International Statistics on Crime and Justice, UNODC, Study notes of Statistics

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E U R O P E A N I N S T I T U T E F O R

CRIME PREVENTION AND CONTROL,

AFFILIATED WITH THE UNITED NATIONS

Edited by

S. Harrendorf, M. Heiskanen, S. Malby

INTERNATIONAL STATISTICS

on CRIME AND JUSTICE

EuropeanInstitutefor UnitedNationsOfficeonDrugsandCrime(UNODC) CrimePreventionandControl, POBox 500  AffiliatedwiththeUnitedNations(HEUNI) 1400 Vienna P.O.Box 444  Austria FINǦ 00531 Helsinki Finland

HEUNI Publication Series No. 64

StefanHarrendorf,MarkkuHeiskanen,StevenMalby(eds.)    InternationalStatisticsonCrimeandJustice

             

Helsinki 2010 

International Statistics on Crime and Criminal Justice

Contents



 Introduction …………………………………………………………………………………..............................................

KaukoAromaa

1  Homicide …………………………………………………………………………………….................................................

StevenMalby

2  TrendsinpoliceǦrecordedcrime ……………………………………………………………………………….............

MarkkuHeiskanen

3  Drugcrime …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………...............

StevenMalby

4  Complexcrimes …………………………………………………………………………….............................................

AnnaAlvazzidelFrate

5  Responsesofthecriminaljusticesystem ………………………………………………...............................

PaulSmitandStefanHarrendorf

6  Attributesofcriminaljusticesystems–resources,performanceandpunitivity …………..

StefanHarrendorfandPaulSmit

7  Trendsinworldprisonpopulation ………………………………………………………………………………………

RoyWalmsley

8  Crimeandcriminaljusticestatisticschallenges ………………………………………………………………..

AnnaAlvazzidelFrate

Forthoseinneedofimprovingtheirstatistics,the UNODC has been working on a support and assistanceapproachwhichisalsobearingfruitin the long term. Those   that, for a multiplicity of reasons, have failed to respond to theSurveysalthoughtheyareinthepossessionof the relevant data, should take this task more seriouslyinthefuture.Thiswouldalsobeintheir owninterestastheywouldbenefitfromknowing their position in a global dataset. Also others in the global community would be keen to know how others have been doing in core issues of crimeandcriminaljustice.

Some of the unavoidable delay problems have been partially resolved by the UNODC in that they publish some data from the country responses on their website as soon as they are made available by the   The advantageisthatthedelayisasshortasitcanbe under the circumstances, where national responsesarethebasis.Ofcourse,beforethereis a national response, nothing can be made available.Itisthereforeofparamountimportance that delays caused by  tates are minimized. –The drawback of the UNODC solutionisthatthe informationonthewebsiteis not –  and cannot be –  validated and processed, leaving the potential user without expert assistance when trying to interpret the data. It is highly problematic and perhaps not advisable at all to publish raw data of this kind without adequatecommentaryregardingknownproblems related to its validity and interpretation problems.

The tenǦyear time span applied should illustrate that for many criteria, it is often of no massive importance that the data are never fully up to date:manyofthetrendsdisplayedcanbeseento be rather stable, meaning that simple basic indicators of features of recorded crime and operationsofthecriminaljusticesystemareoften of a rather robust nature. Consequently, a large proportion of the presented data and findings, even if outdated, are unlikely to change significantly from one year to another. Consequently,thecurrentdelay inthe timeliness of the presented data is mostly of no major concern.Themostobviousexceptionsare

