Most Crimes Are Unreported
A
Clean Criminal Record Does Not Mean Absence of Criminal Behavior
A criminal background check identifies
only a small percentage of overall criminal activity.
Checks of criminal records identify only the
tip of the iceberg of criminal activity. A clean record indicates only that
there are no records of criminal conduct in the places checked. The absence of
information in criminal record files should not be viewed as positive evidence
of reliability or trustworthiness.
Most crimes are not
reported to the police.
Most
reported crimes do not lead to arrest, and
many arrested persons are not
prosecuted and convicted. Even for those who are prosecuted and
convicted, the
criminal records are often incomplete or missing. As a result, the
chances are very small that an individual who has committed a single crime, even
a serious crime, will have a criminal record. The more crimes a person has
committed, the greater the odds of that person having a record. See
Prevalence of Crime for a
discussion of the percentage of the population that has a criminal record.
Much past criminal behavior is likely to be
discovered only by self-admission, interviews with references or developed
sources, or polygraph examination. This behavior should be evaluated under the
adjudication guidelines even though there may be no criminal record.
The 1994 National Crime Victimization Survey
found that only 36% of crimes against individuals are reported to police. Broken
down by type of crime, 42% of violent victimizations and 34% of all property
crimes were reported. Ref 11
Even fewer crimes against businesses are
reported to police. For example, shoplifting and theft by retail employees are
very common, but even those few offenders who are caught are seldom reported to
police. Most businesses handle these and other economic crimes such as fraud and
embezzlement internally (through job termination, restitution, demotion),
through civil litigation, or by writing them off as a cost of doing business.
The FBI's annual report on crime in the United
States reports that only 22% of Crime Index offenses (the most serious offenses)
reported during 1990 were "cleared," which in most cases means the offender was
arrested and turned over to the court for prosecution. The clearance rate was
46% for violent crimes and 18% for property crimes.
Ref 12
If only 38% of crimes are reported and only 22%
of those reported lead to arrests, this suggests that the chances of a crime
leading to arrest are only about 8%. Owing to significant differences in
procedures between the FBI reporting and the National Crime Victimization
Survey, this 8% figure is only a very rough approximation.
For each 100 persons arrested by the police on
felony charges, about 45 are typically released due to insufficient evidence or
legal technicalities unrelated to guilt or innocence. About 55 are prosecuted,
with one acquitted and 54 convicted.
To avoid the cost and uncertainties of a trial,
more than half the prosecuted cases are
plea-bargained down to conviction for a misdemeanor rather than a
felony, which generally involves far less serious consequences for the
defendant. Only about 32 of every 100 persons arrested on felony charges
actually spend any time in a correctional institution.
Ref 13
Records of cases that are dismissed without
prosecution or that are plea-bargained may be incomplete or misleading. When
evaluating criminal conduct, the individual's behavior is the primary
consideration, not whether the individual was prosecuted or convicted. If there
is good reason to believe the person committed a felony but plea-bargained down
to a misdemeanor, it counts as a felony.
For an extensive Federal report on this subject please
Click
Here
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