Economic and Social Cost of Crime

Application in Criminal Careers

Crime and Justice User DayJoe Perman: Assistant Economist, Scottish Government

Purpose

• What data we use

• What we use the cost estimates for– Total costs – useful to know??– Value for money of interventions

• e.g Who should we target with limited resources

• What else could we be doing?

Data sources

• Economic and Social Costs of Crime

• Scottish Crime and Justice Survey

• Reconviction Rates in Scotland

• Police Recorded and Cleared Up Crime

• Criminal Proceedings in Scottish Courts

Anticipation

Consequence

Response

SecurityInsurance

Property, lost output, health services,

emotional and physical impact

Criminal Justice System(courts, police, prisons, etc)

Economic and Social Costs of Crime

Unit Costs of Crime

£24,719

£8,403 £6,700 £4,774 £3,770 £2,072 £999 £731 £127

£28,726

£88,731

£0

£10,000

£20,000

£30,000

£40,000

£50,000

£60,000

£70,000

£80,000

£90,000

£100,000

Offence

Co

st p

er o

ffen

ce

Multipliers

• We may have data on the number of police recorded crime or convictions – but we are interested in the actual incidence of crime

• i.e. including those which are not reported or recorded for various reasons

CONVICTION RATE

ACTUAL CRIME RATE

POLICE RECORDED CRIME RATE

CLEAR-UP RATE

2

4

9

1

1

34

388

SHOPLIFTING

SERIOUS ASSAULT

How we get there

Charges proved from Criminal Proceedings

Police clear up rate

Police recorded crimes

Scottish Crime and Justice Survey (and business surveys, research)

Table of multipliers and costsCrime/offence group Scotland crime/Offence name Conviction Cleared up Recorded Actual incidence Unit cost (£2010/11)

Non-sexual crimes of violence

Murder 1 1 1 1 £ 1,736,998

Serious assault 1 2 3 11 £ 25,504

Robbery and assault with intent to rob 1 3 5 6 £ 8,670

Other non-sexual crimes of violence 1 5 6 14 £ 9,591

Crimes of indecency

Rape & attempted rape 1 17 31 176 £ 83,487

Indecent assault etc 1 7 12 116 £ 31,111

Other crimes of indecency 1 3 5 5 £ 2,137

Crimes of dishonesty

Housebreaking 1 4 16 36 £ 3,891

Theft by OLP 1 5 20 63 £ 755

Theft by from a motor vehicle (OLP) 1 3 20 70 £ 1,022

Theft of a motor vehicle & contents including taking & driving 1 8 18 19 £ 4,927

Theft by shoplifting 1 3 4 61 £ 131

Other theft 1 5 23 70 £ 755

Other crimes of dishonesty 1 3 4 13 £ 755

Fire-raising, vandalism etc

Fire-raising 1 5 25 148 £ 1,031

Vandalism, etc 1 6 23 138 £ 1,031

Miscellaneous offences

Minor assault 1 4 5 13 £ 6,913

Minor assault of an emergency worker 1 4 5 13 £ 1,714

Breach of the peace 1 5 5 5 £ 2,137

Drunkenness 1 36 36 36 £ 2,137

Other miscellaneous offences 1 13 14 14 £ 2,137

Other crimes

Crimes against public justice 1 3 3 3 £ 2,137

Handling an offensive weapon 1 2 3 3 £ 2,137

Drugs 1 5 5 5 £ 2,137

Other crimes 1 1 1 1 £ 2,137

An assumption too far?

• Multipliers fine at population level analysis, but what about small samples?

• Individuals? One conviction of housebreaking means we guess that person has actually broke into 9

• Some people better at not getting caught?

Applications

• Total Cost of Crime

• Value for Money of Criminal Interventions

• Reducing Reoffending Project

• Presumption against short term sentences

• Criminal careers– Males, females, under/over 21– Persistent offenders vs long term prisoners

Total costs - Tree plotMinor assault (£1,786m) Breach of the

peace (£186m)

Other miscellaneous (£140m)

Indecent assault etc (£504m) Rape and attempted rape (£400m)

Oth

er i

ndec

ency

(£2

2m)

Shoplifting (£402m) Housebreaking (£167m)

Theft (£127m)

Vehicle crime (£86m)

Other dishonesty (£39m)

Serious assault (£340m)

Murder (£148m)

Other violent crime (£84m)

Robbery and assault (£59m)

Vandalism (£298m)

Others (£25m)Drugs (£87m)

Other crimes (£79m)

