Juvenile gun arrests skyrocket 19% as NYPD sees gains in plague of youth violence

The number of teens busted with guns in NYC has skyrocketed 19% this year, even as cops see some gains in the plague of youth violence, new data show.

There have been 423 kids under age 18 arrested so far this year compared to 355 in the same period in 2025, NYPD data show.

There were 76 juveniles shot so far this year, a 19% decrease compared to the same period in 2025 when 93 were shot.

This year’s tally, 76, is down slightly from 2024, when 78 were shot, according to the data.

The number of young shooters is down 11% this year, with 83 shooting another person so far this year compared to 93 during the same period of 2025, the data show.

But the number of juveniles pulling the trigger is up 6% so far this year over two years ago, to 83 from 78, according to the data.

Police attribute the problem to New York’s 2017, soft-on-crime “Raise the Age” law, which mandated housing juvenile offenders separately from adult inmates in correctional facilities.

That, coupled with laws that make some crime ineligible for cash bail, a judge will only send juveniles to the city’s main detention centers for the most serious crimes.

“They’ve been sending the message for years that you’re not going to go to jail if you get caught with a loaded gun,” said retired NYPD Assistant Commissioner of Youth Strategies Kevin O’Connor. “It’s not only the guns, it’s the felony assaults with weapons.”

The NYPD has been using various strategies to fight youth crime, including setting up safety zones in the areas most heavily trafficked by students, the NYPD has said.

The NYPD also assigns specialized Youth Coordination Officers, supervised by sergeants, to monitor crime trends around schools and neighborhoods and to connect young people with programs.

The department also touts youth programs like Saturday Night Lights, a city-wide, youth sports program, and the Police Athletic League that runs youth initiatives.

But the NYPD can only do so much about the problem of juvenile crime, said New York Law School Professor Kirk Burkhalter, who served 20 years in the NYPD and retired as a first-grade detective.

“I remember being a cop in the 1980s and life was extremely cheap and most of the folks doing the life-taking in large urban areas were very young,” he said, citing the crack epidemic as the driving force at the time.

Today’s youth violence tends to explode over turf wars between crews in the city’s neighborhoods and online threats and bragging among juveniles, experts have said.

“It’s pretty amazing that there‘s a segment of young people who are committing crimes that would be difficult to apprehend them for but for them putting the proceeds of those crimes – and holding an unlicensed firearm – on some type of social media, literally bragging about it,” he said.

The most the NYPD can do in the end is to make arrests, Burkhalter said.

“The police are literally keeping the top on the bottle,” he said. “The only thing they can do is apprehend offenders once they’ve committed a crime. There has to be a different approach.”

The latest youth shooting happened when Jihadi Pack took a bullet to the stomach around 6:20 p.m. Wednesday behind NYCHA’s King Towers building on West 115th Street near Malcolm X Boulevard, where he lived, according to police.

He was rushed to Mount Sinai Morningside, but he could not be saved, authorities said.

A 57-year-old man – who law enforcement sources identified as a worker for the New York City Housing Authority – was struck in the right hand by an apparent stray bullet nearby, police and sources said. A 15-year-old was taken into custody but he wasn’t immediately charged, police said.

The motive wasn’t clear, cops said.

In another recent tragic case, 14-year-old Malakai Adams was fatally gunned down by a scooter-riding killer on Sept. 21 in Far Rockaway, Queens. 

The shooter allegedly stole Adams’ ride after blasting him in the back around 3:40 p.m. but it wasn’t clear if that was the main motive, cops said. Investigators haven’t ruled out gang involvement in the shooting, police sources said.

Harlem mom Jackie Rowe-Adams, who lost two sons in shootings, wants inner city communities to do more to help stop youth gun violence, she said. 

“Let’s tell the truth of what’s happening in the urban community,” said the 79-year-old who runs a group called Harlem Mothers and Fathers SAVE (Stop Another Violent End) and helps grieving parents who’ve lost their children to street violence.

“We as parents and community leaders must do more,” she said. “We must check their backpacks when they leave our houses. We have to check under mattresses. I’m not saying it will stop it, but it could really slow it down.”

Rowe-Adams’ son Anthony Bouldin was shot and killed in Harlem at the age of 17 in 1982. Sixteen years later, her 28-year-old son, Tyrone Bouldin, was murdered in Baltimore.

“You never, ever forget,” she said. “You learn to move on, but you never forget your loved ones. If I can save another mother or another family from feeling the hurt and pain, my life will not be in vain.”