NCJ Number
119706
Date Published
1989
Length
21 pages
Annotation
Financial estimates of the cost of individual crimes to victims were derived by applying estimates of the value of life as well as jury awards in injury accident cases to actual injury and death rates and were found to provide some independent verification for estimates based on studies of property values.
Abstract
The research used data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics and other sources. It focused on the pain, suffering, and fear endured by crime victims and estimated the financial levels of these effects using actual injury rates and jury awards. It also combined crime-related death rates with estimates of the value of life to arrive at the monetary values for the risk of death. This approach produced cost estimates for specific types of crimes. When these estimates were converted to an aggregate crime index, the estimates were quite consistent with the estimates obtained from property value studies using hedonic pricing models that compare property values in areas with high and low crime rates. The two methodologies have conceptual differences and have many empirical limitations. In addition, the estimates of the present research are uncertain and need further refinements. Nevertheless, the approach used deserves further study. In particular, jury awards appear to be an underused and valuable source of data.