countries undergoing irregular rapid transformations –  for such countries, however, a UNǦCTSishardlyofimmediateinterestanyway. We have not reproduced the data collection instruments in this volume. Due to various changesovertime,eachUNǦCTSquestionnaireis slightly different. The questionnaires can be foundinallUNlanguagesattheaddress: http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/dataǦandǦ analysis/Ninth(Tenth)ǦUnitedǦNationsǦSurveyǦ onǦCrimeǦTrendsǦandǦtheǦOperationsǦofǦ CriminalǦJusticeǦSystems.html The report comprises eight chapters. They are designedtodealwithallcentral issuesaddressed inthequestionnaires.First,policeǦrecordedcrime isdiscussed,withseparatechaptersonhomicides (chapter 1), other policeǦrecorded crimes (chapter 2), and drugǦrelated crime and drug trafficking (chapter 3). Also, complex crimes are analysedseparately,suchasorganisedcrime,and trafficking in human beings ( hapter 4). Such offenceshaveplayedamarginalroleintraditional crime statistics, and in order to improve the relevance of the data on such offences, new solutions need to be developed. Chapter 5, shifting to the next stage of the criminal justice system, presents data on responses of the criminal justice system, including an innovation where attrition issues are being discussed. A parallel issue to responses of the criminal justice system are resources and performance. These are discussedin  6 wherealsoadiscussionon the punitivity of criminal justice systems is included. Next, a presentation on prison populations of the world closes the analysis of criminal justice data. The last chapter, finally discusses challenges with crime and criminal justice statistics, arguing for the importance of furtherimprovementsinthearea. The objective of this report is to show potential usersofinternationalcrimedatawhattheycould learn from these, and provide guidance as to restrictions, pitfalls and strengths of the unique set of data that is now available thanks to the countriesthathaverespondedtotheUNSurveys.

chapter

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member states

member states.

member s

International Statistics on Crime and Criminal Justice

Homicide

StevenMalby*

Abstract

This chapter presents available data on the crime of intentional homicide –  the intentional killing of a person by another. As one of the most effectively recorded crimes, law enforcement data on intentional homicideistypicallymorereadilyavailablethanforothercrimes.Assuch,ratesofintentionalhomicideper 100,000 population have sometimes been used as a proxy for levels of violent crime or even overall crime. Data from both law enforcement and public health sources may be combined to increase data availability and geographic coverage. Results suggest that the highest homicide levels are found in the Americas and Africa region, with the lowest homicide levels generally incountries in Europe. For those countrieswhere trend data is available, the majority show decreasing or stable homicide rates, with the exception of a number of countries, predominantly in the Americas that show high and increasing rates. Such increases may be linked to the challenges of organized crime, drug trafficking, and gang activity. Significant data challenges remain however, particularly in Africa, where criminal justice data on intentional homicide is presentlyverylimited.

Introduction

The intentional killing of a person by another (‘intentional homicide’) represents the most serious end of the spectrum of violent crime. Recent attention on the issue of armed violence and the growing importance of homicide as an indicator has resulted in increased efforts to improve statistics at international, regional and nationallevels. The results presented in this chapter derive primarily from criminal justice data. Despite varying definitions, ‘homicide’ is perhaps the most widely collected and reported crime in law enforcement and criminal justice statistics. Due toitsseriousness,thekillingofapersontendsto berecordedmoreeffectivelythanothercrimes. Nonetheless, the challenges of crossǦnational comparability are considerable. National legal systems may have different thresholds for categorising a death as intentional homicide. Whilstintentionalhomicideusuallyrequiresthat theperpetratorpurposefullyintendstocausethe death or serious injury of a victim, in some countries a death that occurs in the act or attempted act of another serious crime may also

qualify as ‘intentional’ homicide or murder. Infanticide, assault leading to death and killings carried out by law enforcement officers (acting legitimatelyinthelineofdutyornot)allmayor maynotbeincludedinpoliceǦrecordedstatistics. In addition, differences in police recording practices such as differences in counting units (offences, suspects or cases), whether or not attempted homicide or nonǦintentional homicidesareincludedinpublishedfigures,and the point in the investigation at which a suspiciousdeathisclassifiedashomicideallvary asbetweencountries. Moreover, as forms of organized criminality and stateinsecurity becomeincreasinglyintertwined, the line between violent deaths that occur in armed conflict and those that can be labelled ‘crime’isoftenblurred.Actswhicharelikelytobe recordedbylawenforcementandcriminaljustice institutions as intentional homicide can take place in a wide range of contexts, including the home, family, social or domestic setting, in the courseofburglary,theftorrobbery,orassociated with gang, organized, or drugǦrelated crime.



