Islam and Youth Offenders: is there a link?

Earlier this week a number of different papers ran a story connected to the announcement that the proportion of male offenders in young offender institutions had risen sharply to 21% of the total, with the further observation that 42% of the prison body in this category came from what were termed ‘black and minority ethnic communities’. What might these figures suggest, and is there a link between an increased propensity to criminality in England and Wales and the profession of Islam?

What strikes the reader immediately with respect to these figures is the very high proportion of offenders not only self-reporting as Muslim, but those who are non-indigenous. Why should this be? One of the reasons, although the figures from the 2011 census relating to religion and ethnicity have yet to be released, is that the share of such groups in the younger population of England in particular, and Wales to a lesser extent, has skyrocketed in recent years, but this in itself is unlikely to account for these percentages, as such figures, excepting certain urban areas, will not proportionately correspond to the composition of the population as a whole. Clearly, other factors are at play.

In terms of the overall numbers, according to the Daily Mail the offender population aged 15 to 18 numbered 1,543 ‘by the end of 2011/12’, which was down from 1,822 in the preceding year, whereas the Guardian notes that four years ago the total stood at 2,365. The proportion of males identifying themselves as Muslim has increased from 13% in 2009-10 to 16% in 2010-11 to 21% in the recent ‘annual review of children and young people in custody’.  Both the Mail and the Guardian observed that a significant proportion – around a third – of the overall offender population in this category had stated that they had been in care for at least part of their childhood.

What neither of these reports provide us with is information pertaining to the types of offences committed by those held in young offender institutions, or an indication as to whether the nature of offences was to a greater or lesser extent associated with religion and ethnicity. Is there something distinct about the type of offences committed by Muslim young offenders when compared to their non-Muslim equivalents? What proportion of the self-reported Muslim offenders were converts? Although it is likely that the percentage of the latter is low given the age group under consideration, it has been observed that in the mainstream prison system an increasing number of prisoners have been converting to Islam because of the contacts, ‘protection’ and perceived ‘privileges’ that belonging to Muslim gangs can afford.

It would be useful also to see which ethnic backgrounds these young Muslim offenders hail from. Are they predominantly from the longer established Pakistani and Bangladeshi populations, or from amongst more recent Muslim arrivals to this country such as Somalis and Afghans? Whatever the case, it would seem that their self-identification as Muslims legitimises in their eyes the perception that their transgression of the law is not such a serious matter, given that our laws are not based upon the Sharia. Although no firm conclusion can be drawn given the incomplete nature of the data at hand, the significant overrepresentation of Muslims amongst this segment of the prison population – as in the prison population more widely, not only in England and Wales, but elsewhere in Europe – is suggestive of a deep-seated lack of respect for, and identification with, the host society and its values. 

Aylesbury Young Offender Institution

Muslim Prison Populations in Europe

Much has been written in the UK over the past year highlighting the disproportionate representation of Muslims in the prison population; moreover, the deeply worrying phenomenon of Muslim gangs targeting inmates for conversion has been brought to light. According to the Labour Market Survey the UK had a Muslim population of a little over 2.4 million in 2008 out of a total population of 61.4 million, some 3.9% of the total. However, in that same year some 12% of the prison population of England and Wales was recorded as being Muslim.

Although these figures demonstrate the statistically higher frequency of criminality amongst the Muslim population in England and Wales, data from elsewhere is even more startling. A report in the Washington Post from 2008 stated:

Research by the Open Society Institute, an advocacy organization, shows that in the Netherlands 20 percent of adult prisoners and 26 percent of all juvenile offenders are Muslim; the country is about 5.5 percent Muslim. In Belgium, Muslims from Morocco and Turkey make up at least 16 percent of the prison population, compared with 2 percent of the general populace, the research found.

These figures are bad, but they pale in comparison with those encountered within the French penal system:

As a matter of policy, the French government does not collect data on race, religion or ethnicity on its citizens in any capacity, making it difficult to obtain precise figures on the makeup of prison populations. But demographers, sociologists and Muslim leaders have compiled generally accepted estimates showing Muslim inmate populations nationwide averaging between 60 and 70 percent.

Bivouac-ID notes that more conservative estimates of the French Muslim prison population still place it at in excess of 50% of the total. As in the UK, French prisoners are targeted for conversion to Islam, with an estimated 400 Islamists proselytising within the French prison system in 2008. The current French population is estimated at 65.4 million with some 5 million French citizens being Muslim (7.6%). Neighbouring Switzerland too has a significant overrepresentation of Muslims within the prison system. For example, the overcrowded Champ Dollon Prison in Geneva reported that in 2009, 56.6% of its inmates were Muslim.

Clearly, there is a problem of Muslim criminality which manifests itself across the societies of Western Europe which have admitted a significant influx of Muslim immigrants. A small part of this disproportionate representation will arise from the fact that the Muslim populations are younger than those of the host societies’ average owing to the higher Muslim fertility rate. In the UK for example, there were an estimated 301,000 Muslims under the age of 4 in September 2008. We should therefore expect the bulge in the Muslim criminal population to grow even further in the years ahead.

Having provided a brief sketch of the size of Muslim prison populations in a number of European states, I’ll leave you to draw your own conclusions as to what these statistics demonstrate. Do they illustrate the innate ‘racism’ of the host societies and the alleged relative economic deprivation of Muslim populations as the official explanations would have you believe; or, is it the case that they demonstrate the innate incompatibility of Islam with our societies and the contempt of doctrinaire Muslims for the kuffar?