Average Age of Inmates Has Dropped

The head of Iran’s prison organization told reporters that the average age of criminals in the country has fallen and younger people are now ending up in prisons. As reported by Iran’s ILNA labor news agency, Asqar Jahangiri told reporters, “In the past, the average of age of criminals was 37 years but now, studies show that it has dropped to close to age 30. We are trying to determine the effects of this because the average age of criminals is dropping.”

He continued, “Our two important crimes are drugs and theft. We know that drugs are closely related to unemployment and the conditions at the country’s borders; while the majority of theft in the country are light theft which also take place because of economic conditions.”

The unprecedented fall in the age of criminals in Iran can also be an indication of the social disintegration in the country.

Late last year (month of Ordibehesht) Reza Mahboobi, the deputy director of the social affairs of the ministry of interior told IRNA official news agency that some 500,000 individuals end up in prisons annually. He added that this was higher than international standards, and said, “The families of prisons are the most unsupported social groups in the country and they are in the worst possible conditions where they receive the least amount of social support. This must be changed.” Mahboobi also said that women constituted less than 10 percent of the prison population of the country and said that a prisoner occupied about 8 square meters of prison space.

The head of the prison organization, Jahangiri, on the other hand announced last year that the prison population of Iran was on the rise.

Other news indicate that in recent years the age group of addicts and drug users in the country has also been dropping. Age groups of women engaged in prostitution have also been recently published. Nader Ghorbani, the director general of the office of social services in the province of Lorestan had announced last month (of Aban) that, “The drug problem had to be tackled through social means, not imposed programs. Education has a heavy role in preventing this because the age of addicts and drug users has dropped and this is a catastrophe.” Colonel Mohammad Mehdi Karimi, the deputy police commander of Rafsanjan had also recently said, “The age of drug addicts was always known, but now we have lost it because it has come down and this is a warning message.”

Reports indicate that the average age of drug addicts has dropped to 14. In March of this year, published studies showed that drug use had even permeated into middle school students. Dana website reported at the time, “According to a national study, the risk of falling into drug use among middle and high-school students in 2011 had been determined and that it had changed from .5% in 2002 to 1% in 2011.”

Earlier than that, Tohid Abdi, the deputy director for social and awareness issues in Iran’s police force had announced that social changes had resulted in that the age of addiction and prostitution had dropped to about 13. Late last year news reports indicated that senior cleric ayatollah Javadi Amoli had told a government official that, “Family, marriage among youth, the dangers of later marriages and the fall in the age of prostitution were among the problems society was currently facing which needed to be addressed.”

But merely expressing concern about these issues does not solve them. The director general of the welfare organization had announced a few years ago that the age when girls deserted their parents’ home was between 9 and 17 years. The head of the sociology association of Iran had also announced in 2011 that the age of prostitution had fallen by 8 to 10 years, i.e., from the age of 20-30 to 12-18.

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