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Chapter 2

Crime and ItsConsequences

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A Legal Definition

A legal definition of crimeis used in criminal

justice in the United States.

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A Legal DefinitionSome behaviors prohibited by criminal law

should not be. Overcriminalization arises in

victimless crimes:Gambling

Prostitution involving consenting adults

Homosexual acts between consenting adults

Use of some illegal drugs, such as marijuana

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A Legal DefinitionFor some behaviors prohibited by criminal

law, the law is not routinely enforced.

Nonenforcementis common for:

White-collar crimes

Government crimes

Victimless crimesMinor crimes

Nonenforcement causes disrespect for the law.

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A Legal DefinitionBehaviors that some people think should be

prohibited by criminal law are not. This is

undercriminalization.

undercriminalization

The failure to prohibit some behaviors that arguably

should be prohibited.

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Elements of CrimeTechnically and ideally, a crime has not been

committed unless the following elements are

present:

HarmLegality

Actus reusMens rea

CausationConcurrencePunishment

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A Legal DefinitionFor crime to occur, there must be harm, either

physical or verbal.

Thinking about committing a crime is not a crime.

A verbal threat to strike another person is a crime.

harmThe external consequence required to make an

action a crime.

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Legality

Legalityhas two aspects:

The harm must be legally forbidden

A criminal law must not be ex post facto.

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Actus Reus

Actus reus requires actual criminal conduct,

or criminal negligence:If parents fail to provide food, clothing, and shelter

for their children, they are committing a crime.

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Mens ReaMens rearefers to the mental aspect of crime.

Criminal conduct usually refers to intentional action

or inaction.Sometimes, negligenceor reckless action can be

criminal.

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mens reaCriminal intent; a guilty state of mind.

negligence

The failure to take reasonable precautions to prevent harm.

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Mens Rea

Legal DefensesIn the United States, an offender is not consideredresponsible or is considered less resp. if he or she:

Acted under duress Was underage

Was insane

Acted in self-defense or defense of a third party Was entrapped

Acted out of necessity

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In order for a crime to be a legal crime, theremust be a causal relationship between the

legally forbidden harm and the actus reus. Thecriminal act must lead directly to the harmwithout a long delay.

Causation

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Concurrence

There must be concurrence between the actusreus and the mens rea; the criminal conductand the criminal intent must occur together.

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Punishment

For a behavior to be considered a crime, there

must be a statutory provision for punishmentor at least the threat of punishment.

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Degrees or Categories of Crime

Crimes can be distinguished by degree or

severity of the offense by being divided into:

Feloniessevere crimes

Misdemeanorsless severe crimes

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Degrees or Categories of Crime

Another way of distinguishing crime is

between:

Mala in se Mala prohibita

Rape

Murder

Trespassing

Gambling

Prostitution

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mala in se

Wrong in themselves. A description applied to crimes

that are characterized by universality and timelessness.

mala prohibita

Offenses that are illegal because laws define them as

such. They lack universality and timelessness.

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The Measurement of Crime

What Americans know about crime is, by and

large, based on statistics supplied bygovernment agencies.

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Crime StatisticsStatistics about crime and delinquency are

probably the most unreliable and most

difficult of all social statistics.Behavior may be wrongly labeled.

Crimes go undetected.

Crimes are sometimes not reported to police.

Crimes may be inaccurately recorded by police.

Statistics do not include the dark figure of crime.

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dark figure of crime

The number of crimes not officially recorded by the

police.

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Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) One of the primary sources of crime

statistics in the United States is the uniform

crime reports.

Today more than 17,000 city, county, and state law

enforcement agencies (representing 95 percent of the U.S.

population) are active in the program.

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Uniform Crime Reports (UCR)

The UCR includes two major indexes:

Offenses known to the policeStatistics about persons arrested

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Uniform Crime Reports (UCR)

Offenses known to the police include eightindex crimes.

Only about 35% of crimes, on average, arereported to the police.

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eight index crimesThe Part I offenses in the

FBIs Uniform Crime Reports.

Murder and nonnegligent manslaughter

Forcible rape

Robbery

Aggravated assault Burglary

Larceny-theft

Motor vehicle theft Arson

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Uniform Crime Reports (UCR)The other major crime index in the UCR isbased on arrest statistics, provided for the

eight index crimes as well as 21 other crimesand status offenses.

status offenses

An act that is illegal for a juvenile but would not be acrime if committed by an adult.

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Uniform Crime Reports (UCR)The UCR also includes statistics on crime indexoffenses clearedby the police, which is a rough

index of police performance in solving crimes.

Murder 70% Burglary 15%

Rape

50% Larceny

20%Robbery 25% MVT 15%

Agg. Assault 60% Arson 15%

20% of all Index crimes

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National Incident-BasedReporting System (NIBRS)

The NIBRS is the result of a joint task force

of the Bureau of Justice Statistics and theFBI aimed at improving the quality of

information contained in the UCR.

The NIBRS contains more data on morecrimes than the UCR.

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National Crime VictimizationSurveys (NCVS)The other major source of crime statistics in

the U.S. is the National Crime VictimizationSurveys.

For nearly all offenses, the NCVS shows more

crimes being committed than the UCR,because of victims failure to report crimes or

failure by police to report crimes to the FBI.

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national crime victimization surveys

A source of crime statistics based on interviews in which

respondents are asked whether they have been victims ofany of the FBIs index offenses (except murder and

nonnegligent manslaughter and arson) or other crimes

during the past six months. If they have, they are asked to

provide information about the experience.

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Self-Report CrimesSelf-report crime surveysask selected

subjects (often high school students) whether

they have committed crimes.Examples:

The National Youth Survey

The National Institute on Drug Abuse effort to ascertain

levels of smoking, drinking and drug use among high schoolstudents

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Who the Victims AreVictimization is not spread evenly through the

U.S. population. The most likely victims of

violent crime are Younger (age 12-24)

Never married, divorced, or separated

Poor

Minority Urban residents

Men

Living in the West or Midwest

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Who the Victims AreThe majority of men (55%) were victimized

by strangers.

The majority of women (68%) were

victimized by someone they knew.