The Criminal as Victim: The Tide Flows Backward

For more than a half-century, the criminal has been portrayed as a victim. Social scientists, criminologists, and mental health professionals continue to characterize criminals as shaped by forces beyond their control. “Criminogenic” environments have long been cited as causal. The assertion is that turning to crime is understandable, even a normal response, if one grows up in a crime-infested neighborhood. Crime has also been attributed to poverty, the thinking being that people who are denied opportunity will seize what they need.

View in Popular Culture

A view of the environment as causing crime has been expressed in popular culture. The 2021 remake of “West Side Story” retains a memorable song written more than a half-century ago. In “Gee, Officer Krupke,” gang members are referred to as victims of a society that “played a terrible trick” that rendered them ”sociologically sick.” In his 2015 book Unfair, law professor Adam Benforado articulated a similarly deterministic view when he stated, “Our surroundings often exert such a powerful influence that they all but erase the effects of disposition” (i.e., personality).

"Risk Factors"

After decades of citing so-called causes of crime, the discussion has turned to “risk factors." This is old wine in new bottles. Again, the major emphasis is on factors in the environment that facilitate criminal behavior. However, circumstances that constitute a risk factor for one person can be a protective factor for another.

In a memoir, former Aurora, Illinois, police chief Kristen Ziman wrote that her father regularly took her to a bar after school. There, she ate Slim Jims and played pool while he drank. Her father’s alcoholism destroyed her parents’ marriage so that she had to move in with family friends when she was 15. Ms. Ziman said that these adversities fostered independence, confidence, and resilience. She wrote that she “took the good things my parents gave me and opted to use the rest as a lesson in what not to do.” Had she become a criminal, people might have said that it was not surprising given her role models and the resulting instability that she experienced. Like Ms. Ziman, many people choose not to emulate bad role models or succumb to temptations around them.

Adversities can serve as “protective factors” resulting in people making decisions not to emulate the criminal conduct of people living nearby, including members of their own family. Most people who are disadvantaged because of environmental adversities do not turn to crime. And many people who grow up in affluent areas with numerous advantages do commit crimes.

A Tough-on-Crime Approach

During the 1980s and 1990s, the social climate trended toward holding offenders accountable for their behavior. Environmental determinism seemed to be fading. However, a “tough on crime” approach did not result in a greater understanding of what causes crime. Behavior is a product of thinking. Criminal behavior results from habitual thinking errors.

A Swing Back to Criminals as Victims

During the 2020s, the pendulum is swinging back to a view that criminals are victims of outside forces such as lack of opportunity, corruption by others, and flaws in the criminal justice system itself. This reversion in thinking about causes of crime is having unfortunate consequences, among them an increase in crime. At the extreme are people who advocate committing crimes to address social injustice. Natalie Escobar defends looting as “a powerful tool to bring about real, lasting change in society.”

Criminals exploit people and programs that regard them as victims or minimize the seriousness of their offenses. When prosecutors do not enforce laws, the criminal takes full advantage. A July 24, 2022, article in The Baltimore Sun reported, “If you spend 5 minutes in Penn North, you’ll see fentanyl being sold hand to hand within 30 feet of parked police cars.” The article went on to state, “All of this tolerated illegal activity has created a rampant sense of lawlessness in our city.”

Criminals' Thinking Processes

When professionals regard the criminal as a victim, they treat him as such. When they think that an offender has turned to crime because of a lack of skills, they provide opportunities for him to acquire skills, but never address basic thinking patterns. The result is a criminal with job skills rather than one without those skills. Of what value is a skilled carpenter if he steals from a job site, pockets a customer’s deposit, and disappears?

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An in-depth knowledge of how criminals think is invaluable both to people who work in the field of criminal justice and the public at large. Such an understanding is likely to result in fewer victims.

I have written a revised, updated 2022 paperback edition of Inside the Criminal Mind in which I discuss in detail the thinking processes that give rise to criminal conduct. I also take issue with myths about criminal behavior that persist and guide public policy. Among other topics that I address are specific thinking patterns before, during, and after a crime; criminality among law enforcement officers; and the relevance of criminality to the opioid crisis. The new edition contains updated research findings and recent cases in which I have been consulted as an expert.

Only when we know who the criminal is can we combat crime more effectively. Instead of regarding the criminal as a victim, we will clearly see him as the victimizer he is. In doing so, we will be better able to recognize such people and protect ourselves.