Victim

Table of contents

Characteristics

Victims suffer from the following,

• Increase in the belief of personal vulnerability.
• The perception of the world as unmeaningful and incomprehensible.
• The view of themselves in a negative light. (Sebba, L., 1996)

The experience of victimisation results in increasing fear and the spread of this fear and suspicion in the community.

Victim's rights

The rights and needs of victims and witnesses, as distinct from the interests of justice or the rights of the accused have, through the discipline of victimology become ever more identified over the past thirty years. Victim Support argued in its policy report, Rights for Victims of Crime (1995), that the criminal justice process treated victims insensitively and that this produced a negative impact on the victim. This process is known as re-victimisation. The report set out five basic rights for victims: the right to compensation; to provide and receive information about the case; to be respected and treated with dignity; to be free from the burden of making decisions relating to the treatment of the accused; and to be protected.

In 2002 the charity published Criminal neglect: no justice beyond criminal justice, which called for services across healthcare, housing and finance to respond more effectively to victims' and witnesses' needs. In particular, it has argued for a more sensitive approach from healthcare workers, for reform to the compensation system for victims, and also for a more effective means of relocating after a crime.

Victimology

The study of victims is multidisciplinary. It does not just cover victims of crime, but also victims of (traffic) accidents, natural disasters, war crimes and abuse of power. The professionals involved in victimology may be scientists, practitioners and policy makers. Studying victims can be done from the perspective of the individual victim but also from an epidemiolomical point of view.

References

• Sebba, L., (1996). Third Parties, Victims and the Criminal Justice System. Ohio State University Press, Columbus.

See also: victim's rights amendment, survivor

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This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Victimology" and Wikipedia article "Victim Support"

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