The Social Dimensions of Crime

1
The Social Dimensions of Crime

• Age and Crime
• Class and Crime
• Gender and Crime
• Race and Crime

2
National Volume, Trends, and Rates

• In 2004, the UCR Program estimated the number of
  arrests in the United States for all criminal
  offenses (except traffic
• violations) at approximately 14 million
• 1.6 million arrests (11.8 percent of all
• arrests) for property crimes
• 586,558 arrests (4.2 percent of all arrests) for
• violent crimes
• Law officers made more arrests for drug abuse
  violations (1.7 million arrests) than for any
  other offense

3
Uniform Crime Report

• UCR Program reports information on the age, sex,
  and race of the persons arrested
• By gender, 76.2 percent of arrests in 2004 were
  of males
• Males accounted for 82.1 percent of the total
  number of arrestees for violent crimes and 68.1
  percent of the total for property crimes

4
2004 arrest data by Race

• Indicated that 70.8 percent of arrestees were
  white, 26.8 percent were black, and 2.4 percent
  were of other races (American Indian or Alaskan
  Native and Asian or Pacific Islander)
• Whites were most commonly arrested for driving
  under the influence (893,212 arrests) and drug
  abuse violations (821,047 arrests)
• Blacks were most frequently arrested for drug
  abuse violations (406,890 arrests) and simple
  assaults (288,286 arrests)

5
Age and Crime

• Age is inversely related to criminality
• Younger people (regardless class, race, sex)
  commit crime more often than their older peers

6
Teens experience the highest rates of violent
crime
7
What do we know from criminological research
about Age and Crime? (Farringdon, 2003)

• Prevalence of offending peaks in the late teenage
  years (between 15 and 19)
• The peak age of onset of offending is between 8
  and 14
• The peak of desistance from offending is between
  20 and 29

8
What do we know from criminological research
about Age and Crime? (Farringdon, 2003)

• Early onset predicts a long career and many
  offences
• Small fraction of the population, chronic
  offenders commit a large fraction of all crimes
• Most offences up to the late teenage years are
  committed with others, whereas most offences from
  age 20 onwards are committed alone
• Reasons given for offending up to late teenage
  years utilitarian, excitement/joy, relive
  boredom, anger
• Reasons for later offending are mostly utilitarian

9
Age-graded Theory
8-9 years
15-19 years
45-55 years
10
Several competing explanations

• Maturation reform (hormones, burning out, aging
  causes desistance)
• Life-course view (Sampson, Laub, 1993) based on
  social bond theory, turning points in life
• M. Warr Number of friends and age
• Moffitts typology (Adolescents-limited,
  life-course persistent, risk factors
  neuropsychological deficit, hyperactivity,
  impulsivity, low self-control)
• Latent Trait theory (Gottfredson and Hirschi) - a
  persons level of self-control) Opportunity might
  change but self-control is stable

11
Link between age and crime

• Young people have less status in our society
  which may lead the police to police their
  behavior more closely/heavily
• If police stereotype young people as potential
  criminals they will police them more closely
  because they are more socially visible (an older
  person committing a tax fraud, on the other hand,
  may be socially invisible
• Working class men stereotyped as real criminals
  whereas older middle class women may escape such
  stereotyping

12
Life Style

• The lifestyles of young people (the young are the
  most-frequent users of pubs and clubs for
  example) may expose them to situations where
  criminal behavior is possible / likely
  (especially violent crimes, joyriding and various
  forms of petty crime minor thefts)

13
Age and Crime

• As people get older they take-on more personal
  responsibilities (work / career for example) and
  social responsibilities (children or a partner
  for example) which makes them consider the effect
  their behavior might have on people they love

14
Age and Crime

• More young people (aged 14 25 the peak ages
  for criminal activity) live in urban areas which
  provides more opportunities for crime more
  shops, offices, businesses, cars, houses etc.

15
Social Class and Crime

• Official statistics indicate that crime rates in
  inner-city, high-poverty areas are higher than
  those in suburban areas
• Self-reports of prison inmates show that
  prisoners are members of the lower class
• Self reports of adolescents found little or no
  relationship between social class and crime

16
Possible Explanations

• W. Chamblisss study of Saints and Roughnecks
• Less visible, public bias, better demeanor
• Who you are is more important than what you do
• Middle and upper class youth have fewer
  opportunities for crime because they are
  more-likely to be in full-time education up to
  age of 21 / 22 than working class youth.

17
Explanations

• Working class youth more-likely to be in
  low-paid, low skill work (or unemployed).
  Criminal behavior may be used as a source of
  excitement as well as money
• Cultural explanations-culture of deviance

18
System of Values

• MIDDLE CLASS VALUES
• Deferred gratificationVerbal skillsRationalityA
  sceticismAmbitionIndividual Responsibility
  TalentCourtesy Chivalry

• LOWER CLASS VALUES
• Instant gratificationMotor skillsSpontaneity-Exp
  ressivenessSociabilityGenerosityChildhood-like
  approach to ResponsibilitySensuality Sexuality

19
Gender and Crime

• Women commit a small share of all crimes
• Their crimes are fewer, less serious, more rarely
  professional and less likely to be repeated
• Females are less likely to be arrested if they
  cry, express concern for their children, or claim
  to be led by men (DeFleur, 1990)
• In consequence, women formed a small proportion
  of prison populations

20
Gender and Crime

• Most victims and perpetrators in homicides are
  male
•    Male offender/Male victim 65.1 
• Male offender/Female victim 22.6 
• Female offender/Male victim 9.9 
• Female offender/Female victim 2.4

