Victimology D3Q

CHAPTER FIVE

THE ONGOING CONTROVERSY OVER SHARED RESPONSIBILITY

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To understand the distinctions between victim facilitation, precipitation, and provocation.

To be able to apply the concepts of victim facilitation, victim blaming, and victim defending to burglary, automobile theft, and identity theft.

To be able to apply the concepts of victim precipitation, victim provocation, victim blaming, victim defending, and system blaming to murder and robbery.

To realize what is at stake in the debate between victim blamers and victim defenders.

To be able to see the institutional roots of crime, which overshadow the victim’s role.

Learning Objectives

To become familiar with the competing theories that attempt to explain why some groups suffer higher victimization rates than others.

To recognize how the issue of shared responsibility impacts the operations of the criminal justice system.

To debate the appropriate role of risk management and risk reduction strategies in everyday life.

To appreciate the difference between crime prevention and victimization prevention.

Learning Objectives

Victim’s Contribution To The Crime Problem

Shared Responsibility— certain victims as well as criminals did something wrong.
Theories
Duet Frame of Reference—Von Hentig, 1941
Penal Couple—Mendelsohn, 1956
Doer-Sufferer Relationship—Ellenberger, 1955

Shared Responsibility

Repeat victims, chronic victims, and victim careers: Learning from past mistakes?

Are these individuals making the same mistakes over and over again?
Clouded judgment due to drinking
Failing to safeguard personal property
Isolating self from bystanders who could intervene
Spending time with dangerous individuals

Frequency of Shared Responsibility for Violent Crimes

Victim’s Levels of Responsibility

Completely innocent victims cannot be blamed for what happened to them. They reasonably reduced risks, no negligence or passive indifference.
Victims of property crimes often harden their targets with security devices and alarms.
Victim is totally responsible when there is no offender—victim may pose as offender and commit fraud.

Victim Blaming vs. Victim Defending

Victim Blaming Characterization
Argument that victims bear some responsibility along with their offender if facilitation, precipitation, or provocation of the event occurred.
Victim Defending Characterization
Whether it is accurate or fair to hold the targeted individual accountable for own losses or injuries inflicted by the wrongdoer.

Victim Blaming vs. Victim Defending

Victim Blaming
“Just World” Outlook—People get what they deserve.
Bad things happen to evil characters and good things happen to good people.
Personal Accountability—Basic doctrine of U.S. legal system that encourages victim blaming explanations.
Crime-conscious individuals should review their lifestyles and routines to increase personal safety.

Victim blaming is the view of majority of offenders.

Victim Blaming vs. Victim Defending

Victim Defending—Rejects the premise that victims are partly at fault.

Victim defender’s criticisms of victim blamers:
Victim blaming overstates victim’s involvement/carelessness/shared responsibility.
Overstates events of victim facilitation, precipitation or provocation.
Exhorting people to be more cautious and vigilant is not an adequate solution.

Shared Responsibility Issues

Murder: “…victim is often major contributor…” (Wolfgang, 1958)
Rape: “…’virtuous’ rape victim is not always the innocent and passive party.” (Amir, 1971)
Theft: “Victims cause crime in the sense that they set up the opportunity for the crime to be committed.” (Jeffrey, 1971)
Burglary: “…understand the extent to which a victim vicariously contributes to or precipitates a break-in.” (Waller and Okihiro, 1978)

Victim Blaming vs. Victim Defending

See Box 5.2: “Early Criticisms of the Notion of Shared Responsibility”
Two tendencies with victim defending regarding who or what is to be faulted:

Offender blaming: do not shift any blame away from offender onto the victim.

System blaming: behaviors of both parties influenced by the social environment ; neither the victim nor the offender is to blame.

System Blaming

Linked with victim defending
If the lawbreaker is viewed as a product of his or her environment, and the victim is too, then the actions of both parties have been influenced by the agents of socialization—
parental input, peer group pressure, subcultural prescriptions, school experiences, media images, religion

Shared Responsibility

Facilitation—Victims carelessly and inadvertently make it easier for a thief to steal (least serious).
Precipitation—Victim significantly contributes to the violent outbreak.
Provocation—Worse than precipitation; victim more directly responsible for the crime (most serious).

