The Nation - News from June 29, 1987

Crime affected 19% of the households in the Northeast, 25% in the Midwest and South and 30% of the households in the West, the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics reported. The differences may be due in part to the concentration in the West of migrants as well as younger people in their mid-teens to early 20s making up the age group most likely to commit crime, researchers suggested. Nationally, one in four households experienced a rape, robbery, assault, burglary or theft in 1986, down from one in three households in 1975, the Justice Department agency said.