has been enjoying the lowest homicide rate in 20 years. Police and criminologists say this is due in large part to fewer young men in the population and the passage of baby boomers into middle age.

When combined with anti-crime measures such as community policing, tougher sentencing laws and after-school programs, homicides plummeted last year to just 566 citywide as of Dec. 14, compared to 709 for the same period in 1996, a 20 percent drop.

The last time the city had fewer than 600 murders was in 1977, when 574 people were killed.

In the San Fernando Valley, the number of homicides increased 6.4 percent to 83 as of Dec. 14 from 78 for the same period in 1996. But the Van Nuys Division saw the biggest drop in violent crime, with 3,040 violent offenses through Dec. 14 compared to 3,661 for the same period in 1996, a 17 percent drop.

``Increased incarceration, increased community policing, quieter drug markets, aging baby boomers and the shrinking of the at-risk adolescent population'' have helped cut crime, said James Alan Fox, dean of the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern University in Boston.

Baby boomers grow up

Just as the baby boomer generation helped drive up crime, now those people born from 1946 to 1964 are moving into middle age and helping drive down crime, Fox said.

``As they're aging, their involvement in violent crime tends to decline,'' he said. ``It's part biology taking over - they're not as aggressive - and part of it is, to an increasing extent, they're taking on more responsibility, and violence is not part of their way of life.''

In Los Angeles, the number of males ages 15 to 24 dropped about 18 percent from 282,928 in 1980 to 232,096 in 1990, according to census data.

``In general, homicide is a male problem,'' said Eric Monkkonen, a professor of policy studies and history at the University of California, Los Angeles. ``Secondly, it's a problem of men over 15, 17 and 18 years of age. When there's an increase in that group of men and nothing else changes, the homicide rates goes up.''

And an increase is forecast.

According to a report cited by the Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse, 39 million children younger than 10 live in the United States. By 2005, the number of teens between 14 and 17 will swell 14 percent.

``Given the trends, we may face a blood bath that makes the 1990s look like the good old days,'' Fox said.

Fox's research shows that the annual number of homicide arrests of people ages 14 through 17 could surpass 4,000, just as it did in the early 1990s when the nation's homicide tally peaked.

``It's the teen-age baby boomerang effect,'' Fox said. ``No one knows for sure if we could have another crime wave, but we will have more at-risk kids in the years ahead. It's up to us to determine whether these teens will be any more or any less violent than their predecessors.''

Anti-crime efforts

The link between age and crime is not entirely complete. Criminologists point out, for instance, that the population of young adult males began declining years before the drop in crime.

``That age group was dropping already - that's the key here,'' Monkkonen said. ``Now things are turning around, and the reasons are not yet perfectly understood. It's a puzzle with a lot of little pieces, and taken alone, no one piece is sufficient'' to explain the shrinking crime rate.

Other pieces of the puzzle include violence prevention programs and new law enforcement tactics such as community-based policing.

``We have an extended eyes and ears program where block captains keep their eyes out on cars that don't belong in the neighborhood or they keep an eye on people who don't have business in their area,'' Alba said. ``It's people taking charge of their own safety and security in their own neighborhood.''

Other major factors are California's ``three strikes, you're out'' law, which mandates life sentences for criminals convicted of a third felony, declining drug violence and an improving national economy that reached a 24-year jobless low in November.

Bracing for crisis

Police hope to curb future teen offenders with existing anti-crime programs and other law enforcement tactics.

``By committing resources now, we can prevent any peaks in violence,'' Alba said. ``It's going to take everybody.''

Statewide, the Office of Criminal Justice Planning spends about $21.2 million on juvenile justice prevention programs.

And last week, Gov. Pete Wilson submitted a proposed budget to the Legislature that calls for $40 million in juvenile crime prevention programs, including $6 million more than last year to expand mentoring programs. The additional $6 million would bring the total for mentoring programs to $14.5 million.

``Gov. Wilson is hoping to break a chain where we can keep kids from becoming the next round of young criminals in the next five to 10 years,'' said H.D. Palmer, assistant director for the state Department of Finance. ``Mentoring is a way to give kids positive role models, keep them in school, off drugs and healthy and prepared for life.''

This year, Wilson also is teaming up with the California District Attorneys Association and the California Sheriffs Association to co-sponsor an initiative aimed at cutting juvenile and gang-related crimes.

Called the Gang Violence and Juvenile Crime Prevention Act of 1998, the initiative would make a graffiti crime that causes more than $400 in damage subject to a year's imprisonment in county jail or as much as three years in state prison. The initiative also would require a juvenile to be tried as an adult in murder cases under special circumstances.

Sponsors hope to place the initiative on the November 1998 ballot.

``We've got to get kids off the dead-end criminal track or face the grim, stark and utterly unaccountable reality that too many Californians will continue to live in fear of crime,'' Wilson said in a prepared statement. ``And tragically, too many boys and girls will continue to trade in the innocence of youth for the cheap thrills of crime without punishment.''

Enough?

Councilwoman Laura Chick said the city must do more to prepare for the boom of teen-agers.

``Instead of focusing on hiring more police and building more prisons, we have to look at how to stop crime on the front end,'' said Chick, who chairs the council's Public Safety Committee overseeing the LAPD.

``That's why I did the truancy ordinance to keep kids in school and why I think we need to have after-school programs at every elementary and middle school. We need to have programs to keep kids from being wooed by gangs and drugs and other criminal activities.''

Chick said the city also has to expand its park programs, particularly for older teens, to keep them involved in positive programs.

It is the fear of the potential juvenile crime increase that has driven Mayor Richard Riordan to emphasize the need to improve schools, a spokeswoman said.

``What the mayor has been talking about is the reason that people turn to negative influences, and crime is because they are not getting an adequate education,'' said spokeswoman Noelia Rodriguez. ``That's why programs like L.A.'s Best is so important. It's an after-school program that keeps kids busy after school and under supervision.

``It's also why the mayor is pushing so hard on education reform. If kids get the tools and are intellectually stimulated . . . they will seek positives instead of negatives.''

Despite the anticipated crime wave, Fox said he is heartened by the growing interest communities are showing in their youngest residents.

``You see communities, city councils, state legislatures and even Congress focusing on youth crime as a significant issue,'' Fox said. ``People want to stay ahead of the wave from the highest levels of government to grass-roots community. In every dimension, people are much more interested in youth.''

Daily News Staff Writer Rick Orlov contributed to this story

CAPTION(S):

Chart

CHART: (Color) DANGEROUS YEARS

Statistics bear out that teen-agers and young adults commit more homicides than people in other age groups. Police and criminologists warn that the numbers of people in the highest-offending age groups will swell in the next decade.

SOURCE: FBI, Supplementary Homicide Reports, Census Bureau, Current Population Survey.

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