 *ResearchOfficer,UnitedNationsOfficeonDrugsandCrime(UNODC)

Chapter 1 – Homicide

International Statistics on Crime and Criminal Justice

Homicide

order to produce a single global dataset for one pointintime(UNODC2008). In contrast, this chapter takes the approach of ‘latest available year’ data in order to provide as timely information as possible, whilst also maintainingwidegeographiccoverage. In order to represent the distribution of this nearlyhalfamillionannualhomicidesbyregions oftheworld,figure 1 belowshowstheaverageofa

limited set of countries in each subǦregion (144 countries intotal); being those forwhichat least one criminal justice and  public health value for intentional homicide are available during the period 2003  to 2008. The range of countries for which data is available for each source alone is somewhat greater and it should be noted that average rates calculated on this wider set of countrieswouldbedifferent. 

Figure1.AverageintentionalhomicideratebysubͲregion,latestavailableyear,criminaljusticeand

publichealthdata 

 Note: Figure 1  includes only those countries for which at least one criminal justice and one public health value for intentional homicide are available in the period 2003 Ͳ2008. This is indicated alongside each subͲregion name by the number of countries includedoutofthetotalcountriesinthesubͲregion.

Overall, figure 1  shows comparatively low homicidelevelsincountriesinEurope,Asiaand North America, with reasonable agreement betweencriminal justiceandpublic healthdata. In contrast, both criminal justice and public healthdata(albeitwithlessagreement)indicate significantly higher rates in South America, Central America, the Caribbean, and Southern Africa. Large data discrepancies remain for

Middle,Western,andEasternAfrica.Substantive workonadministrativedatarecordingsystemsin boththecriminaljusticeandpublichealthfields is required in these subǦregions before meaningfulcomparisonscanbemadewithother subǦregionsoftheworld. Figure 1  also reveals the continued existence of signficant data limitations. In particular, very fewcountriesinMiddle,WestandEasternAfrica

0 10 20 30 40 50 60

WesternEurope(8/9countries)

SouthernEurope(12/13countries)

Oceania(3/25countries)

EasternAsia(4/5countries)

NorthernEurope(9/10countries)

WesternAsia(16/18countries)

NorthernAfrica(5/7countries)

SouthernAsia(8/9countries)

NorthernAmerica(2/3countries)

CentralAsia(5/5countries)

SouthͲEasternAsia(8/11countries)

EasternEurope(10/10countries)

Caribbean(9/24countries)

CentralAmerica(8/8countries)

WesternAfrica(9/17countries)

SouthAmerica(12/13countries)

EasternAfrica(9/19countries)

MiddleAfrica(2/9countries)

SouthernAfrica(5/5countries)

Rateper100,000population

CriminalJustice PublicHealth

are able to provide criminal justice data on intentional homicide. Where data is available, significant differences exist as compared with

publichealthfigures.Thelimitationsincriminal justicedataavailabilityinAfricarelativetoother regionsareshowninfigure2.



Figure 2. Availability of criminal justice data on intentional homicide: Countries with at least one

criminaljusticesourceavailable(2003Ͳ2008)

Note:TheboundariesanddesignationsusedonthismapdonotimplyendorsementoracceptancebytheUnitedNations

 For those countries where both criminal justice and public health data are available, significant differences often exist. As shown in figure 1, for nine countries in Western Africa, for example, thepublichealthaveragerateistentimesthatof thecriminaljusticeaveragerate. In countries in both Central America and the Caribbean subǦregions, the average rate of intentionalhomicidereportedbycriminaljustice institutionsishigherthanthatreportedbypublic healthinstitutions.Thismaybeduetoanumber of factors. The dataset used in figure 1  relies primarily on national data for countries in Central America and the Caribbean. Data published by national authorities may be less comparable than that collected through crossǦ national initiatives, such as the UNǦCTS, which make use of standard definitions and metadata. Further, with respect to the public health data, some countries in these regions have incomplete

