Crime harm index

Last updated

A crime harm index is a measurement of crime rates in which crimes are weighted based on how much "harm" they cause.

The most simple and most common method of measuring an area's crime rate is to count the number of crimes. In this case, one minor crime (e.g. a shoplifting incident) counts for the same as a single very serious crime (e.g. murder). Leading criminologists have argued in favour of creating a weighted measurement. Lawrence W. Sherman and two other researchers wrote in 2016 that "All crimes are not created equal. Counting them as if they are fosters distortion of risk assessments, resource allocation, and accountability." [1]

Most crime harm indices use prison sentencing policies to decide what the "harm score" of an offence should be. The harm score of an offence is the default length of the prison sentence that an offender would receive, if the crime was committed by a single offender.

Cambridge Crime Harm Index

The Cambridge Crime Harm Index was unveiled in 2016. [2] [1] It was developed by Lawrence W. Sherman, Peter Neyroud and Eleanor Neyroud. It uses sentencing guidelines of England and Wales to calculate the harm score of each crime. The system has already been adopted by several UK police forces. [3] According to the CCHI, the harm score for a crime is the default prison sentence that an offender would receive for committing it, if the crime was committed by a single offender with no prior convictions. [2] For minor crimes that would instead result in a fine, the harm score is the number of days it would take someone with a minimum wage job to earn the money to pay the fine. [1]

The Cambridge Crime Harm Index has inspired other crime harm indices for New Zealand, [4] Denmark [5] and Western Australia. [6] It has also been evaluated for use in Scotland, though officers of Police Scotland have noted that it does not reflect Scottish sentencing guidelines. [7]

Related Research Articles

Life imprisonment is any sentence of imprisonment for a crime under which convicted persons are to remain in prison either for the rest of their natural life or until pardoned, paroled or otherwise commuted to a fixed term. Crimes for which, in some countries, a person could receive this sentence include murder, attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder, blasphemy, apostasy, terrorism, severe child abuse, rape, child rape, espionage, treason, high treason, drug dealing, drug trafficking, drug possession, human trafficking, severe cases of fraud, severe cases of financial crimes, aggravated criminal damage in English law, and aggravated cases of arson, kidnapping, burglary, or robbery which result in death or grievous bodily harm, piracy, aircraft hijacking, and in certain cases genocide, ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity, certain war crimes or any three felonies in case of three-strikes law. Life imprisonment can also be imposed, in certain countries, for traffic offenses causing death. The life sentence does not exist in all countries: Portugal was the first to abolish life imprisonment, in 1884.

Restorative justice approach to justice where victims and perpetrators mediate a restitution agreement

Restorative justice is an approach to justice in which one of the responses to a crime is to organize a meeting between the victim and the offender, sometimes with representatives of the wider community. The goal is for them to share their experience of what happened, to discuss who was harmed by the crime and how, and to create a consensus for what the offender can do to repair the harm from the offense. This may include a payment of money given from the offender to the victim, apologies and other amends, and other actions to compensate those affected and to prevent the offender from causing future harm.

Mandatory sentencing requires that offenders serve a predefined term for certain crimes, commonly serious and violent offenses. Judges are bound by law; these sentences are produced through the legislature, not the judicial system. They are instituted to expedite the sentencing process and limit the possibility of irregularity of outcomes due to judicial discretion. Mandatory sentences are typically given to people who are convicted of certain serious and/or violent crimes, and require a prison sentence. Mandatory sentencing laws vary across nations; they are more prevalent in common law jurisdictions because civil law jurisdictions usually prescribe minimum and maximum sentences for every type of crime in explicit laws.

A habitual offender, repeat offender, or career criminal is a person convicted of a new crime who was previously convicted of crimes. Various state and jurisdictions may have laws targeting habitual offenders, and specifically providing for enhanced or exemplary punishments or other sanctions. They are designed to counter criminal recidivism by physical incapacitation via imprisonment.

