ABSTRACT
This chapter uses police records to describe the number and proportion of young adults suspected of a crime in 2007 out of the general population and briefly examines the crime trends for the period 1996-2007. It addresses several key empirical questions that are relevant to the debates. The chapter compares three offender groups: adolescents, young adults and adults, based on the Herkenningsdienstsysteem (HKS) of the Dutch police. It focuses on adolescents, young adults, and adults with a criminal case that has been settled by the public prosecutor or the court. The chapter reports on the number of persons who were suspected of a crime by the police using the HKS statistic. Crime rates of young adults are also higher than for adults. It concludes by lower dismissal rates among young adults by the police than that are typical for adolescents and in accord with a more pedagogically oriented juvenile justice system.