death registration data, resulting in possible underǦcaptureofviolentdeaths.Finally,asshown later in thischapter, homicide rates ina number of countries in the Central America and Caribbean subǦregions have increased in recent years.Criminaljusticedataforcountriesinthese subǦregions corresponds to more recent years (mostly 2007  and 2008) than public health data (mostly 2003 Ǧ2006). A combination of these factorsmayexplainthepatternobserved. The pattern of differences between criminal justice and public health data, and indeed the level of availability of criminal justice data on homicide, can be more clearly seen at the individual country level. Figures 3  to 5  represent the latest year criminal justice data available by country, presented alongside a set of country ‘death by violence’ estimates produced by the World Health Organization for the year 2004  (WHO2009).

Jamahiriya, and Cape Verde. Further research is needed to identify ‘true’ underlying homicide rates in countries in Africa. WHO estimates of death by violence rates for the majority of countries on the continent (with the exception mostlyofcountriesinNorthAfrica)aretypically high, ranging from around 7  to 40  times that of averagesinWesternEurope.Countryinformation on mortality is not available for the majority of countries in Africa and public health values for thesecountriesaremostlyderivedfromestimates usingcauseǦofǦdeath models. (WHO 2009) Only inveryfewcountriesareestimatesbasedoncause of death registration data with complete or almostcompletegeographiccoverage.Whilstthe accuracy of WHO estimates is unknown, at the same time it is likely that law enforcement and criminaljusticeinstitutionsinthesecountriesdo significantly underǦcapture levels of violent deaths. This can be due to factors including limitations in the capacity of police and law enforcement agencies to identify and record homicideevents.

Figure 4  shows significantly greater criminal justice data availability in the Americas but also some significant differences at the country level as between criminal justice and public health data. As noted above, this may be due to a number of factors, including the fact that some WHO country estimates are not based on complete cause of death recording systems and the fact that a number of countries in the Americas show significantly increased homicide rates as between 2004  and 2006/2007. As shown later in this chapter, increasing homicide rates

may explain the significant public health/criminal justice differences for Belize, Trinidad and Tobago, Honduras, and Jamaica in particular. Both criminal justice and public health data are clear, however, that some of the countries with the highest homicide rates in the world can be found in the (^) Americas region. El Salvador, Guatemala, Venezuela, Honduras, Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica all show policeǦrecorded homicide rates over 40  per 100,000 population. Colombia has shown declines in policeǦrecorded homicide rates in recent years and according to police data for 2008  is now well under 40  homicides per 100,000 population. WHO 2004  data for Colombia estimates a far higher figure andthismaybeduetoboththedifferenceinyear of measurementandthepossibilitythatahigher proportionofconflictǦrelateddeaths(asopposed to criminal homicide) are captured by public healthfigures. As shown later in this chapter, a number of the countries with some of the highest homicide rates have shown significant increases in homicide rate over the last five years. Research suggeststhathomiciderelatedtointimate,family or other close/known persons tends to stay relativelystable,oronlychangeslowlyovertime. As such, it is likely that particularly high and increasing homicide rates in a number of countries in the Americas are due on the most part to increasing presence of organized crime, drug trafficking and gang activity (UNODC 2007).

International Statistics on Crime and Criminal Justice

Homicide

Figure4.Homiciderateper100,000population,Americasregion,bycountry(criminaljustice,latest

availableyear;publichealth,2004)

Note:Numberbycountrynamesignifiesyearofcriminaljusticedata  Figure 5  shows yet another different pattern to thatforAfricaandtheAmericas.Criminaljustice data availability is very high with reasonable or goodagreementwithpublichealthfiguresforthe majority of countries. Notably, those countries with poorer agreement between public health figures and criminal justice data are also those with the overall higher homicide rates in the region. The link may be more than coincidental. Good agreement between data sources suggests effective administrative recording systems. High qualitycrimedataisinturnbothavaluabletool

forcrimepreventionandindicativeofmethodical and organized policing. Indeed, countries in Europe with low homicide rates (under 2  per 100,000population)havegenerallyachievedsuch rates through a focus on crime prevention and evidenceǦled policing. Overall, homicide rates in the region are relatively similar across countries, with countries in Northern and Western Europe showing rates typically under 2.5 per 100,000 population. In contrast, countries in Eastern Europeshowratesfromthisleveluptoaround 10  per100,000.  

