Males were involved in 59% of petitioned status offense cases in 1997 (table 72). Males accounted for the majority of status liquor law violation cases (68%), ungovernability cases (55%), and truancy cases (53%) but less than half of runaway cases (40%).

The offense profiles of status offense cases for males and females reflect the relatively greater involvement of males in liquor law violations and of females in runaway cases. Liquor law violations accounted for 30% of cases involving males, compared with 20% of cases involving females; runaway cases accounted for 22% of status offense cases involving females, compared with 10% of cases involving males (table 73).

The number of petitioned status offense cases involving females increased 105% between 1988 and 1997, while the number involving males increased 98% (table 74). The largest percent increase among females was for liquor law violations (108%). Among males, the largest increase was for runaway cases (105%).

In 1997, the status offense case rate for males was 6.3 cases per 1,000 males in the juvenile population, compared with 4.7 for females. The case rate difference between males and females was much smaller for status offenses than for delinquency cases. The status offense case rate for males ages 16 and 17, however, was considerably higher than the rate for females in the same age groups (figure 24). The status offense case rate for females peaked at age 16 then declined through age 17, whereas the case rate for males increased continuously through age 17.

For both truancy and ungovernability cases, the male and female age-specific case rate patterns were comparable, with rates peaking at age 15 (figure 25). By contrast, status liquor case rates were considerably greater for males than for females after age 15. Case rates within the status liquor category increased continuously with age for both males and females, showing large increases in the older age groups. In runaway cases, unlike any of the other status offense categories, the case rate for females was greater than the case rate for males at all but the youngest ages.