Criminal Victimization Surveys:
Whom to Question?
Alfredas Kiškis,
Mykolas Romeris University Faculty of Law
[email protected]
This research was funded by a grant (No. SIN-08/2010)
from the Research Council of Lithuania
27th Baltic Criminological Conference, Vilnius
27 June 2014
Criminal Victimization Surveys

Measure rates of:



victims (have you suffered from...)
crimes (how many times have you
suffered...)
Two types of respondents (crimes):


Households (household break-in, car
theft, theft from a car, etc.)
Individuals (robbery, theft of personal
property, sexual offenses, assault, etc.)
2
The problem of assessing prevalence
rate of crimes


We need numbers of crimes and numbers of victims.
Using household surveys:



We try to avoid situations where several individuals suffer
from the same crime.
It helps to calculate crime rate more precisely.
But from individual surveys it is seen that there are
situations when several persons suffer from the same
offense:



Robbers can rob a few people at the same time;
Drunken man at home can beat his wife and children...
There is one crime, but several victims.
3
How to solve this problem?

We can include the question in questionnaire:
How many other people suffered
from the same crime (incident) as
you (you know it exactly)?


Then we would question only individuals, not
the households.
It‘s cheaper and more accurate.
4
The survey




Representative survey was conducted from
24 February to 31 March 2012.
The investigation territory was Lithuania.
2.006 residents aged between 15 and 74
were interviewed.
The investigation period was 2011.
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Type of criminal offence
Respondents
that suffered
Additional
individuals
that
suffered
Additional
individuals
that suffered
,%
Total
persons
that
suffered
41
134
327%
175
8
10
125%
18
Violation of public order
83
73
88%
156
Causing physical pain or
health impairment
78
50
64%
128
Unlawful influence on el. data
23
14
61%
37
114
49
43%
163
Offering, giving or selling
drugs
63
19
30%
82
Threatening to murder or
terrorising
34
10
29%
44
205
45
22%
250
Robbery
34
7
21%
41
Sexual harassment
38
4
11%
42
152
10
7%
162
1
0
0%
1
874
425
49%
1299
6
Fraud
Extortion of property
Destruction of or damage to
property
Theft
Claim a bribe
Sexual assault
TOTAL
Assessed prevalence rate of crimes
per 100 thousand inhabitants
100.000
Number of crimes (incidents) x
xC
2.006
Number of respondents that suffered
, where C =
Total number of persons that suffered
C≤1
In this case C = 0,49
7