The genuine victim and prosecutors’ charging decisions in sexual assault cases

This study examined the effect of victim characteristics and evidence factors on prosecutors’ decisions to file charges in sexual assault cases. Social scientists and legal scholars argue that sexual assault case processing decisions are affected by stereotypes of real rapes and genuine victims. They assert that complainants whose backgrounds and behavior conform to the image of a genuine victim will be taken more seriously, and their allegations treated more seriously, than complainants whose backgrounds and behavior are at odds with this image. We used a sample of arrests for sexual assault made by the Detroit Police Department in 1989 to test these assertions. We combined six victim characteristics to create a genuine victim scale, and we examined the effect of this scale, as well as a number of evidence factors, on prosecutors’ charging decisions. We performed separate analyses on cases with child victims and cases with adolescent or adult victims. We found that the genuine victim scale did not influence charging decisions in cases with child victims, but was theonly significant predictor in cases involving adolescent or adult victims. In contrast, none of the four evidence factors affected charging in cases with adult victims, and only one of these factors was related to charging in cases involving children. These findings suggest that prosecutors attempt to avoid uncertainty by screening out sexual assault cases unlikely to result in a conviction because of questions about the victim’s character, the victim’s behavior, and the victim’s credibility. This paper is based on work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. SES-9010826. Points of view are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the position of the National Science Foundataion.     

Disappearing Without a Moral Trace? Rights and Compensation During Times of Emergency*

Scholars are divided over whether a victim’s rights persist when an agent permissibly responds to an emergency. According to the prevailing view the moral force of rights is not extinguished by moral permissibility and the agent, therefore, has a duty to compensate the victim. According to another influential view permissibility does erase the moral force of rights and the agent, therefore, can only have a duty to compensate for reasons other than the fact that they committed a rights transgression. I argue that liability does not follow even if we grant that the victim’s rights persevere. A non-pecuniary remedy such as a formal apology provides an adequate way of vindicating the victim’s rights and of recognizing the agent’s causal role. Thus, the answer to the question of what remedy the permissible transgressor owes the victim does not provide us with an answer to the question of who should bear the burden.     

Left Realism,community and state-building

Left Realism, as it emerged in the mid 1980s in the UK was a policy-oriented intervention focusing on the reality of crime for the working class victim and the need to elaborate a socialist alternative to conservative emphases on ‘law and order’. It saw the renewal of high crime, deprived communities as involving democratic police accountability to those communities. During the subsequent period developments have moved very much against the orientations of Left Realism. This paper compares two different contexts of renewal—the deprived urban community in the UK and the war-torn ‘failed state’ in Bosnia—and identifies certain common policy orientations which are then criticised from a Left Realist perspective.     

Complainant emotional expressions and perceived credibility: Exploring the role of perceivers’ facial mimicry and empathy

Purpose

This research investigated the roles of perceivers’ facial mimicry and empathy in the emotional victim effect (EVE) – the finding that complainants tend to appear more credible when exhibiting (vs. not exhibiting) negative emotional displays during their statements. Because facial mimicry plays a key role in empathic responding, it was hypothesized that inhibiting and facilitating perceivers’ mimicry would attenuate and amplify the EVE, respectively.

Methods

Participants (N = 362) in an experiment were instructed to mimic or not to mimic facial expressions (controls received no mimicry instructions) while watching a statement by an emotional or non‐emotional rape complainant. Participants rated the complainant's believability and the extent to which they experienced cognitive and affective empathy.

Results

The perceived believability of the complainant was not affected by complainant emotions, thus failing to replicate the EVE. However, the inhibition of mimicry unexpectedly reduced the perceived believability of the complainant, apparently by decreasing participants’ cognitive empathy.

Conclusions

The current findings suggest that mimicry inhibition may increase scepticism in the context of credibility assessment. This has important implications for decision‐making in legal settings and for research on the process of credibility attribution. Moreover, the failure to replicate the EVE adds to the cumulative evidence on the underlying effect size for the phenomenon.     

