Homeless and Non-Homeless Arrestees: Distinctions in PRevalence and in Sociodemographic, Drug Use, and Arrest Characteristics Across DUF SItes, Final Report

摘要

A series of analyses was performed on five quarters of DUF data from 23 metropolitan areas nationwide. These DUF data are among the first to include housing choices that reflect two states of homelessness, living in shelters or living on the streets. The focus of the analyses was on whether being homeless or not affects being arrested. It was hypothesized that homeless persons are arrested more frequently for less serious crimes than housed persons and are more likely to be involved with drugs but not receiving drug treatment. First, the proportion of arrestees in the DUF sample who reported being homeless was determined, after dividing the data between adults and minors, males and females. The rates of arrestees who were coded as homeless ranged from 6.2 per cent for adult maks to 2.4 per cent for juvenile males. The rates for females were 5.0 per cent for adults and 4.1 per cent for juveniles. The rate for non-whites was lower than for whites, 4.8 per cent versus 6.4 per cent. The rates of homeless arrestees were much higher than the rates of homelessness for the communities where arrestees lived. The average rate of homelessness across communities was .14 per cent, based on 1990 census data, versus 5.4 per cent for arrestees. Even the highest estimates of homelessness nationwide, reported from research studies, fall well below the levels of homelessness among arrestees. In fact, all sites reported arresting a higher per cent of homeless persons than double the highest estimated community homeless rate. e After distinguishing three subgroups of adult arrestees and three subgroups of juvenile arrestees on sociodemographic, arrest status, drug use, and drug history variables, tests of difference on four variables were performed between homeless and housed arrestees.