Crime in Sweden

Crime in Sweden describes an act defined in the Swedish Penal Code or in another Swedish law or statutory instrument for which a sanction is prescribed.

Deterrence (penology) the use of punishment as a threat to deter people from offending

Deterrence in relation to criminal offending is the idea or theory that the threat of punishment will deter people from committing crime and reduce the probability and/or level of offending in society. It is one of five objectives that punishment is thought to achieve; the other four objectives are denunciation, incapacitation, retribution and rehabilitation.

Multiple deprivation index

Indices of multiple deprivation (IMD) are widely-used datasets within the UK to classify the relative deprivation of small areas. Multiple components of deprivation are weighted with different strengths and compiled into a single score of deprivation.

Youth justice system in England and Wales comprises the organs and processes that are used to prosecute, convict and punish persons under 18 years of age who commit criminal offences. The principal aim of the youth justice system is to prevent offending by children and young persons.

Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 United Kingdom legislation

The Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which makes significant changes in many areas of the criminal justice system in England and Wales and, to a lesser extent, in Scotland and Northern Ireland. In particular, it changes the law relating to custodial sentences and the early release of prisoners to reduce prison overcrowding, which reached crisis levels in 2008. It also reduces the right of prison officers to take industrial action, and changed the law on the deportation of foreign criminals. It received royal assent on 8 May 2008, but most of its provisions came into force on various later dates. Many sections came into force on 14 July 2008.

Lawrence W. Sherman is an American experimental criminologist and police educator who is the founder of evidence-based policing.

A sex offender registry is a system in various countries designed to allow government authorities to keep track of the activities of sex offenders, including those who have completed their criminal sentences. In some jurisdictions, registration is accompanied by residential address notification requirements. In many jurisdictions, registered sex offenders are subject to additional restrictions, including on housing. Those on parole or probation may be subject to restrictions that do not apply to other parolees or probationers. Sometimes, these include restrictions on being in the presence of underage persons, living in proximity to a school or day care center, owning toys or items targeted towards children, or using the Internet. Registered sex offenders are not allowed to sign up for or use Facebook or other social media platforms. Sex offender registries exist in many English-speaking countries, including Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United States, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, South Africa, the United Kingdom, Israel and the Republic of Ireland. The United States is the only country with a registry that is publicly accessible; all other countries in the English-speaking world have sex offender registries only accessible by law enforcement.

Indefinite imprisonment or indeterminate imprisonment is the imposition of a sentence by imprisonment with no definite period of time set during sentencing. It was imposed by certain nations in the past, before the drafting of the United Nations Convention against Torture (CAT). The length of an indefinite imprisonment was determined during imprisonment based on the inmate's conduct. The inmate could have been returned to society or be kept in prison for life. Such a sentence is unconstitutional today, particularly in the United States.

Crime in New Zealand encompasses criminal law, crime statistics, the nature and characteristics of crime, sentencing, punishment, and public perceptions of crime. New Zealand criminal law has its origins in English criminal law, which was codified into statute by the New Zealand parliament in 1893. Although New Zealand remains a common law jurisdiction, all criminal offences and their penalties are codified in New Zealand statutes.

Life imprisonment has been the most severe criminal sentence in New Zealand since the death penalty was abolished in 1989 having not been applied since 1957. Offenders sentenced to life imprisonment must serve a minimum of 10 years imprisonment before they are eligible for parole, although the sentencing judge may set a longer minimum period or no minimum period at all. Released offenders remain on parole and are subject to electronic tagging for the rest of their life.

Sentencing in England and Wales refers to a bench of magistrates or district judge in a magistrate's court or a judge in the Crown Court passing sentence on a person found guilty of a criminal offence. In deciding the sentence, the court will take into account a number of factors: the type of offence and how serious it is, the timing of any plea of guilty, the defendant's character and antecedents, including his/her criminal record and the defendant's personal circumstances such as their financial circumstances in the case of a fine being imposed.

