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Original Articles

Violent street crime: Making sense of seemingly senseless acts

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Pages 171-180 | Published online: 23 Apr 2008
 

Abstract

This paper explores the extent to which street crime can be explained by rational factors associated with the successful commission of the offence or social factors related to street culture. The study is based on qualitative interviews with 55 violent street offenders who were serving sentences for street robbery and assault in six prisons in the UK. The findings identified five main motives for street violence: (1) instrumental motives relating to the specific objectives of the offence (for example, obtaining cash or goods in the case of robbery or inflicting harm in the case of assault), (2) for the buzz and excitement, (3) to express anger, (4) to achieve status and honour, and (5) to inflict informal justice. The implications of the findings are discussed in relation to research and crime prevention.

Acknowledgement

The research on which this article is based was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council for England and Wales (Award Number: RES-000-22-0398).

Notes

1. R.V. Clarke and D.B. Cornish, ‘Modelling Offenders’ Decisions: A Framework for Research and Policy', Crime and Justice 6 (1985): 147–85.

2. K.J. Hayward and J. Young, ‘Cultural Criminology: Some Notes on the Script’, Theoretical Criminology 8, no. 3 (2004): 259–74.

3. B. Jacobs and R. Wright, ‘Stick-up, Street Culture, and Offender Motivation’, Criminology 37 (1999): 149–73.

4. V. Topalli, R. Wright and R. Fornango, ‘Drug Dealers, Robbery and Retaliation’, British Journal of Criminology 42 (2002): 337–51.

5. N. Shover and D. Honaker, ‘The Socially-bounded Decision Making of Persistent Property Offenders’, Howard Journal of Criminal Justice 31 (1992): 276–93.

6. R. Matthews, Armed Robbery. Crime and Society Series (Cullompton, Devon: Willan Publishing, 2002).

7. M. Gill, Commercial Robbery: Offenders' Perspectives on Security and Crime Prevention (London: Blackstone Press, 2000).

8. S. Morrison and I. O'Donnell, ‘An Analysis of the Decision Making Practices of Armed Robbers’. In The Politics and Practice of Situational Crime Prevention, ed. R. Homel (Monsey: Criminal Justice Press, 1996), 159–88.

9. J. Smith, ‘The Nature of Personal Robbery’. Home Office Research Study 254, London, 2003.

10. Jacobs and Wright, ‘Stick-up, Street Culture’.

11. B. Jacobs, V. Topalli and R. Wright, ‘Carjacking, Street Life, and Offender Motivation’, British Journal of Criminology 43 (2003): 19–34.

12. Jacobs and Wright, ‘Stick-up, Street Culture’.

13. E. Anderson, Streetwise (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990).

14. J.W. Messerschmidt, Flesh and Blood: Adolescent Gender Diversity and Violence (Lanham, MA: Rowman and Littlefield, 2004).

15. C. Mullins, R. Wright and B. Jacobs, ‘Gender, Streetlife, and Criminal Retaliation’, Criminology 42 (2004): 911–40.

16. L. Athens, ‘Violent Encounters: Violent Engagements, Skirmishes, and Tiffs’, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 6 (2005): 631–78.

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