Miscellaneous offences

Crimes of indecency

Crimes of dishonesty

Crimes of violence

Other crimes

Vandalism and fire-raising

Breakdown of the costs of crimeInsurance

Administration1%

Defensive Expendiutre

5%

Physical and Emotional Impact

34%

Net value of property

13%

Lost Output6%

Health Services 2%

CJS Costs39%

Value for money of Criminal Justice Interventions

• Ex-Post – evaluating interventions • Ex-Ante – using historical offending data

to look at “what if” scenarios

• Both aimed at identifying the value for money in policies aimed at reducing reoffending based on the costs of crime and therefore the potential savings from reducing it

Offences before/after

0

200

400

600

800

1,000

1,200

1,400

1,600

Non-sexualcrimes ofviolence

Crimes ofindecency

Crimes ofdishonesty

Fire-raising,vandalism etc

Miscellaneousoffences

Other crimes

Offence category

Before

After

Decrease from 2,800 to 1,900 --> 32% fall

Persistent Offenders Project

0

0.01

0.02

0.03

0.04

0.05

-1200 -800 -400 0 400 800 1200

Days from POP intervention

Off

en

ces

pe

r d

ay p

er o

ffen

der

Persistent Offenders Project –

Pre and post intervention crime rates

Persistent Offenders Project - Total Costs

Cost of crime

Before After Savings

£30 million £19 million £11 million

Project Cost = £1million over the 3 years

NET BENEFITS of £10 million

illustrative!!

• we are not implying causality

• use the estimates to illustrate the potential savings available

• Magnitudes, rather than pounds and pence

• Should be used in conjunction with other quantitative and qualitative data

Presumption against short sentences

• Don’t know the impact on reoffending by moving someone from custodial sentence to community sentence– Differing characteristics etc

• Use breakeven analysis to find the reducing in offending needed to balance out the increased costs

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

0 2 4 6 8 10 12

Number of years since index conviction/release from custody

Perce

nt rec

onvic

ted

Custody (3 months or less) Community Service Order

Probation Order Supervised Attendance Order

Community Payback Order (modelled)

Reconviction rate over time

0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1

1.2

1.4

1.6

0 2 4 6 8 10 12

Number of years since index conviction/release from custody

Annu

al av

erag

e rec

onvic

tions

Custody (3 months or less) Community Service Order

Probation Order Supervised Attendance Order

Community Payback Order (modelled)

Average annual number of reconvictions

Reoffending Rates/Frequencies

Custodial Cohort Costs

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Year

£M

illio

n

1%£6m

Criminal Careers

• Follow cohort over 10 years using unit level conviction data

• Split by age and gender to start with

• Only looking at the ‘average’ across each cohort, will be differing distinct ‘types’ within each groups

Criminal Careers

0.0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

1.0

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

year

freq

uen

cy o

f co

nvi

ctio

ns

Average Male Female Under 21 Over 21

Frequency of convictions

£0

£10,000

£20,000

£30,000

£40,000

£50,000

£60,000

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10year

aver

age

cost

per

off

end

er

Average Male Female Under 21 Over 21

Cost of Reoffending

£0

£100

£200

£300

£400

£500

£600

£700

£800

£900

£1,000

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Avera

geyear

aver

age

cost

per

off

ence

Female Male Under 21 Over 21

Average cost per offence

Persistent versus long term

• Where should we focus limited resources

• The ‘serious’, high tariff long term prisoners are an easy target

• But what about the harder segment, low tariff, persistent offenders?

0.000

0.200

0.400

0.600

0.800

1.000

1.200

1.400

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

year

fre

qu

en

cy

(a

ve

rag

e n

um

be

r o

f c

on

vic

tio

ns

pe

r o

ffe

nd

er)

3 previous

short sentence

long term

Frequency of convictions

0

5,000

10,000

15,000

20,000

25,000

30,000

35,000

40,000

45,000

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

year

£ (a

vera

ge

cost

per

off

end

er)

3 previous

short sentence

long term

Average cost per offender

Cost as a proxy for seriousness

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

3 previous short sentence long term

Offender type

Per

cen

tag

e o

f cr

imes

Other Total

Damage Total

Dishonesty Total

Sexual Total

Violence Total

Average cost per offender

Average per offender

Number in segment

Prolific (3 previous)

£ 180,000 20,365

Very short term (< 6 months)

£ 277,000 4,139

Long term (> 4 years)

£ 147,000 401

Size does matter?

Violence

Dishonesty

Damage

Other

Sexual

Prolific (3+ previous)£3.9 billion

Very short termers£1.1 billion

Long termers£59 million

What next??

• Defining the segments?

• Where else could you see cost estimates being used?

• ???