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80

BermudaͲ 0  4

PuertoRicoͲ 08

FrenchGuianaͲ 08

CanadaͲ 07

PeruͲ 06

BoliviaͲ 06

UruguayͲ 07

Grenada

Haiti

ChileͲ 07

UnitedStatesofAmericaͲ 07

Cuba

CostaRicaͲ 06

ArgentinaͲ 07

AntiguaandBarbudaͲ 07

MexicoͲ 08

DominicaͲ 00

SurinameͲ 06

SaintKittsandNevisͲ 0  8

PanamaͲ 08

HondurasͲ 07

TrinidadandTobagoͲ 08

NicaraguaͲ 06

DominicanRepublicͲ 07

ParaguayͲ 07

SaintVincentandtheGrenadines

BarbadosͲ 00

GuyanaͲ 06

SaintLuciaͲ 07

BelizeͲ 06

Bahamas

EcuadorͲ 06

BrazilͲ 07

JamaicaͲ 07

Venezuela(BolivarianRepublicof)Ͳ 08

GuatemalaͲ 06

ElSalvadorͲ 08

ColombiaͲ 08

Intentionalhomiciderateper100,000population

Criminaljustice WHO 2004

International Statistics on Crime and Criminal Justice

Homicide

Figure6.AverageintentionalhomicideratesforcountriesintheAmericas(2003Ͳ2008)

Note:Weightedaverageofhomicideratesincountriesconsistentlyreportinghomicidefortheentireperiod 2003 Ͳ 2008 (basis: 2003 =100)

Figure7.AverageintentionalhomicideratesforcountriesinAsiaandOceania(2003Ͳ2008)

Basis: 2003 = 100

Caribbean(7/24countries) CentralAmerica(7/8countries) SouthAmerica(12/13countries) NorthernAmerica(2/3countries) Americas(28countries)

International Statistics on Crime and Criminal Justice

Figure6.AverageintentionalhomicideratesforcountriesintheAmericas(2003Ͳ 2

Note:Weightedaverageofhomicideratesincountriesconsistentlyreportinghomicidefortheentireperiod 2003 Ͳ 2008 (basis: 2003 =100)

Figure7.AverageintentionalhomicideratesforcountriesinAsiaandOceania(

Basis: 2003 = 100

Caribbean(7/24countries) CentralAmerica(7/8countries) SouthAmerica(12/13countries) NorthernAmerica(2/3countries) Americas(28countries)

Basis: 2003 = 100

CentralAsia(5/5countries) EastandSouthͲEastern Asia(6/16countries) SouthernAsia(5/9countries) WesternAsia(7/18countries) Oceania(2/25countries) AsiaandOceania(25countries)

Figure8.AverageintentionalhomicideratesforcountriesinEurope(2003–2008)

At the regional level, average intentional homicide rates recorded by criminal justice institutions decreased over the time period for counties in Asia and Oceania and Europe. They stayed largely constant for countries in the Americas. At the subǦregional level however, subǦregions with high homicide rates such as Central America and the Caribbean showed average increases over time. Nonetheless, subǦ regional rates in general changed reasonable slowly and did not exhibit unpredictable large increasesordecreasesfromyeartoyear.

The story can be different at national level. As shown in figure 9, countries in the Central America and Caribbean subǦregions such as

Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, as well as in Venezuela, show significant increases in homicide rates in recent years. According to police statistics, the homicide rate in Honduras, for example, approximately doubled between 2004  and 2008. (UNODC 2010) Increases in homicide rates in the Central America and Caribbean subǦregions maybelinkedtohomicideassociatedwithgang, drugǦrelated ororganized crime. Thedrug trade fuels crime in numerous ways, through violence linked to trafficking, by normalizing illegal behaviour,bydivertingcriminaljusticeresources from other activities, and importantly with respect to homicide, by contributing to the widespreadavailabilityoffirearms.

