Role of Crime Statistics

State and its agencies compile statistics on crime in the society; these statistics are compiled in the statistical bulletins published from time to time by the Office of National Statistics. As such, such crime statistics are records on the incidence of crime in the society that are maintained by state agencies and they reflect on the trends and patterns in crimes (Hope, 2013). While some academic literature considers crime statistics to be scientific, independent and accurate (Godfrey, et al., 2008); there are some writers who question the credibility of crime statistics and argue that these are not the true representation of crime in the society (Muncie & McLaughlin, 2001; Carrabine, et al., 2004; Morrison, 2014). Therefore, there are two ways to look at crime statistics: as credible representation of the incidence of crime in the society; or as inaccurate representation of crime because of the inherent weaknesses in the crime statistics. Despite these weaknesses however, crime statistics are important in that they apprise policy makers as well as criminologists on the patterns and incidence of crime and elicit responses from them. This essay discusses the strengths and weaknesses of crime statistics.

There are different data that are used to report on the statistics of crime in England and Wales, the most important of which are the Crime Survey for England and Wales, generally considered to be the most reliable and important source on crime statistics; the Home Office Police recorded crime data; the data on victims collected by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) and the Ministry of Justice Criminal Justice Statistics (Office for National Statistics, 2019). The latest release of statistical bulletin in England and Wales was on 23 April 2020 for the year ending December 2020. The bulletin notes that the level of crime is stable and also notes that the Crime Survey for England and Wales estimate a fall of 5% in the year ending December 2019, but also that it was early to predict the actual state of crime (Office for National Statistics, 2020). Official surveys have come in for some criticism for their failure to report the true state of crime in the society and for that reason, official surveys may even be rejected as valid by some writers for instance, Box (2002) writes about the difference between the statistics and the actual incidence of crime.

The British Crime Survey has suggested that there is a difference between the official statistics such as those maintained by the police and the statistics of the Survey thus providing an insight into the discrepancies between the two (Carrabine, et al., 2004). Crime statistics are easy to obtain. They are therefore, inexpensive and as they are based on the records of the police, they have credibility. There are also some weaknesses of recorded crime statistics are, most important of which are related to under-reporting of crimes, and non-reporting by the to the police. On the other hand, Crime Survey data is considered to be more reliable in reporting long term trends of crime and also consist of unreported crimes (Office for National Statistics, 2019). However, these are expensive to conduct and are time consuming (Davies & Francis, 2018).

In academic literature as will be discussed presently, it is accepted that crime statistics do have certain inherent weaknesses. However, crime statistics are also credible because they are maintained by the agencies of the state and report the crime rates as per the records of the agencies like the police. In the following sections, this essay will first discuss the strengths and weaknesses of crime statistics as reported in the literature. There are two predominant views on crime statistics: the realist view; and the ‘dark figure’ view. The realist view argues that the records maintained by the agencies of the state are the true indicators of the state of crime (Hope, 2013). On the other hand, the dark figure view argues that crime statistics cannot present an accurate state of crime because of the incidence of unreported crime that is not reflected in crime statistics (Coleman & Moynihan, 1996). For instance, white crimes are generally considered to be under reported in the official statistics (Muncie & McLaughlin, 2001). Similarly, there are other crimes like rapes, and sexual assaults against women, domestic violence, that may not be accurately reflected in the official statistics because of the problem of under reporting of these crimes; this means that the dark figure of the crimes may be difficult to calculate (Morrison, 2014).

In the next sections, this essay will focus on the strengths and weaknesses of the crime statistics. One of the strengths of crime statistics is that these have credibility because these are maintained by the agencies of the state. Moreover, crime statistics indicate the workload of the police forces and the performance level (Office for National Statistics, 2020). As performance levels of the police forces can be assessed on the basis of crime statistics, these statistics can be useful in increasing the accountability of the police forces and other agencies.

Crime statistics are also a good source of information on which kinds of crimes are being committed in the society, which crimes have more incidence and in which kinds of crimes reduction can be seen. Using this information, policy decisions can be taken by the government and the agencies like police services. Decisions on social services can also be taken based on the crime statistics. This information can be used for understanding and responding to intersections between race, gender, and class on one hand and victimisation and perpetration of crime on the other hand (Hope, 2013). All these policy decisions can be taken based on the trends that are reported in the crime statistics.

One of the weaknesses of the official statistics on crime is that it may be impacted by the institutional bias in recording certain offences, which may be driven by the considerations of the racial and minority status of the perpetrator or the victim, which may mean that some offences are not reflected in the statistics of crime in the society (Hope, 2013, p. 50). Therefore, because the police may not record certain crimes due to the bias factor, it has a direct correlation with the statistics which will not reflect the unrecorded crime. There is also the possibility of police forces not recording crime because even though an incident may be reported to the police, it may not be classified as such and may be dealt with summarily. Such crimes do not get reflected in the crime statistics maintained by the state (Hope, 2013).

Another weakness of statistics is that it may be impacted by the fear of some victims to report crimes; for instance, a fear of retaliation by the perpetrator may make the victim scared to go to the police to report the crime (Berman & Berman, 2015, p. 444). As a consequence, the crime is not reflected in the official statistics, while the Survey may be more accurate in capturing the crime incidence. The recent crime statistics also reflect on the discrepancies between actual incidence of crime related to sexual offences and domestic abuse and those recorded by the police and notes that the police records do not provide a reliable measure of trends despite improvements in police recording practices and increased reporting by victims have contributed to increases in recent years (Office for National Statistics, 2020). Thus, there is an awareness within the government that although crime statistics can be a good source of information on the patterns and trends in crimes, it is not always accurate representation of the crime.

To conclude, crime statistics are important because these represent the state of crime in the society as seen in the records of the agencies like the police. As these are based on actual records, crime statistics are credible source of data on the state of crime. Using these statistics, the government can understand the trends in crimes, and make policy decisions on how to control certain crimes or respond to certain other crimes through social or criminal justice measures. Criminologists can also use the crime statistics to understand the incidence and kinds of crimes in the society. Crime statistics reveal that trends and patterns of crime that is useful to both criminologists as well as policy makers. At the same time, crime statistics can be problematic in that they are not always the most accurate representation of crime in the society. The dark figures, unreported crimes, and crimes reported but not recorded by the police due to bias or other factors are also to be taken into account when considering crime statistics. This means that there is a possibility of discrepancy between actual crime and reported crime in the statistics. Therefore, there are also certain limitations of crime statistics that need to be taken into consideration before relying on the statistics to make policy decisions.

References

Berman, M. & Berman, D., 2015. State and Local Politics. Oxon: Routledge.

Box, S., 2002. Power, Crime and Mystification. London: Tavistock.

Carrabine, E. et al., 2004. Criminology: A Sociological Introduction. London: Routledge.

Coleman, C. & Moynihan, J., 1996. Understanding Crime Data. Open University Press.

Davies, P. & Francis, P., 2018. Doing criminological research. London: SAGE Publications Limited.

Godfrey, B., Lawrence, P. & Williams, C., 2008. History and Crime. London: Sage.

Hope, T., 2013. What do crime statistics tell us?. In: C. Hale, K. Hayward, A. Wahidin & E. Wincup, eds. Criminology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 43.

Morrison, W., 2014. Theoretical Criminology from Modernity to Post-Modernism. London: Routledge.

Muncie, J. & McLaughlin, E., 2001. The Problem of Crime. 2 ed. London: Sage.