Steve Barkan Victimization

According to Steve Barkan (Criminology: A Sociological Understanding), the patterns seen in the study of victimization are "disturbing" similar to those noted for criminality. Communities with higher than average percentages of law breakers and incidents of violence (assault, rape, murder) have commensurately higher numbers of victims included in their total population (often measured per 10,000). As was noted in Barkan's treatment of the Uniform Crime Reports, studies of victims tend to focus on street crime with fewer researchers tracking white collar crime victims. Rates of victimization are especially high for young African-American males. Medical examiners, based on autopsy evidence, affirm that greater than 85% of deceased persons register positive for the presence of drugs and/or alcohol on postmortem toxicology screening. With regard to violence crime, weapons are used in about one-fifth of such

The majority of crimes against women are perpetrated by nonstrangers. Females are said to know their offenders in almost 70% of violent crimes committed against them (relatives, acquaintances or friends). That being said, males are victimized more than females. People from lower socioeconomic classes are inequally represented as victims. Hispanics and non-Hispanics were equally likely to experience overall violent crime (Crime In America.net, December 2010). People living in urban areas had much higher rates of crime than people living in suburbs and rural areas. Those who live in single family homes have lower rates of crime than people living in apartments (National Crime Survey). To summarize, our chances for violent victimization are more controlled by what we do than by