NCJ Number
173813
Date Published
1996
Length
14 pages
Annotation
After reviewing the situation of crime victims 25 years ago to show the rapid changes in victim status that have occurred up to the present, this chapter extrapolates existing trends to project the future for the status and services for crime victims in the year 2020.
Abstract
Three tendencies that seem to be the most influential are examined: the trend toward greater formal rights, the trend toward privatization, and the trend toward differential case handling. The author projects that the trend toward granting crime victims greater formal rights within the criminal justice process might lead to the emergence of victim advocates. These advocates could advise individual victims about their increasingly complicated rights, opportunities, options, and obligations; they would look after victims' best interests in their dealings with detectives, defendants, defense attorneys, prosecutors, judges, probation officers, corrections officials, parole boards, compensation boards, and journalists. The chapter also projects how the trend toward privatizing criminal justice functions might lead to private prosecution. This would stem from a new philosophy that is emerging from the victims' movement that challenges the government's monopoly on the exercise of prosecutorial discretion. Further, the author suggests how the trend toward developing more alternatives to both adjudication and incarceration might bring a greater reliance on victim- offender reconciliation programs. The trend toward differential justice, however, might increase the gap in the way victims are treated. The author advises that for each of these trends there will be opposing forces that will determine actual outcomes. Study questions and a 39-item bibliography