Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, December 9, 1994                   TAG: 9412100032
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-9   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

MURDER ODDS BAD FOR YOUNG BLACK MALES

Black males ages 12 to 24 were victims of homicide at a rate of 114.9 per 100,000 that year, compared with 8.5 murder victims per 100,000 of the general U.S. population, the Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics said.

Young black males constituted 17.7 percent of all homicide victims, even though they were only 1.3 percent of the U.S. population, the report said.

Young white males made up a smaller share - 10.3 percent - of those killed in single-victim homicides during 1992, although they were a larger share of the overall population at 7.4 percent, the report said. Young white males were killed at a rate of 11.7 per 100,000.

Black men older than 24 were victims of homicide at a rate of 67.5 per 100,000, compared with 7.8 per 100,000 for white men.

The Bureau of Justice Statistics also said that among males ages 16 to 24, blacks were 1.5 times more likely than whites to be victims of all types of violent crime.

About two-thirds of the violent crimes suffered by black males ages 12 to 24 were the most serious types of non-homicide violence, such as robberies and aggravated assaults. White males in the same age group suffered mostly simple assaults involving no weapons and resulting in little or no injury.

Two-thirds of the violent crimes against blacks younger than 21 were committed by people who also were younger than 21, the study said. The overwhelming majority of crimes against black males were committed by other blacks, while whites committed the great majority of violent crimes against white males.