Review- Presentations on crime Sonia Jackson Jamaica

Definitions Definitions from the Concise Oxford :  Criminal is “a person who has committed a crime”  Crime is “an offence punishable by law”

Concept - Criminality Italy 3 types a) Real Criminality – the whole crime set in a specific place & time; wether reported or not b) Reported Criminality – those incidents that have been reported & recorded c) Hidden Criminality – events that occur but not reported Ireland The information provided by the police and the criminal justice system  Jamaica The reports focus on the crimes that are reported and taken through the various systems. There are concerns about crimes that are not reported. The concept of innocent until proven guilty applies in all cases.

Data sources Italy  Police  Courts System  Penal system Through the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Interior to the CSO Victimization surveys Ireland  Police  Courts System  Penal system To the CSO Victimization surveys Jamaica  Police  Courts System  Penal system Victimization Survey – 2006

Quality Assurance Italy CSO does quality assurance checks before statistics are released. The data system is automated but data gaps still exist (no information on data gaps) Ireland CSO does quality assurance checks – data cleaning and number checks. Data system are not yet fully integrated Jamaica Statistics on the various sections are administrative records and no information has been provided on quality assurance checks. Data systems are not integrated – efforts are being made to integrate the system

Classification  Italy 6 broad categories: Crime against a) the person; b) households, moral; c) Property; d) the state, other social & public institutions; e) the economy & public faith; and f) Organized crime  Ireland There is a formal classification system with 16 groups & 3 layers administered by the CSO (since 2006)  Jamaica 3 broad categories (a) Offences against the person (b) Offences against Property (c) Miscellaneous Motor vehicle accidents, particularly those involving deaths, are monitored as separately.

Victimisation surveys Victimization Surveys (VS) are used to:  Validate crime data  Test incidence and prevalence  Subjective indicators such as fear  Analyse reporting behaviour VS have been used by both Italy & Ireland; Jamaica did its first survey in 2006.

Special topics Italy – violence against women Ireland – none indicated Jamaica – growing concerns  Link between different types of crimes – e.g. illegal drugs and illegal import of ammunitions – gang warfare  The correlation between “deportees” with criminal records and the increase in crime in some communities  Corruption/extortion

Dissemination ItalyIrelandJamaica By geographic region√√√ By categories of crime√√√ By sex of offenders√√√ By sex of victims√√√ Periodicity

Recommendations There needs to be a standard classification for reporting crime statistics at the international level; Information on crime needs to differentiate between “reporting” and “conviction”; Guidelines need to be developed for the collection and analysis of crime data – these are to be developed in conjunction with the police, the CSO, the representatives of the justice and the penal systems and any other major stakeholder; Data collection on the perpetrators should include information on family history as well as some data on the community; Targets and strategies for intervention at the national level need to be established (similar to the MDGs and poverty reduction) Guidelines need to be developed for the conduct and analysis of victimization surveys – like other household; and Country specific problems require special studies and the methodology outlined in the paper by Italy is recommended.