Patterns in official statistics
- Class: working-class people are over-represented in official crime statistics and prisons. But white-collar and corporate crime is less likely to be detected or prosecuted.
- Gender: most offenders convicted are male, especially for violent crime. Women are more likely to be convicted of offences such as shoplifting.
- Age: offending peaks in the late teens and early twenties, then falls.
- Ethnicity: Black people are over-represented in stop and search and prison statistics. Explanations include police racism and targeting, as well as social and economic disadvantage.
- Locality: crime rates are generally higher in urban areas than rural ones, such as in Guernsey's quieter parishes compared with big cities.
Explaining the patterns
- Official statistics may reflect policing practices and labelling rather than who really commits crime.
- Poverty and lack of opportunity may explain some patterns, as may gender socialisation (boys encouraged to be aggressive and take risks).
Victims
- Young men are the group most likely to be victims of violent crime; women are more likely to be victims of domestic abuse and sexual offences.
Key terms
- Official statistics
- Numbers collected by the government, such as police recorded crime.
- Corporate crime
- Crime committed by companies for their benefit.
- Stop and search
- Police powers to stop and search people.
- Over-representation
- A group appearing more in statistics than its share of the population.
- Locality
- The area where crime happens.
- Gender socialisation
- Learning expected behaviour for one's gender.