Decisions to report violent victimization to the police

Abstract

As most crimes are never reported, official police data underestimates the true extent of crimes. Decisions to report also varies between groups resulting in a systematic bias in data used to form police changes in the criminal justice system. The current research focuses on the impact that crime types, victims SES, and trust towards the police has on decisions to report. The study uses a combined dataset of victimization surveys conducted annually from 2014 to 2021 (n = 19,440). Results show that fewer victims of gender-based violence report than victims of other types of crimes. Victims’ perception of the seriousness of the violence has the strongest impact on decision to report. Young people and people in rural areas are less likely to report than other groups. The article reviews the complex relationship between trust towards the police and decisions to report violence. The findings indicate that a recent experience of violent victimization reduces trust towards the police. Reporting gender-based violence has a tendency to reduce trust towards the police but reporting other types of physical violence is associated with increased trust. The results also show that victims of serious intimate partner violence have become more likely to report to the police in recent years than before 2018.