NCJ Number
164665
Journal
Journal of Quantitative Criminology Volume: 12 Issue: 4 Dated: (December 1996) Pages: 363-390
Date Published
1996
Length
28 pages
Annotation
Using data from the National Crime Victimization Survey from 1987 to 1992, this research investigated the effects of victim and offender race on three police responses to robbery and aggravated assault: (1) police response time to the scene; (2) effort exerted by police at the scene; and (3) likelihood of arrest.
Abstract
Because the research focused on police responses, only victimizations reported to the police were examined. The racial status of both victim and offender was classified using victim perceptions only. It was found that police officers were quicker to respond and also exerted more effort at the scene, searching and taking evidence, to incidents of black-on-white robbery compared to all other racial dyads. This relationship held even after controlling for other factors such as victim-offender relationship, poverty, victim injury, and victim gender. No significant effects of race were found when predicting the probability of arrest in robbery cases. Effects of race on police responses to aggravated assault were more complicated. For assaults involving strangers, police officers were significantly more likely to exert additional effort at the scene if the victim was white and the offender was perceived to be black. This effect was reversed for nonstranger assault victimizations. Police officers were significantly less likely to exert effort at the scene or to make an arrest in black-on-white assaults involving nonstrangers. The most consistent predictors of arrest in both stranger and nonstranger assault victimizations were police response time, victim injury, and whether the incident occurred in a public setting. 40 references and 9 tables