Basis: 2003 = 100

EasternEurope(10/10countries) NorthernEurope(10/10countries) SouthernEurope(9/13countries) WesternEurope(6/9countries) Europe(35countries)

Homicideweapons

Althoughfirearmsarenottheonlyweaponsused inhomicide,theiravailabilitycanbeakeyfactor indrivinglevelsofarmedviolenceandhomicide rates.SubǦregionswithhighhomicideratestend to be amongst those wherea high percentageof homicides are committed by firearm. Available

data from 61  countries indicate that the percentage of homicides committed by firearm varies from 10  percent in countries in East and Southeast Europe to around 75  percent in CentralAmericaandtheCaribbean.

Figure11.Percentageofhomicidescommittedwithafirearm,latestavailableyear(2003Ͳ2008)

Although a number of interpretations may be given to the data, such as the effect of gun control laws and differing availability of firearms, the results must be interpreted with caution. Countries operate different recording

systemsandmayinaccuratelyrecordthenumber of homicides committed by firearms. This may be the result of limited criminal justice statisticsǦgathering capacity or factual difficultiesinidentifyingthecauseofdeath.

Summaryandconclusions

Theoverallglobalhomicideratewasestimatedat 7.6 per 100,000 population in 2004, correspondingtosome490,000violentdeathsin thatyear. ‘Latestavailableyear’datashows that, despite significant difference between criminal justice and public health data in some subǦ regions, the highest homicide rates are likely in Southern Africa, Central America and the CaribbeansubǦregions.Basedoncriminaljustice data, these subǦregions show rates between 20  and 30 per100,000population.Thelowestglobal homicide rates are found in Western Europe, Southern Europe, Oceania, Eastern Asia and Northern Europe subǦregions. Both criminal justiceandpublichealthdatashowratesunder 3 

per100,000populationinthesesubǦregions.The majority of countries for which trend data is available show decreasing or stable homicide trends over the period 2003  –  2008. Overall regionalratesbasedondatafromthesecountries showdecreasingtrends.AtthesubǦregionallevel however, increasing subǦregional rates are seen in the Caribbean and Central America. Such increasesarelikelyduetoarelativelylimitedset ofcountriesthatshowincreasinghomiciderates including Guatemala, Venezuela, Jamaica, Belize, Trinidad and Tobago, and Honduras. Increasingratesinthesecountriesmaybelinked in particular to the challenges of organized crime,drugtraffickingandgangactivity. 

EastandSoutheastEurope(8countries)

Oceania(2countries)

Asia(15countries)

WestandCentralEurope(20countries)

NorthAmerica(2countries)

SouthAmerica(7countries)

CentralAmericaandCaribbean(7countries)

%homicideswithfirearm

International Statistics on Crime and Criminal Justice

Homicide

References

AebiMF2004.CrimeTrendsinWesternEurope from 1990 to2000. EuropeanJournalonCriminal PolicyandResearch ,Vol.10,Nos. 2 Ǧ3, 163 Ǧ 86  GenevaDeclaration2009.GlobalBurdenof ArmedViolenceReport,GenevaDeclaration Secretariat.Availableat: www.genevadeclaration.org UNODC2007.CrimeandDevelopmentin CentralAmerica:Caughtinthecrossfire.United NationsPublicationSalesNo.B.07.IV.5 UNODC2008.UnitedNationsOfficeonDrugs andCrime,InternationalHomicideStatistics

2004.Availableat: http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/dataǦandǦ analysis/ihs.html UNODC2010.UnitedNationsOfficeonDrugs andCrime,homicidestatistics.Availableat: http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/dataǦandǦ analysis/homicide.html WHO2009.WorldHealthOrganizationdisease andinjurycountryestimates.Availableat: http://www.who.int/healthinfo/global_burden _disease/estimates_country/en/index.html