21
The gender distribution of homicide victims and
offenders differs by type of homicide
Women are particularly at risk for intimate
killings, sex-related homicides, and murder by
arson or poison.Women are more likely to commit
murder as a result of an argument or murder by
poison.
22
Background Information is important

• A few facts about the lives of adult women in
  U.S. prisons in 2000
• 60 of women under correctional authority
  reported that they have been sexually and
  physically assaulted at some time in their lives
• 69 of these women reported the assault happened
  before they were 18 years old

23
National Study

• In 1990, the American Correctional Association
  published the results from a survey it conducted
  on female offenders Based on the responses of
  female offenders in 400 state and local
  correctional facilities, a very detailed profile
  of the female offender was produced

24
Female offender - Profile

• Most are young (25-29)
• The majority are economically disadvantage
  minorities with children
• About half ran away from home as youths
• About a quarter had attempted suicide/had serious
  drug problems
• More than half were victims of physical
  abuse/sexual abuse

25
Female Offender - Profile

• About a third had never completed high school
• Over a quarter had been unemployed in the three
  years before going to prison
• Most of the women were first imprisoned for
  larceny, theft, or drug offenses, and, at the
  time of the survey, they were serving time for
  drug offenses, murder, larceny, theft, or robbery
  
• Many of the women convicted of manslaughter or
  murder had killed a boyfriend or husband who
  abused them

26
Weapon use in Murder

• A firearm (handgun) is used in about two-thirds
  of all homicides (predominantly males)
• Knives or other cutting instruments
  (predominantly females)
• Personal weapons (hands, fists, and feet)
• Blunt objects
• Strangulation
• Contrary to media images, poison and explosives
  are rarely used as murder weapons

27
Method of killing

• Women usually kill their partner with a knife or
  sharp instrument (78)
• Poisoning (6.2)
• Blunt instrument (2.6)
• Arson (2.2)
• Shooting (2.0)

28
Homicides committed by women

• Female-perpetrated homicides account for 10-12
  of the overall homicides
• Who do women kill?
• The answer is those closest to them, with whom
  they live (intimate partners, or ex-partners and
  family members)
• Over the period 1995-2001, intimate partners
  accounted for 32 of female-perpetrated homicides

29
Explanations of Intimate Partner Homicide

• Battered Woman Syndrome (Walker, 1989) (women
  who have been physically, psychologically, or
  sexually abused over an extended period of time)
• Financial gain (financial benefit from the death
  of partner)
• Sexual Motivation (establish legal relationship
  with another party)

30
Invisible women

• Every year, girls account for over a quarter of
  all arrests of young people in America (FBI,
  2002, p.239)
• Despite this, the young women who find themselves
  in the juvenile justice system either by formal
  arrest or referral are almost completely
  invisible
• Explanations for their delinquency explicitly or
  implicitly avoid addressing girls

31
Liberal feminism

• Liberation perspective
• Greater equality in education, politics, economy,
  and military
• An unintended consequence of this availability to
  women of a wider range of social roles is their
  greater involvement in crime (arena dominated by
  men)

32
Power-Control Theory of Gender and Delinquency

• John Hagan, 1987
• The theory explains the difference between male
  and female rates of delinquency
• Two types of family structures (Patriarchal
  families vs egalitarian families)

33
Patriarchal family

• Fathers occupy the traditional role of sole
  breadwinner and mothers have only menial jobs or
  remain at home to handle domestic affairs
• Fathers focus is directed outward towards his
  instrumental responsibilities, while the mother
  is left in charge of the children, especially
  their daughters
• Sons are granted greater freedom as they are
  prepared for the traditional male role symbolized
  by their fathers
• Daughters are socialized into the cult of
  domesticity under the close supervision of their
  mothers, preparing them for lives oriented
  towards domestic labor and consumption

34
Patriarchal family

• Sons are encouraged and allowed to "experiment"
  and take risks
• Daughters in this scenario are closely monitored
  so that participation in deviant or delinquent
  activity is unlikely.

35
Egalitarian family

• Is characterized by little difference between the
  mother's and father's work roles, so that
  responsibility for child rearing is shared
• Neither child receives the close supervision
  present over females in the paternalistic family
• Middle class aspirations and values dominate
  mobility, success, autonomy, and risk taking
• Daughter's deviance now mirrors their brother's

36
Middle-class girls

• ...middle-class girls are the most likely to
  violate the law because they are less closely
  controlled than their lower-class counterparts
• And in homes where both parents hold positions of
  power, girls are more likely to have the same
  expectations of career success as their brothers
• Power-control theory, then, implies that
  middle-class youth of both sexes will have higher
  crime rates than their lower-class peers

37
Assessing power-control theory

• Hagan's theory has been criticized as being
  basically a fairly straightforward adaptation of
  the "liberation hypothesis," as females
  experience upward mobility and status change,
  their access to deviant and illicit behaviors
  expand
• Female deviance becomes a product of the "sexual
  scripts" within patriarchal families that make it
  more likely for them to become the victims of
  both sexual and physical abuse
• If they run away, the juvenile court supports
  parental rights and returns them to the home,
  persistent violations lead to incarceration and
  future trouble as official delinquents/deviants
  or life on the street where survival depends on
  involvement in crime

38
Racial differences exist, with blacks
disproportionately represented among homicide
victims and offenders
39
Most murders are intraracial
40
Homicide victimization rates by age, gender, and
race, 1976-2002