Talking Heads and Bleeding Hearts: Newsmaking, Emotion and Public Criminology in the Wake of a Sexual Assault

Using our own experiences in attempting to ‘do’ public criminology in the wake of a violent sexual assault on our campus, we offer a critique of the emerging public criminology framework. Focusing specifically on tensions between fact and emotion and representations of expertise in the news media, we argue for a greater respect for emotional responses to crime in moving the public criminology agenda forward. We suggest that if public criminology sets as its goal educating the public about crime with an eye towards injecting a counter/critical discourse into ‘get tough’ crime control policies, then public criminologists need to recognize and take seriously the public’s emotions rather than negate them. Drawing on the work of Ahmed (The cultural politics of emotion. Routledge, London, 2004), we suggest that the role of the expert is not to simply inform citizens of the ‘facts’ about crime, but to establish—through emotions—the relationship between themselves and the imagined criminal Other (Young in Imagining crime: Textual outlaws and criminal conversations. Sage Publications, London, 1996). Thus, alongside trying to convince the public to be more ‘rational’ when it comes to crime, critical criminologists must start to accept people’s fear and anger as legitimate reactions and try to redirect these emotions toward more productive ends.     

Effects of Victimization on the Belief in a Just World in Four Ex-Yugoslavian Countries

Levels of support for just world beliefs among young adults (N = 598) from four ex-Yugoslavian countries—Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, and Slovenia—were compared, taking into account victimization experiences and the general belief in a just world. Being a victim affected an individual’s belief in a just world in the two less economically favored contexts: Victims of exclusion in Macedonia and victims of war in Bosnia and Herzegovina were less likely to believe in a just world than non-victims. These victimization variables partly explained why the mean scores of these two countries were less than those of the two others. A deleterious effect of cumulative negative events on belief in a just world was identified, in parallel with a lower endorsement of the belief when the first victimization occurred more recently.     

<Emphasis Type="Italic">Random Activities Theory</Emphasis>: The Case for ‘Black Swan’ Criminology

In the United States, infamous crimes against innocent victims—especially children—have repeatedly been regarded as justice system “failures” and resulted in reactionary legislation enacted without regard to prospective negative consequences. This pattern in part results when ‘memorial crime control’ advocates implicitly but inappropriately apply the tenets of routine activities theory, wherein crime prevention is presumed to be achievable by hardening likely targets, increasing the costs associated with crime commission, and removing criminal opportunity. In response, the authors argue that academic and public policy discourse will benefit from the inclusion of a new criminological perspective called random activities theory, in which tragic crimes are framed as rare but statistically inevitable ‘Black Swans’ instead of justice system failures. Potential objections and implications for public policy are discussed at length.     

A Timely Jurisprudence for a Changing World

This article is an innovative piece and at the same time—a timely piece, in a world of global warming. A time in which fierce scientific debates are being fought over anthropogenic impact. Yet the general public would appear to ‘feel’ the change, without any need for measurement and contesting of findings. This ‘feeling’ is manifest in the Earth Hour. It is this collective act which I would argue is borne out of feelings for the earth. Feelings which tell people instinctively a change in behaviour is needed. This article therefore examines the semiotics of a jurisprudence which is premised on feelings. Feelings towards the Djang—a primordial force expounded by the Australian Aboriginal Senior Law Man Bill Neidjie of the world heritage listed—Kakadu National Park, Australia. He foresaw the climatic shifts and wanted to assist European Australians—Balanda to help avert the possible consequence.     

Expectancy violation and perceptions of rape victim credibility

Purpose. Rape victims have been found to have a heightened risk of secondary victimization in the legal system through biased perceptions of their credibility. In this study, participants observed a video of a rape victim reporting the crime and evaluated her credibility, to establish the influence of victim emotional expressiveness on evaluations of victim credibility. Methods. The nonverbal (eye‐contact, crying) and paralinguistic (tone of voice) behaviour of the rape victim was manipulated such that the emotional presentation viewed by observers was either expressive, or not expressive. One hundred and thirty seven participants were randomly allocated to observe a videotape of either an expressive or a non‐expressive victim. Participants’ specific expectations about the emotional expressiveness of rape victims in general were also measured. Results. Results revealed no significant main effect of emotional expressiveness on perceptions of credibility. However, among participants with a strong expectation of emotional expressiveness, a rape victim who was emotionally expressive was perceived to be significantly more credible than a victim who was not emotionally expressive. Conclusions. It appears to be expectancy violation rather than emotional expressiveness per se that biases observers’ perceptions of rape victim credibility.     

Why Victims of Intimate Partner Violence Withdraw Protection Orders

While reasons for returning to abusive partners have received considerable attention in research on intimate partner violence, few studies have examined the reasons why victims fail to follow through with the protection order process, regardless of whether or not they return to their abusive partners. Fifty-five women who were in the process of withdrawing a protection order against a male intimate partner were surveyed in the present analysis. Recognizing that reasons given for withdrawing a protection order often follow common themes, individual responses were organized into several “domains,” or groupings of such reasons. The most commonly cited domain involved a “concrete change” on behalf of the victim or defendant, which made the protection order less necessary in the victim’s view. This was closely followed by the domain addressing emotional attachment to the abuser. Implications for future research and policy are discussed.     

