The Truth About Crime
Encyclopedia
The Truth About Crime is a British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 television documentary series inspired and presented by Nick Ross
Nick Ross
Nick Ross is a British radio and television presenter across a wide range of factual programmes and during the 1980s and 90s he was one of the most ubiquitous of British broadcasters, but he is best known for his long-running co-hosting of the BBC TV show Crimewatch which he left on 2 July 2007...

 in association with the film-maker Roger Graef
Roger Graef
Roger Arthur Graef OBE is a criminologist and film-maker. Born in New York, he moved to Britain in 1962, where he has made ground-breaking documentary films with his ability to gain access to hitherto closed institutions, including Government ministries and court buildings.-Early life:Graef was...

, executive producer Sam Collyns and series producer Alice Perman. It was first broadcast on BBC One
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...

 in July and August 2009.

Region

The show focused on a single city, Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...

, which has demographics and crime rates broadly representative of urban Britain, and used a multitude of techniques to measure the real extent of crime and victimisation. In a two-week crime audit
Audit
The general definition of an audit is an evaluation of a person, organization, system, process, enterprise, project or product. The term most commonly refers to audits in accounting, but similar concepts also exist in project management, quality management, and energy conservation.- Accounting...

, camera teams followed police, fire services and paramedics and an on-line questionnaire, based closely on the national British Crime Survey
British Crime Survey
The British Crime Survey or BCS is a systematic victim study, currently carried out by BMRB Limited on behalf of the Home Office. The BCS seeks to measure the amount of crime in England and Wales by asking around 50,000 people aged 16 and over , living in private households, about the crimes they...

, invited residents and businesspeople to describe their personal experiences of victimisation. A survey of 14- and 15-year-olds in Oxford schools was one of the biggest of its kind ever undertaken to discover how under-16s are affected by, and involved in, crime. Random children from some of the schools were then chosen to take part in the series being quizzed on crime by Ross on such topics as theft, drugs, alcohol and many other things. Amongst the interviewed was Xa White, who although remained silent for the TV shows, voiced his opinions with great insight on the BBC website in an exclusive online interview.

Programme 1

The first programme (BBC One
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...

 9pm Tuesday 21 July 2009) looked at violent crime and revealed that almost all woundings involved victims who had been drinking or who had been assaulted by someone who was drunk, and took place close to a licensed premise
Licensing laws of the United Kingdom
Licensing laws of the United Kingdom regulate the sale and consumption of alcohol, with separate legislation for England and Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland being passed, as necessary, by the UK parliament, the Northern Ireland Assembly, and the Scottish Parliament respectively.Throughout the...

.

Lack of commensuration with official statistics

Most of the seriously injured, as measured by those treated in hospital, did not report what had happened to the police. One senior physician told Nick Ross that police figures on crime are virtually "meaningless". The physician interviewed was Jonathan Shepherd, a Professor of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery
Oral and maxillofacial surgery
Oral and maxillofacial surgery is surgery to correct a wide spectrum of diseases, injuries and defects in the head, neck, face, jaws and the hard and soft tissues of the oral and maxillofacial region. It is an internationally recognized surgical specialty...

 at the Cardiff University Dental School. Domestic violence
Domestic violence
Domestic violence, also known as domestic abuse, spousal abuse, battering, family violence, and intimate partner violence , is broadly defined as a pattern of abusive behaviors by one or both partners in an intimate relationship such as marriage, dating, family, or cohabitation...

 was shown to be a major problem, though mostly resulting only in minor injuries, and with women as perpetrators as well as men. Women were interviewed in a Women's shelter
Women's shelter
A women's shelter is a place of temporary refuge and support for women escaping violent or abusive situations, such as rape, and domestic violence....

.

Crime mapping

Helmet camera
Helmet camera
A helmet camera, otherwise known as a micro video camera, bullet camera, or lipstick camera, is a camera attached to a helmet allowing someone to make a visual record from their point of view , while keeping their hands and vision free....

s were shown and Spencer Chainey of the Jill Dando Institute
Jill Dando Institute
The UCL Jill Dando Institute of Security and Crime Science is an institute of crime science located in London, United Kingdom and a part of University College London...

 at University College London
University College London
University College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and the oldest and largest constituent college of the federal University of London...

 described crime mapping
Crime mapping
Crime mapping is used by analysts in law enforcement agencies to map, visualize, and analyze crime incident patterns. It is a key component of crime analysis and the CompStat policing strategy...

