Crime Victims: An Introduction to
Victimology
Sixth Edition
By Andrew Karmen
Chapter Three: Sources of
Information About Crime Victims
1
Introduction
The Big Picture
Where and when do most crimes occur,
use of weapons, are victims usually
strangers, how do victims act, fight back,
escape, etc., how many are injured or
hospitalized, and how much money did
they lose?
2
Introduction
 How do we “put together” the Big Picture?
– Official statistics gathered by government
– Criminologists and victimologists gather their
own data
– Special interest groups gather crime data
3
Use and Abuse of Statistics
 Statistics—meaningful numbers that reveal
important information
 Official statistics—compiled and published
by government
– Statistics—
 Provide realistic assessments of a threat posed to
individuals by criminal activity
 Reveal patterns of criminal activity
 Reflect trends of criminal activity
4
Use and Abuse of Statistics
 Statistics –continued–
– Reveal costs and losses by criminal activity
– Project number of possible victims of a
particular crime
– Evaluate effectiveness of recovery efforts and
prevention strategies
– Identify statistical portraits (profiles) of a typical
victim
5
Use and Abuse of Statistics
 Interpretation of Statistics
– Can be used to influence decision makers
– Can be used to reduce fears
– Can be used to support police administration
– Can be used to show something is not working
Interpretations of mathematical findings
can be given a spin that is usually
debatable
“Is the glass half full or half empty?”
6
FBI’s Crime Clock
 FBI gathers data annually from local police
departments nationally and publishes every
year an annual report of crime statistics
called the Uniform Crime Report (UCR)
 The data is reported in a ‘Time Clock’
format, noting how many seconds or
minutes apart a particular crime or criminal
event occurs—see Figure 3.1, Page 46
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FBI’s Crime Clock
 Crime clock portrayals lend to sales pitches
that play on fears that often lend to the
exploitation to boost sales of burglar alarms,
antitheft devices, or crime insurance
 This portrayal is so ominous it may convince
citizens “they are next” if they haven’t
already been victimized
8
Using Rates per Year
 The Crime Clock gives impression that
being singled out for crime=common
occurrence
 Different set of government gathered crime
data collected by the Bureau of Justice
Statistics (BJS) is derived from a different
source, the National Crime Victimization
Survey (NCVS)
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Using Rates per Year
 NCVS reports criminal activity based upon
1,000 population. Example—2 out every
1,000 citizens were robbed in 2004, or only
2% of the population
 1 out of every 1,000 were injured during a
mugging or hold-up in 2004—or only 1% of
the population—999 were not injured
10
Using Rates per Year
BOTH SOURCES OF DATA ACCURATE
AND TRUSTWORTHY—ONLY
PRESENTED DIFFERENTLY
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UCR vs. NCVS
 During 70s and 80s, there appeared to be
low correlation between the two official
sources of data in regards to victimization
rates
 The two reporting systems again gave
conflicting signals at the end of 2001
regarding violent crimes and property crimes
12
Uniform Crime Report (UCR)
 Data Gathered by FBI from local agencies
 Part One Crimes Reported—8 Crimes
– Violent Crime Data—(4) Murder and Victim Info,
Forcible Rape, Robbery and Aggravated Assault
– Property Crime Data—(4) Burglary,
Larceny/Theft, Motor Vehicle Theft and Arson
13
Uniform Crime Report (UCR)
Data expressed using “Time Clock”: Number of
crimes occurring every minute
UCR reflects data for cities, counties and states
Reports include:
Number of complaints filed with police
Proportion of cases solved
Characteristics of offenders arrested
No information about complainant or victim
14
Uniform Crime Report (UCR)
 Reports number of hate crimes reported to
police
 Analyzes number of law enforcement
officers feloniously assaulted and killed in
the line of duty, weapons used, etc.
 Collects extensive data about victims of
homicides including race, age, gender,
weapon used, etc.
15
Uniform Crime Report (UCR)
 Shortcomings of UCR Report
– Underreporting a major problem
– Focus is offenders, not victims (homicide
exception)
– Mixes attempted crimes and completed crimes
– Robbery includes all targets, does not single out
households, banks, stores, etc.
– Use ‘hierarchy rule,’ which reports only the most
serious crime in a sequence of several criminal
incidents
16
National Incident-Based Reporting
System (NIBRS)
 Tracks 46 Group A Offenses—Greater
Breakdown in data:
– i.e. simple assault, vandalism, blackmail, fraud,
statutory rape, kidnapping
– Gathers data relating to commission of crime,
victim information, value of theft, race/ethnicity
– Originally scheduled for year 2000
implementation
17
National Crime Victim Survey
(NCVS)
 Crime rates determined by public survey
randomly selected by U. S. Census Bureau
 First survey, 1966—Presidents Commission
on Law Enforcement and the Administration
of Justice
18
National Crime Victim Survey
(NCVS)
 Focuses on four part one crimes
 Crimes of Violence
– Forcible Rape
– Robbery
– Aggravated Assault
– Simple Assault
 Only surveys those 12 years of age or
older—Does NOT include crimes against
those under 12 years of age
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National Crime Victim Survey
(NCVS)
 Crimes Against Property
– Larceny
– Burglary—No data gathered on businesses
burglarized
– Motor Vehicle Theft
No data gathered on murders or crimes against
children under age 12
Crime data reported by U.S. Region and
Suburban vs. Rural
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Four Reasons NCVS Questioned
 Bias of Information
 Credibility of Information
– Wives reporting abuse, girls reporting date rape, boys
reporting robberies on bad drug deals
 Crimes against children under 12 not probed
 Over reporting
– Pollsters, not detectives, to sort out conflicting stories or
facts
21
UCR vs. NCVS
 UCR—No data for victims except murder
 NCVS—No data on crimes of murder, bias/hate
crimes, line of duty assaults on police
– No data on offenses against children under 12
– No data on business robberies or burglaries
– No data on arson or victims of arson
UCR—computes rates/100.000 population
NCVS—computes rates/1,000 age 12 and older
or/households (no number)
22
Estimated Victimization Rates
 Table 3.1, Pages 55-56
 Estimated Victimization Rates from both the
UCR and the NCVS, 2004
23
Key Terms
Statistics
Official Statistics
Patterns
Trends
Profiles
Spin
Crime Clock
Uniform Crime
Report
National Crime
Victimization
Survey
Correlation
Index crimes
Hierarchy Rule
Self report
survey
Memory decay
Range (Confidence
Interval)
Victimization
Rates
Forward
telescoping
Raw numbers
Rates
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