NCJ Number
169464
Journal
EuroCriminology Volume: 11 Dated: (1997) Pages: 41-65
Date Published
1997
Length
25 pages
Annotation
The current legal status of victim restitution and compensation is reviewed in the context of United Nations (UN) international humanitarian law, including human rights and criminal justice perspectives.
Abstract
UN law indicates victimization can result from criminal acts and from the abuse of power. Contemporary experiences show that more victimization is occurring in which victimizers are difficult to identify, as in the case of transnational money laundering and computer-related crime, and that non-state actors such as militant groups, warring factions, and corporations are playing a larger role at the international level than in the past. From the criminal justice perspective, since the time of the Eighth UN Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders in 1990, proposals have been advanced to create a voluntary fund for transnational crime victims. From the human rights perspective, recent proposals have been offered to establish a voluntary fund for terrorism victims. Although the international community still has a long way to go in controlling transnational and organized crime, the trend is to establish the idea of victim restitution and compensation in multilateral treaties. 56 footnotes