AlbaniaStatistical Training

Prosecution / Courts Session 4, January 31, 14.45 – 16.00

Overview of the Criminal Justice System and Statistics – Recording and Counting rules

With funding from the European Union

DEVELOPMENT OF MONITORING INSTRUMENTS FOR JUDICIAL AND LAW ENFORCEMENT INSTITUTIONS IN THE WESTERN BALKANS 2009-2011 Phase three – Training

Recording and counting rules

• One of the most confusing aspects of Criminal Justice Statistics is the changing counting unit. Roughly spoken from victim to crime to offender to case.

• One of the complications is that labeling is sometimes needed at another level of counting (e.g. crime type at the case level)

• Another complication is one of communication: between languages, but also between agencies within one country

Contents

1. Counting unit / counting moment

2. Principal Offence rule

3. Multiple sanctions / offences / suspects

Recording and counting rules

• For each item I will give a general introduction and I will reflect on how it is dealt with in the Netherlands, followed by a roundtable discussion establishing the situation in Albania

• I will discuss the whole flow through the Justice System, but concentrating on Prosecution and Courts

• The aim of this session is to describe in detail the recording and counting rules in Albania and to identify possible shortcomings

Counting unit

• There is a multitude of potential counting units. To name a few (in English, not to be translated!):

• Victim, Person, Household, Crime, Criminal act, Offence, CC article, Offender, Case, File, Dossier, Verdict, Sentence, Sanction, …

• The exact (legal) definition is often not clear, which makes it hard to translate

Counting unitVictim Surveys

• The counting unit here is often (as in the Dutch Victim Survey) a person, however restricted to persons above a certain age.

• Sometimes the unit is a household

• For bussiness surveys the unit is a company

• The reporting unit can be the number of victimizations

Counting unitPolice recording

Here it starts getting more complicated. Usually the unit is the crime, possibly defined as:

“a set of actions, linked together in time and place, committed by one or more persons at the expense of zero or more persons, where these actions are considered criminal by law”

This would be a good description of the Dutch situation: a crime (misdrijf) is recorded with possibly more victims and more offenders. And more offences (feiten), provided these are part of the same crime.

Counting unitPolice recording (cont.)

Would this be a good description of the counting unit for recorded crimes in Albania? What would be the local terms and is ‘crime’ in your view the logical translation in English for the whole and ‘offence’ for the parts?

Counting unitSuspected Offenders

This seems easy, the counting unit is the person.

Some questions remain, such as:

• When is a person considered a suspected offender? (the Neth: when the person is formally interrogated)

• Are unique persons counted? (the Neth: no)

• Again: what would the answer be in Albania?

Counting unitPolice output / Prosecution input

Statistically, these could be the same. In the Netherlands police output is not seen as a separate statistic.

(But of course, the input of the Prosecution could come from other agencies as well)

The counting unit is called a zaak in the Netherlands, which could be translated into the English term ‘case’. But:

Prosecution / Court cases (the Netherlands)

The basic unit for statistical purposes is the ‘case’ (Dutch: ‘zaak’). A case has always exactly one offender. A sentencing decision by the court is always made on the level of the case and can consist of different sanctions

However, a case can have more than one crime committed by this offender (cases can be combined into one case). A decision by the PPS can be on the level of the crime.

Also, a crime can consist of more than one offence (Dutch: ‘feit’) …..

Prosecution / Court cases (the Netherlands)

And this can be done in two ways:1. The crime itself consists of more than one

offence (e.g. robbery in combination with illegal arms possession)

2. The crime has been given an alternative lable by the PPS: (e.g. manslaughter or assault leading to death)

The guilty/not guilty court verdict is on this level (the offence)

N.b. The offence can exist of more than one articles in the CC

Prosecution / Court cases (Macedonia)

How is this organized in Albania statistics:

• Offenders, cases, verdicts, offences, sanctions?• Are these in your view indeed the right English terms?• The same for Prosecution and Courts?

Prosecution / Court cases (the Netherlands)

Statistically, the Dutch data structure is problematic for two reasons:

1. The number of cases is rather flexible (cases seem to disappear when they are combined). This has an effect on what is considered input/output.

– Combining cases by Prosecutor and/or Judge is possible (in the Netherlands). In Albania?

– It is very important how to deal with those in Statistics. What kind of a decision would this be?

Prosecution / Court cases (the Netherlands)

Statistically, the Dutch data structure is problematic for two reasons:

2. Much information is available on the level of the offence, but needed on the level of the case.This makes the decision what offence level information to use (e.g. to answer the question what sentence was given to which crime type) rather complicated!

– Principal Offence rule– Principal Sanction rule

Principal Offence rule

If a case consists of more than one offence there are several possibilities when establishing the type of crime:

1. The crime type of the most important offence is taken (and how is most important then defined?)

2. The crime type of the first offence is taken3. The statistics are not given on the level of the case,

but on the level of the offence4. Other, ...The principal offence rule says to use 1. What would the

solution be in Albania?

Principal Sanction rule

If more than one sanction is imposed on an offender there are several possibilities when establishing the type of sanction for the crime:

1. The most severe sanction is taken (and how is most severe then defined?)

2. The first sanction is taken3. All sanctions are given4. Other, ...The principal sanction rule says to use 1. What would

the solution be in Albania?

Suggestion

• An exact description / definition of all entities (like case, offender, offence etc.) in the Criminal Justice System and their relation to each other is very important. So is a description of the flow through the system of each entity

• There are useful tools – mainly used in IT - to model these aspects. For example class diagrams and state diagrams in UML (Unified Modelling Language)

• It would be very useful (and necessary anyhow when building computer systems to support your statistics) to do this, together with IT professionals

AlbaniaStatistical Training

Prosecution / Courts Session 4, January 31, 14.45 – 16.00

Overview of the Criminal Justice System and Statistics – Recording and Counting rules

With funding from the European Union

DEVELOPMENT OF MONITORING INSTRUMENTS FOR JUDICIAL AND LAW ENFORCEMENT INSTITUTIONS IN THE WESTERN BALKANS 2009-2011 Phase three – Training