DEFINITION OF HATE CRIME

1
DEFINITION OF HATE CRIME

• any incident, which may or may not constitute
  a criminal offence, which is perceived by the
  victim or any other person as being motivated by
  prejudice or hate.

2

• OFFICIAL CRIME STATISTICS
• PROBABLY
• DO NOT REPRESENT
• OUR EXPERIENCE OF CRIME

3
UNDER REPORTING IS NOT A RANDOM EVENT

• forecasts of crime trends fail to take proper
  account of what drives unreported crime
• Individual on relatively high income is 8 more
  likely to report burglary than someone on less
  than average income

4
LIMITATIONS OF OFFICIAL CRIME STATISTICS

• Are plagued by dark figure of unreported or
  hidden crime
• Forecasts of crime fail to take account of what
  drives unreported crime. i.e. unemployed is 7
  less likely to report a burglary than someone who
  is currently employed
• Forecasts of crime trends ought to include
  mechanism for correcting, for reporting behaviour
• There is disparity between official crime
  statistics and the publics experience of crime

5
NON-REPORTING AND DELAYED REPORTINGLEARNING
DISABILITY/VULNERABLE VICTIMS

• Reluctance to involve police is based on previous
  experience
• Various factors often cause significant (and
  often damaging) delays in reporting
• Victims unaware that an offence had been
  committed
• The incident may not be defined as a crime
• Prime concern of agencies is the wider issue of
  abuse, their policies reflect this. Domestic
  violence and marital rape were not perceived as
  crimes
• There are often no formalised reporting
  procedures as the agency policy may not
  facilitate this

6
ECONOMIC MODELLING OF CRIME PROBLEM

• These models typically focus on property crime
• Determine which factors influence the aggregate
  crime rate
• Show in addition to being influenced by changes
  in CJS, some crimes i.e. property crimes increase
  with unemployment but falls as National Income
  increases

7

• What matters to sophisticated public
• is
• How they feel
• Rather than
• What official statistics
• They read

8
BARRIERS TO REPORTING

• lack of confidence in partners
• economic factors
• lack of know-how
• belief that there is no victim (business crime)
  or they can afford it
• ..
• ..

9
POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS TO UNDER REPORTING

• governments policy i.e. gun crime, to introduce
  tough mandatory sentences
• 3rd party reporting centres
• ..
• ..

10

• IS THE WELSH ASSEMBLY QUESTIONNAIRE REVELATIONS
• REPRESENTATIVE?

11

• OVER TO YOU