Victim Facilitation and Auto Theft

“Is it the careless who end up carless?”
Most likely victim—under age 25, apt. dweller, urban inner-city, African Americans and Hispanic Americans, low-income

Trends in Motor Vehicle Theft Rates, United States, 1973–2013

NOTE: UCR figures include thefts of taxis, buses, trucks, and other commercial vehicles.

Victim Facilitation and Auto Theft

Victim blaming focuses on the proportion of motorists with bad habits (i.e. carelessness about locks and keys).
Victim defending focuses on majority of motorists who did nothing wrong.
Teenagers are no longer #1 in stealing cars—organized car rings/chop shops

Typology of Shared Responsibility

Auto Theft:
Conscientiously Resisting Victims
Conventionally Cautious Victims

- Carelessly Facilitating Victims

Precipitative Initiators
Provocative Conspirators
Fabricating Simulators

} 75%

} 15%

} 10%

Victim Facilitation and Identity Theft

Identity Theft—Unauthorized appropriation of personal information
Names, addresses, date of birth, etc.

Victim Precipitation and Provocation

Subintentional death those who got killed played contributory roles in their deaths by exercising poor judgment, taking excessive risks, or pursuing a self-destructive lifestyle (Allen, 1980).

justifiable homicide if the security officer resorted to deadly force in self-defense.
Suicide by cop (Klinger, 2001).

Frequency of Shared Responsibility

Homicide—person who died was the first to resort to force: 22%
Aggravated Assault—seriously injured first to use force or offensive action (fighting words): 14%
Armed Robberies—victim did not reasonably handle money, jewelry or valuables: 11%
Forcible Rapes—woman first agreed to sexual relations or invited through gestures, but then retracted before the act: 4%

Study conducted by National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence

System Blaming

Victim-blaming and victim-defending arguments bridge the gap between theoretical propositions and abstractions and how people genuinely think and act.

These arguments get caught up in the details of cases ignoring the social forces that shape both criminals and victims.
Whenever partisans of the two perspectives clash, they inadvertently let the system and culture off the hook.

System Blaming Arguments

Homicide: glorification of violence in the media as a source of entertainment, conflict resolution, and policy-making.
Robbery: gulf between the well-off and the poor, and the over-importance of material possessions.
Burglary: organized nature of fencing as an incentive to thievery
Identity Theft: numerous data breaches expose personal data to thieves regardless of efforts by customers

Laws and Law Enforcement

Nearly all states have passed laws to compel organizations that maintain databanks to notify people put at risk when a breach of security takes place.
Many law enforcement agencies still lack experts in forensic computing and remain behind the curve when it comes to detecting intrusions, figuring out who did it, and gathering evidence that will stand up in court.

Laws and Law Enforcement

Problems undermining law enforcement efforts in fighting identity theft:
Many officers lack training and agencies lack resources to provide adequate response.
Multi-jurisdictional complications undercut an agency’s commitment to follow through.
Law enforcement agencies stymied as many instances not reported to police (sometimes not even the victim is aware of the crime).

Victim Facilitation and ID Theft

Risk Reduction Strategies
Lock up computer, desktop, laptop
Shred pre-approved credit card invitations
Discreetly discard receipts and ATM info
Devise clever passwords
Never give Social Security number to unknown person
Box 5.5 provides additional preventative measures and red flags for identity theft.

Legal Importance of Determining Responsibility

Responsibility rests on judgments that are subject to challenges and criticisms.
Whether the victim facilitated, precipitated or provoked, an offender is considered responsible by police, prosecutors, juries, judges, compensation boards, insurance examiners, and politicians.
It is an issue at many stages of the CJ process, restitution consideration, civil lawsuits, and insurance settlements.

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