, which uses geographic information system
Geographic Information System
A geographic information system, geographical information science, or geospatial information studies is a system designed to capture, store, manipulate, analyze, manage, and present all types of geographically referenced data...

s.

Alcohol-fuelled violence

A licensing officer from Thames Valley Police, a Hook Norton Brewery
Hook Norton Brewery
Hook Norton Brewery is a regional brewery in Hook Norton, Oxfordshire, England, founded in 1849. The brewing plant is a traditional Victorian "tower" brewery in which all the stages of the brewing process flow logically from floor to floor; mashing at the top, boiling in the middle, fermentation...

 executive and David Poley, the Chief Executive of the Portman Group
Portman Group
The Portman Group is a trade group composed of alcoholic beverage producers and brewers in the UK.-History:It was set up in 1989 as part of a campaign to raise awareness of alcohol-related issues, and its members account for the majority of alcohol products sold in the UK...

, were interviewed. Ross went on to describe several interventions which had cut alcohol-related violence in the UK and elsewhere and urged a more pro-active approach to tackling alcohol-related violence. For most of the incidents, there were few arrests featured.

Programme 2

The second in the series (Tuesday 28 July) explored the nature of acquisitive crime and proposed solutions to burglary, car theft and fraud. Ross implied that society needs to accept human nature for what it is and focus less on how to penalise criminals and more on taking sensible precautions with tempting valuables. Temptation and opportunity drives crime far more than "badness". 90% of burglaries are to fuel a drug habit. A 19 year old single mother, Kelly, burgled some students, who were meanwhile happily enjoying themselves in a pub, to fund her heroin habit. A policeman said that this type of crime is committed by people who find themselves in social and emotional situations from which they find it difficult to get out of.

Shoplifting

There are around fifty persistent burglars in Oxford. Some of them would commit up to twenty burglaries a week. A shoplifter who was caught by CCTV in a shop, stealing a £10 set of headphones, turned out to be a 19-year-old Polish immigrant who possessed no ID. Nick Ross even confessed to shoplifting
Shoplifting
Shoplifting is theft of goods from a retail establishment. It is one of the most common property crimes dealt with by police and courts....

 occasionally when a teenager, as did school pupils interviewed. During a normal weekday, shoplifting peaks at 3.30pm when school ends.

Distraction burglary and scams

Distraction burglary
Burglary
Burglary is a crime, the essence of which is illicit entry into a building for the purposes of committing an offense. Usually that offense will be theft, but most jurisdictions specify others which fall within the ambit of burglary...

 is different to more common random burglary, and is rarer but often more upsetting because it involves more dedicated and skilful felon
Felony
A felony is a serious crime in the common law countries. The term originates from English common law where felonies were originally crimes which involved the confiscation of a convicted person's land and goods; other crimes were called misdemeanors...

s. The ruthless individuals perpetrating this crime usually target properties around the edge of Oxford near the ring road, and tend to come from outside the area. Household scams, of a ruthless and targeted similar nature, usually involved elderly people who they would be cajoled into paying astronomical prices for unnecessary repair work done on their property. The rogue traders involved were difficult to trace by county council Trading Standards
Trading Standards Institute
The Trading Standards Institute is the professional association which represents trading standards professionals in the UK and overseas.-History:...

 officers. An elderly couple were conned into paying for minor repairs with their entire life savings. Online scam
Confidence trick
A confidence trick is an attempt to defraud a person or group by gaining their confidence. A confidence artist is an individual working alone or in concert with others who exploits characteristics of the human psyche such as dishonesty and honesty, vanity, compassion, credulity, irresponsibility,...

s were more prevalent than perhaps realised, with up to £20bn of online fraud committed a year. It was investigated by the e-commerce
Electronic commerce
Electronic commerce, commonly known as e-commerce, eCommerce or e-comm, refers to the buying and selling of products or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other computer networks. However, the term may refer to more than just buying and selling products online...

 unit of SOCA
Serious Organised Crime Agency
The Serious Organised Crime Agency is a non-departmental public body of the Government of the United Kingdom under Home Office sponsorship...

. Richard Cox of The Spamhaus Project
The Spamhaus Project
The Spamhaus Project is an international organisation to track e-mail spammers and spam-related activity. It is named for the anti-spam jargon term coined by Linford, spamhaus, a pseudo-German expression for an ISP or other firm which spams or willingly provides service to spammers.-Spamhaus...

 was interviewed about internet crime
Computer crime
Computer crime, or cybercrime, refers to any crime that involves a computer and a network. The computer may have been used in the commission of a crime, or it may be the target. Netcrime refers to criminal exploitation of the Internet. Such crimes may threaten a nation’s security and financial health...

