2.2 Patterns and trends content

• What are the two main types of official crime statistics?

  1. Police recorded crime
  2. the Crime Survey for England and Wales
• What do PRC statistics exclude (3 things - negative)

  1. Exclude summary offences
  2. Inevitably exclude crimes not reported to or detected by the police
  3. Not all crimes reported to the police are recorded by them
• What does the CSEW involve?

  Involves a large representative sample of adults who are interviewed at home and asked about their experience of being a victim in the past year and whether they reported these crimes to the police.
• What is a strength of the CSEW?

  It picks up on crimes that have not been reported to the police or that have been reported but not recorded. High response rate which increases validity.
• What are limitations of the CSEW?

  • Doesn't include some crimes due to its nature as a victim survey (eg murder) or victimless crimes
  • Doesn't include most types of corporate and environmental crime
  • People who live outside households such as the homeless and those in prison are not part of the sample and they are likely to have high rates of victimisation.
• How is the 'crime problem' often thought about?

  In terms of crimes covered by the official statistics but they don't cover all crimes.
• What is white-collar crime?

  Crime committed by people in higher-status positions and includes fraud, embezzlement, workplace theft and individual tax evasion.
• What is corporate crime?

  Crime committed by organisations. The main categories are financial crime, crimes against consumers, crimes associated with employment relationships and environmental crime. There are no official statistics for corporate crime.
• What are SOC and TOC?

  SOC - serious organised crime

  TOC - Transnational serious organised crime
• What type of crime has globalisation been associated with?

  The growth of transnational serious organised crime.
• What does TOC involve?

  Crimes such as drug trafficking, human trafficking, illegal trading in firearms, wildlife and cybercrime.
• How is TOC increasingly carried out?

  By relatively loose-knit social networks of criminals acting across national boundaries.