Victim Typologies Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Victim Typologies - Essay Example mization which involves only a single person being targeted – the objective is easy, there is one person on the mind of the potential criminal and he wished to target only him for the purpose of benefitting in some manner; secondary victimization involves that a person be targeted indirectly or impersonally where the criminal may target someone close the actual person he wants to target however brings in the aspect of threat; tertiary victimization refers to when the entire public (absolutely anyone) is being targeted and there is no particular target in mind as the object is to scare a larger crowd of people; mutual victimization is the fourth type that occurs when there are two sets of criminals that turn against each other and target one another for some purpose; lastly, no victimization is when it is difficult to understand and identify the target. There are a number of differences between victimology and criminology, the major being that in criminology, time is spent studying the focal point of the offender and the motive behind his crime whereas in victimology, the goal is to help the victim suffer as less as possible while restoring him back to his community with a healed relationship and state of mind with respect to the crime. The former refers to studying the relationship that a criminal has with a victim with respect to the crime as well as the motive behind committing the same and the latter refers to studying the victims and helping them improve their social status as well as working conditions. Both these studies fall under the branch of crime studies and they significantly assist in increasing the effectiveness of the criminal justice system. There have been a number of criminal cases of late which may be marked with either of the victim typologies; as of June 13, 2011, the body of a young student Lauren Spierer has been missing and the police in Indianapolis have been looking for signs of either life or death. Her family has been worried sick