.

Rehabilitation

The police thought that prison was the best place for persistent burglars. It kept the burglars off the streets. Prison was not viewed as a deterrent because the persistent offenders live such types of lives that they would be better looked after in prison than on the streets, with regular meals and companionship. Once they left prison they would quickly reoffend. Rehabilitation
Rehabilitation (penology)
Rehabilitation means; To restore to useful life, as through therapy and education or To restore to good condition, operation, or capacity....

 centres for repeat offenders and drug addicts
Drug rehabilitation
Drug rehabilitation is a term for the processes of medical or psychotherapeutic treatment, for dependency on psychoactive substances such as alcohol, prescription drugs, and so-called street drugs such as cocaine, heroin or amphetamines...

 were not successful because the offenders were not of a capable mental state to be sufficiently receptive or adaptive to the treatments given

Prevention not cure

Some of the crimes, especially rare ones targeting the elderly, are committed by evil lifestyle criminals, but most offenders are un-glamorously ordinary and few are "ogres" even in the eyes of the police. Most solutions lie in better design and sensible precautions. Since crime peaked in the 1990s homeowners have halved burglary rates by locking their doors and windows, retailers and tackled shoplifting by guarding their open shelves with security devices, and vehicle manufacturers have made cars so difficult to steal that auto-crime is now largely confined to old bangers.

Programme 3

The third and final show (Tuesday 4 August) exposed widespread anti-social behaviour
Anti-social behaviour
Anti-social behaviour is behaviour that lacks consideration for others and that may cause damage to society, whether intentionally or through negligence, as opposed to pro-social behaviour, behaviour that helps or benefits society...

 and the lack of a concerted response. Much of anti-social crime is not added to the official crime statistics. Much of it is fuelled by drugs and gang culture of under-educated and employed young males under the acronym NEET
NEET
NEET is a government acronym for people currently "not in education, employment, or training". It was first used in the United Kingdom but its use has spread to other countries, including Japan, China, and South Korea...

. The Chief Constable
Chief Constable
Chief constable is the rank used by the chief police officer of every territorial police force in the United Kingdom except for the City of London Police and the Metropolitan Police, as well as the chief officers of the three 'special' national police forces, the British Transport Police, Ministry...

 of Thames Valley Police
Thames Valley Police
Thames Valley Police, formerly known as Thames Valley Constabulary, is the territorial police force responsible for policing the Thames Valley area covered by the ceremonial counties of Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire....

, Sara Thornton
Sara Thornton
Sara Joanne Thornton CBE QPM is currently the Chief Constable of Thames Valley Police. She replaced former Chief Constable Peter Neyroud who, in January 2007, moved to the role of Chief Executive of the National Policing Improvement Agency.Thornton was born in Poole, Dorset. She attended the...

, was interviewed. It was found that improved styles of architecture for estate
Housing estate
A housing estate is a group of buildings built together as a single development. The exact form may vary from country to country. Accordingly, a housing estate is usually built by a single contractor, with only a few styles of house or building design, so they tend to be uniform in appearance...

 housing and lit thoroughfares
Street light
A street light, lamppost, street lamp, light standard, or lamp standard is a raised source of light on the edge of a road or walkway, which is turned on or lit at a certain time every night. Modern lamps may also have light-sensitive photocells to turn them on at dusk, off at dawn, or activate...

 can reduce anti-social crime significantly.

Perspective on crime statistics

Ross's general thesis is that recorded crime rates are unreliable, that theft and violence have actually declined sharply but that the downward trend may not be continuing, and that there are hundreds of quite simple solutions to crime, mostly by reducing temptations and opportunities for bad behaviour rather than trying to remould people's predispositions.

Reception

The series has been well received, with The Times "fascinated [by the] sane, insightful and compellingly argued documentary series" - and has achieved good ratings despite being scheduled against ITV1
ITV1
ITV1 is a generic brand that is used by twelve franchises of the British ITV Network in the English regions, Wales, southern Scotland , the Isle of Man and the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey. The ITV1 brand was introduced by Carlton and Granada in 2001, alongside the regional identities of their...

's fast-moving, similarly themed Car Crime UK, a six-part police car-chasing documentary series narrated by Trevor McDonald
Trevor McDonald
Sir Trevor McDonald OBE is a Trinidadian-British newsreader and journalist. He had a long career as a news presenter with ITN...

.

External links

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