Becoming-Animal,Becoming-Detainee: Encountering Human Rights Discourse in Guantanamo

The Guantanamo detention facility, from its early days an emblem for human rights abuses, is a space where legal subjectivity of detainees is contested or even permanently suspended. This essay argues that we should look for the underlying rationale for this treatment not in the politicians who pursue intelligence, security, and strategic interest, or indeed even revenge for 9/11, but rather in the logic—or the ontology—that drives the present political and legal system. This is not to say, of course, that politicians play no role, or that they are mere ‘victims’ of social and political power relations—far from it; yet, it has to be acknowledged that the foundational assumptions on which the existing system operates create conditions of possibility for such degrading actions and exclusionary politics. This paper will first explore these philosophical foundations that enable such an understanding of exclusionary legal subjectivity as we see practiced in Guantanamo, amongst other places; secondly, it will search for an alternative logic of legal subjectivity as a ‘foundation’ for rights. Gilles Deleuze’s notion of ‘becoming’ as a potentially facilitative practice for an ‘open’ notion of legal subjectivity, as well as Alain Badiou’s account of ethics and evil, which points to a more ‘inclusive’ yet ‘situational’ understanding of human rights, will prove particularly useful here.     

‘Schooling’ and the ‘Naturalization’ of racial injustice

Despite various government initiatives that have emerged in response to Canada's increasing racial diversification, the unjust treatment of racial minorities remains a problem. By examining the contracdictions between ideology and practice within an educational context, this paper provides an explanation of why government efforts direced towards the eradication of racial injustice have been relatively ineffective. The continued mistreatment of racial minorities is, in part, attributable to the promotion of a particular form of justice that ‘naturalizes’ racism. First, a reformulation of the relationship among the concepts of justice, ideology, and complementarity generates an analytical framework within which to address the problem of ‘naturalization’. The latter part of the paper examines the ‘naturalization’ of inequality generally, and racial inequality specifically, within education. A critical review of the teaching of Canadian history and Philippe Rushton's controversial theory demonstrates how education currently—but not inevitably—reinforces negative racial stereotypes, inviting the unjust treatment of racial minorities to remain unquestioned.     

Re-Conceptualising the Policing of Hatred: Confessions and Worrying Dilemmas of a Consultant

Community Safety Units in the London Metropolitan Police handle over 9000 reported incidents of ‘hate’ crime each month. This paper explores the work of these Units through its conceptualisation of the notion of vulnerability. The workload of the CSUs includes domestic, racist and homophobic incidents. The victim/perpetrator relationship, it is assumed, provides special motivation for the offender's violence and requires police to consider special support for the victim. The paper begins with an exploration of how the MPS conceptualises ‘hate crime’. Its rationale for dedicated resources for the policing of particular forms of violence can be found, I suggest in the second part of the paper, in the way in which violence itself is conceptualised. I then offer a different term for thinking about hate crime – targeted violence. I go on to argue in depth how the(faulty) logic about violence obscures our ability to take people's ordinary experiences of intimidation, threat and bodily harm seriously in law and in society. The term ‘hate crime’, I conclude, in advertently reinforces this (faulty) logic. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

The end of organised crime in the European Union

So much has been written—and vigorously contested—about ‘organised crime’ (OC) that the impending fall of this familiar icon may come as a shock, both to its detractors and to those who take it for granted. Yet that moment may be upon us, for reasons that this paper will explore, as the European Union shifts the vocabulary within which policies on police cooperation are articulated. A pivot of this change is the EU Council Decision on Europol, first debated by the Council in late 2006 and anticipated as applying from 2010 onwards. This will shift the scope of Europol’s work from ‘organised crime’ (attributing qualities to criminality) to ‘serious crime’ (concern with impacts and harms falling on individual and collective victims); will transfer financing of Europol to the Community budget; and so will initiate parliamentary scrutiny. These issues in security governance are explored from ‘northern’, ‘southern’ and ‘eastern’ European perspectives and in the contexts of ongoing enlargement and democratisation of the EU.

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Allergologies Versus Homeopathies

This paper is a reconstruction of Levinas’ reading of Hegel and his understanding of violence (of the enemy and the war). Combining Franz Rosenzweig’s reflections which concern the sick philosopher and Hegel’s state, as well as Derrida’s interpretation of the different attributes of violence, our aim is also to give full evidence of Derrida’s critical reading of Levinas. The first part illustrates the various classifications of the figures of violence from the different periods of Hegel’s life and the traces that these figures have left in Levinas’ texts beginning with ‘Liberté et commandement’ in 1953. In the second part we discuss Hegel’s well-known analogy from his Rechtsphilosophie on sovereignty and the organism—that is to say the parallel reading of some paragraphs of Naturphilosophie too—and the relation between totality and violence, in Levinas’ ‘ontology as allergy’ and in Derrida’s autoimmunology.     