Crime in Finland

Crime in Finland is combated by the Finnish police and other agencies.

2014 California Proposition 47 measure reducing the criminal penalties on many nonviolent drug and property crimes from felonies to misdemeanors

Proposition 47, also known by its ballot title Criminal Sentences. Misdemeanor Penalties. Initiative Statute, was a referendum passed by voters in the state of California on November 4, 2014. The measure was also referred to by its supporters as the Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act. It recategorized some nonviolent offenses as misdemeanors, rather than felonies, as they had previously been categorized.

Scottish Sentencing Council

The Scottish Sentencing Council is an advisory non-departmental public body in Scotland that produces sentencing guidelines for use in the High Court of Justiciary, sheriff courts and justice of the peace courts. Judges, sheriffs, and justices of the peace must use the guidelines to inform the sentence they pronounce against a convict, and they must give reasons for not following the guidelines.

Experimental criminology

Experimental criminology is a field within criminology that uses scientific experiments to answer questions about crime: its prevention, punishment and harm.. These experiments are primarily conducted in real-life settings, rather than in laboratories. From policing to prosecution to probation, prisons and parole, these field experiments compare similar units with different practices for dealing with crime and responses to crime. These units can be individual suspects or offenders, people, places, neighborhoods, times of day, gangs, or even police officers or judges. The experiments often use random assignment to create similar units in both a "treatment" and a "control" group, with the "control" sometimes consisting of the current way of dealing with crime and the "treatment" a new way of doing so.. Such experiments, while not perfect, are generally considered to be the best available way to estimate the cause and effect relationship of one variable to another. Other research designs not using random assignment are also considered to be experiments because they entail human manipulation of the causal relationships being tested.

Joseph McCann is an English-born Scottish–Irish traveller and serial rapist. In April and May 2019, McCann committed sexual attacks in Hertfordshire, London, Greater Manchester and Cheshire against 11 strangers, ranging in age from an 11-year-old boy to a 71-year-old woman. He evaded police, who suspect that he was sheltered by a "support network" across the country. For these crimes, he was tried at the Old Bailey and, on 6 December, convicted of 37 offences. Three days later, he was given 33 life sentences.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Sherman, Lawrence; Neyroud, Peter William; Neyroud, Eleanor (3 April 2016). "The Cambridge Crime Harm Index: Measuring Total Harm from Crime Based on Sentencing Guidelines". Policing. 10 (3): 171–183. doi: 10.1093/police/paw003 .
  2. 1 2 "Crime: measuring by 'damage to victims' will improve policing and public safety". Cambridge University. 4 April 2016. Retrieved 15 November 2017.
  3. "Bobbies on the spreadsheet - Measuring crime". The Economist. 1 September 2016. Retrieved 15 November 2017.
  4. Curtis-Ham, Sophie; Walton, Darren (23 August 2017). "The New Zealand Crime Harm Index: Quantifying Harm Using Sentencing Data". Policing: A Journal of Policy and Practice. 12 (4): 455–467. doi:10.1093/police/pax050.
  5. Anderson, Helle Aagard; Mueller-Johnson, Katrin (7 May 2018). "The Danish Crime Harm Index: How It Works and Why It Matters". Cambridge Journal of Evidence-Based Policing. 2 (1–2): 52–69. doi: 10.1007/s41887-018-0021-7 .
  6. House, Paul; Neyroud, Peter (9 May 2018). "Developing a Crime Harm Index for Western Australia: the WACHI". Cambridge Journal of Evidence-Based Policing. 2 (1–2): 70–94. doi: 10.1007/s41887-018-0022-6 .
  7. Knight, Laura; Hill, Dave (21 April 2017). "BLOG: Is the Crime Harm Index the future? – By Dr Laura Knight and Supt. Dave Hill". EMPAC. Retrieved 7 December 2017.