Crime
The forgotten victims
Graham Junes
A fifteen-year-old boy was appearing before a juvenile court, accused of two offences of indecently assaulting teenage girls. One of these, aged twelve, he had lured into a bedroom at his grandparents' house and attacked. She was found in a distressed state running through the streets, screaming. It is a case that remains vividly in my memory from my days as a news reporter. The boy, it was revealed in court, had committed four attacks on young girls that year: the last on his way back from an attendance centre where he had been supposedly receiving 'corrective treatment.'
The mood in the juvenile court was one not of horror, not of disgust. There was an atmosphere of total sympathy for the boy. Probation officers and social workers presented their reports to the magistrates. Here was a young boy for whom social and psychological pressures had proved too much. The magistrates were understanding. Here is another chance, they told him. A chance to pull your socks up. We are going to place you under a two-year supervision order. The boy was already under a supervision order from his first court appearance: this had proved of no value in halting his astonishing record of attacks on young girls. Yet nobody paused to think of the other, perhaps more serious, victims of the social and psychological pressures on him: the girls he had assaulted. And nobody stopped to consider what appeared to be the crucial question. How long would it be before he were to frighten some other little girl out of her wits?
The advent of sociology as an important university discipline has focused much attention on those brought before the courts. Conventional sociological wisdom argues that wrongdoers are often the victims of the pressures of present-day society. Yet this sympathy for those whose environ-. me,nt is an encouragement to violence and crime has tended to ignore those other unfortunates — the people on the receiving end of crime. This has not only refused consideration to the sometimes valid argument that offenders should be denied their liberty for the protection of others. It has channelled a great deal of public resources to the assistance of offenders, while virtually ignoring the people they have harmed — physically, financially and psychologically.
It may well be external forces which cause youths to attack and rob pensioners. Or to beat up passers-by for the thrill of it. But do not those who are attacked deserve at least equal attention to that lavished upon their assailants? Do not those who are robbed deserve at least the same help from the state as those who have deprived them of money and property?
While elaborate machinery exists to aid those brought before
the courts through the probation service and local authority social service departments — there is no comparable concern for their victims. Social workers are theoretically available to all who call for them: but in practice no
one bothers to refer to them cases of hardship resulting from criminal acts. Relatives are largely expected to cope.
There has been a move towards. help for those on the receiving end of crime: though the idea of compensation for those suffering criminal injuries is only comparatively recent. And concern about those who suffer as a result of teenage violence was only awakened recently by a tragedy — that of Tina Wilson, the fifteenyear-old girl driven to suicide by bullies at her school.
Clearly much still needs to be done to help the victims of crime. An experimental scheme in Bristol has uncovered a real and extensive need among those who have suffered due to others' social deviance. Under the scheme, run by the National Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders in co-operation with the police, a team of fourteen volunteers has helped more than 400 victims of criminal acts in its first three months. Among its early successes it has prevented people becoming brankrupt because of theft, and has helped old people get over the emotional and practical traumas of having their homes ransacked. But, most significantly, the extent of the hardship the operation has discovered has surprised its organisers.
The misfortunes of those innocently on the receiving end of crime need not end with the criminal act itself. While the laws governing court reporting are designed to give a great deal of protection to the offender, they do not offer the same safeguards to the victim. Unsubstantiated allegations from defendants are often reported in the press. The innocent victim of an unprovoked street assault, for example, can find reported in his local paper a statement that he was a homosexual attempting a 'pickup.' Privilege means the victim is given no redress to an allegation which may ruin his standing in the community. The laws of libel and slander do not apply in judicial proceedings, nor to newspaper reports of them, provided these are 'fair and accurate' accounts of what is said.
Much good would come from the press observing a code of ethics with regard to the courts. There is an unwritten rule among many papers that the names of victims of rape should not be disclosed. This could well be extended to all witnesses and third parties named in the course of court proceedings. The rules of privilege are at present giving protection to many statements arising out of malice and dishonesty.
However, the prime need is for an urgent extension of schemes such as that at Bristol to make help available to the victims of crime. This could be done through police officers, or social workers working with the police, specifically appointed to make sure those who have suffered as a result of criminal acts are given every appropriate assistance. After all, we are a backward nation if we continue to devote more time and resources to criminals, no matter how heavy the social pressures upon them, than we do to their victims.
Graham Jones is a leader writer for the Glasgow Herald
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