Racist Offenders and the Politics of ‘Hate Crime’

In the UK and USA ‘Hate crime’ has become a topic of public controversy and social mobilization around issues of violence and harassment. This has largely but not exclusively addressed racism, homophobia and gender based violence. This article has three objectives. First, to situate hate crime legislation within a broad theory of modernity;secondly to examine the politics of its emergence as a public issue; thirdly to use data from the authors' recent research in Greater Manchester to illuminate the complexity of the concept of ‘hate crime’. The centrality of ‘hate crime’ to current debates derives from the importance of rights-based regulation of complex societies and the juridical management of emotional life. Hatred and violence have become problematic behaviour thrown into relief by a long term civilizing process. Hate crimes have thus acquired powerful rhetorical focus for mobilization of victim and identity politics. With reference to racist violence in Oldham and elsewhere in Greater Manchester, we argue that in its application and construction, however, ‘hate crime’ is a complex phenomenon that might dramatize rather than regulate the problems it seeks to address. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Heteronormativity and the European Court of Human Rights

This article examines a recent judgment by the European Court of Human Rights (E.B. v France) that upheld the complaint of a homosexual woman who alleged that her application for authorization to adopt a child had been refused by domestic French authorities on the grounds of her sexual orientation. I argue that the judgment constitutes an innovative and atypical legal consideration of, and challenge to, the heteronormative social relations of contemporary European societies. After exploring the evidence presented by the applicant, and the Court’s interpretation of it, I argue that in order to reach its judgment it was necessary for the Court to make a significant departure from its established jurisprudence in relation to sexual orientation. An essential element of this involved the adoption of a distinctive critical approach, strongly resonant with aspects of ‘queer theory’, which focused attention on the social, cultural and political construction of normative heterosexuality. Whilst a number of commentators have assessed the importance of the judgment in terms of its evolution of ‘gay rights’ in the area of family life, I argue that the Court’s reconceptualized ‘theoretical’ understanding of, and critical approach to, heteronormativity offers the potential to expand the scope of the European Convention on Human Rights across a number of areas of social life—in marriage, public assembly, freedom of expression, as well as family life—where non-heterosexuals continue to face discrimination in contemporary Europe.     

I Spy with My Little Eye: Jurors’ Detection of Internal Validity Threats in Expert Evidence

This experiment examined whether jury-eligible community members (N = 223) were able to detect internally invalid psychological science presented at trial. Participants read a simulated child sexual abuse case in which the defense expert described a study he had conducted on witness memory and suggestibility. We varied the study’s internal validity (valid, missing control group, confound, and experimenter bias) and publication status (published, unpublished). Expert evidence quality ratings were higher for the valid versus missing control group version only. Publication increased ratings of defendant guilt when the study was missing a control group. Variations in internal validity did not influence perceptions of child victim credibility or police interview quality. Participants’ limited detection of internal validity threats underscores the need to examine the effectiveness of traditional legal safeguards against junk science in court and improve the scientific reasoning ability of lay people and legal professionals.     

You shouldn't feel that way! Extending the emotional victim effect through the mediating role of expectancy violation

Recent research has shown that the ‘emotional victim effect’ (an emotional victim is more readily believed than a nonemotional victim) is mediated by expectancy violation: people base their judgments about a victim's credibility on their expectations of the victim's suffering. Victims whose behavior is inconsistent with these expectations suffer a loss of credibility. In this article, we further examine the role of expectancy violation and explore possible negative effects of a victim's highly emotional post-crime reaction. Using several mediations, we demonstrate three important contributions to the existing literature. First, we demonstrate that, in the same way as expectancy violation mediates the effect from nonverbal emotional expression on perceived credibility, this mediating effect would also hold for the verbal expression of emotions. Second, we demonstrate that expectancy violation mediates the effect from a victim's verbal emotional expression on the observer's attitude toward the victim. More specifically, we demonstrate that a highly emotional written Victim Impact Statement (VIS) could lead to secondary victimization, dependent on the observer's expectations regarding the effects of the crime. Third, this article is the first to demonstrate that expectancy violation leads to a negative effect on people's acceptance of the VIS in the criminal justice procedure.