Recorded Crime

Why might the figures for recorded crime underestimate the actual amount of crime that takes place?

Brief definition of crime and the process from committed crime to prosecution.
An overview of recorded crime numbers between the years 1876-2000. Given statistics of the actual amount of recorded and unrecorded crime.
Possible reasons and examples for crimes not being recorded based on BCS surveys.

To define crime we have to look at it from two different perspectives, one is based on the legal point of view and the other one will be normative, viewed from the society’s or the individual’s perspective. Crime defined by the Law means actions that violate the exact word of a law whereas the normative definition of crime says that crimes
are acts which go against certain rules and norms or morals in a given society. Before an act can be called a crime, it needs to be legally recognized as such. It involves sometimes long and complicated processes as there are many aspects to consider.
Here is an example: An incident happens that could be classed as crime, if it was unnoticed or not defined as crime it might be not reported or reported but not as crime. If the event was observed and defined as crime by the victim or the witnesses it might be reported to the police. From this point the police decide if further action will be taken or not. If an action is taken it usually leads to arrest and prosecution. The offender can be either only cautioned, found not guilty if prosecuted or convicted (DD121 Introductory Chapter, Croall, 1998, p.16).

According to Maguire, figures of recorded crime changed drastically between the years 1945-2000. Less than 100,000 offences a year were recorded by the police before the 1930s, after that the number rose slightly until the 1940s where it levelled off up to the early 1950s. A rapid growth was to observe from the mid 1950s, the numbers doubled between 1955 and 1964, then doubled again till 1977 and again up to 1991. This serious rise in crime activity where it reached nearly over 5.5 million, was followed by a five year small but steady drop in numbers up to 1998 (less than five million recorded). By the year 2000 the amount has risen again to 5,171,000 (DD121 Introductory Workbook, Maguire, 1997, p. 158; Social Trends, 2002). Here are some examples and numbers of crimes recorded, reported and unreported in 1993 one of the peak years of crime statistics between the years 1945-2000: all acquisitive crime including burglary, theft of vehicles and bicycles and theft from the person mounts up to an estimate over seven million all together from which recorded by the police were only 2.5 million! Vandalism against household property and vehicles shows estimates of over 3.5 million and recorded only half a million. Violence including wounding and robbery was estimated to one million of which recorded were approximately a mere of 250.000 (DD121 Introductory Chapter2004, Munice and McLaughlin, 1996, p.34).

According to those statistics the figures of recorded crime hugely underestimate the total of crime taking place.
It shows that it is a serious problem within the British society which needs to be addressed and deeply analyzed. Surveys carried out by the British Crime Survey prove as well that the numbers are greatly understated. The estimate in 1998 was 16,437,000 recorded crime compared to the total of 4,595,300 not recorded (DD121 Introductory Chapter, Mirrlees-Black et al.,
1998)!
There are various reasons for incidents not being recorded.
One of the main problems is people simply not reporting events. The same survey as above focused furthermore on exactly that setback, asking respondents to give reasons for not reporting a crime. Results showed that generally people thought the police wasn’t capable to do anything about some of the incidents or wouldn’t even be interested partly because the events are thought not to be of priority to the police. This shows that people are being let down a lot of the times and there is no sufficient protection for the citizens. Some respondents simply say they don’t care about what happened and deal with the matter in their own ways without reporting it. Fear of revenge from the offenders is a factor as well (DD121 Introductory Chapter 2004).
A question comes to mind at this point: could it be that numbers of crime rise because it is being less reported? At present we are witnessing an era of a fast social economic change and according to criminologist Mike Maguire those changes INCREASE the number of reported crimes. The vast access to phones gives more opportunities to report incidents; insurance policies require us to report theft or damage in order to process claims. But also a whole range of new crimes arises by fast developing technologies, like computer-hacking or child pornography on the
internet.

The numbers of recorded crime underestimate the actual amount of crime taking place, because of all the factors mentioned above, people not reporting events, not all the police forces work according to one and the same scheme, everyone has their own perception of crime and what it means. It is not recognized equally be everyone legally or normatively. It seems that the figures will not level when it comes to recorded and unrecorded crime. As long as the world keeps changing and developing so is the law and crime.

Reference
Mooney, G., Kelly, B., Goldblatt, D. And Huges, G. (2004) DD121
Introductory Chapter, What is a crime?, Beyond common sense: Counting the crime problem, Interpreting the crime problem, Milton Keynes, The Open University