SEX OFFENDERS: AGE AT FIRST CONVICTION AS AN ADULT
We have also calculated the proportions of each group who had been convicted as adults of some sort of offense, sexual or not, by particular ages. Whether or not the conviction was under juvenile or adult court proceedings is disregarded; we only specify the offender be aged sixteen or more. We realize that the age at which any one offender will be convicted for the first time is largely adventitious, but the data should give us some idea of how rapidly particular groups became involved with the law.
First convictions come early in life. By the end of their sixteenth year 18 per cent of the prison group had been convicted of some offense, by age twenty nearly three fifths, by age thirty about four fifths, and by age forty nine out of ten of the prison group had been convicted. Only three sex-offender groups match or surpass this meteoric rise in percentages. The aggressors vs. minors and adults, and the peepers equal or exceed the prison group by every age from eighteen on, reaching the 90 per cent level by age thirty. The other sex-offender groups display a much slower rate of involvement, the incest offenders being particularly tardy. Since ultimately all offenders were convicted, the tardy groups necessarily must accelerate their pace in later life. Thus we see that all three incest-offender groups increase as much as 20 percentage points in five years, while the increments of the groups involved at earlier ages are smaller.
The above picture gives no inkling of the severity of the offense. To measure this we calculated the percentages of individuals who by various ages had had convictions resulting in incarceration for a year or more. We are aware that the length of sentence is often dependent upon the age of the offender, his cooperativeness in court, his prior record, the type of offense, and a number of sub judice matters including the state of the judge’s viscera at the time of sentencing; nevertheless we feel it has more significance than a misdemeanor-felony distinction, since a misdemeanor in one jurisdiction or at one time may well be a felony at another place or period. Furthermore, a not inconsiderable number of felony charges are reduced to misdemeanors upon pleas of guilty or upon agreement to a bench rather than a jury trial.
Once again we find that more of the prison group served one year or more in earlier life than most sex-offender groups. The proportions of the prison group are nearly one fifth by age eighteen, one half by twenty-six, and three fifths by forty. Only the heterosexual aggressors exceed this record: two of the three aggressor groups pass the 50 per cent level before age twenty-three, and all three have passed the two-thirds level by age thirty. The peepers, who showed a rapid involvement in terms of any conviction, are less impressive in terms of convictions leading to a year or more of imprisonment. Although they tend to surpass the other sex offenders in early life, they lag behind the aggressors and prison group and ultimately end with a rather modest percentage.
The influence of the type of sex offense is only partly masked in these calculations. Note that sex offenders against children and minors tend to have more men with one-year-plus sentences than offenders against adults of either gender. Similarly the high percentages of all aggressor groups show that the use of force in sex, regardless of the age of the victim, is enough to warrant a substantial sentence.
Having broached the subject, we should now consider the cumulative incidence of the specific types of sex offenses for which the sex-offender groups were named. The incest offenders are by definition the most retarded group: a substantial amount of aging is involved in getting married, producing a daughter, and rearing her to a given age. Consequently we find that half of the incest offenders vs. children had not committed their incest offenses until their early thirties, the incest offenders vs. minors not until the late thirties, and the incest offenders vs. adults do not attain the halfway mark until their midforties
The groups that accumulate their offenses most quickly are the aggressors vs. minors and adults, and the peepers. These reach or pass the 50 per cent level by age twenty-three, and the 80 per cent level by age thirty.
The offenders, aggressors, and homosexual offenders vs. children definitely tend to commit their type offenses later than those who aggress or offend against older persons. The heterosexual offenders and aggressors vs. children do not pass the 50 per cent mark until their early thirties, whereas the heterosexual offenders and aggressors vs. minors and adults reach that point in their early to middle twenties. Among homosexual offenders the trend is less clear; nevertheless the homosexual offenders vs. children reach the halfway mark at an older age (about thirty) than do the homosexual offenders vs. adults. This trend is, of course, reversed among the incest offenders where the age of the daughter and father are linked.
Turning now to the age of the average (median) individual at conviction, for any offense, sexual or not, we see that the average (median ) prison-group male was 19.6 years old when first convicted as an adult for any offense. Only one sex-offender group (the peepers) equals this youthfulness, and only one (the aggressors vs. minors) had a younger median individual. Aside from these three teen-age convict groups, in nine of the remaining 12 sex-offender groups the average man was convicted in his early twenties (twenty to twenty-five years old). Remaining are the three incest-offender groups whose median individuals were convicted for the first time at ages twenty-nine, thirty-five, and thirty-eight.
A similar picture appears when one considers the median age at which the first conviction resulted in imprisonment for a year or more. Comparing the age at first conviction and the age at first conviction resulting in a year or more of prison, one sees that the former occurs about two to three years before the latter in the majority of groups. This gap reflects an increasing severity of offense with increasing age and also, undoubtedly, the leniency often shown to first offenders. The exceptions to the generality are two incest-offender groups where the gap amounts to as much as four and a half years, and the offenders vs. adults, for whom the first conviction and the conviction resulting in a year’s imprisonment occurred within a year.
The conviction for the sex offense for which a group is named always occurs later, speaking in terms of averages, than either the first conviction or the first conviction resulting in a year’s imprisonment. The first sex-offense convictions for the average males of the various groups occurred between the ages of twenty-two and forty-six—that is, anywhere from two and a half to 12 years after his first conviction for any offense. Early criminal activity, as measured by first conviction, seems linked with early conviction for sex offense. For instance, the peepers and aggressors vs. minors, who among the sex offenders were the youngest when first sentenced, were also the youngest when sentenced for their specific sex offense. Similarly, there is a correlation between late involvement in crime and late conviction for sex offense: the incest offenders are the prime example. Despite these chronological relationships, the time gap between first conviction and first sex-offense conviction shows no clear trends for the various groups.
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