It's Time to Confront Failures of Justice (Part II)

Serious crime and failures of justice aren't going away.

This is the second in a five-part series where we're guest blogging about our new book Confronting Failures of Justice: Getting Away With Murder and Rape, available here. In the last post we introduced the largely overlooked problem of failures of justice—instances where guilty offenders escape punishment entirely or receive a clearly inadequate punishment. But perhaps focusing on instances of unpunished crime is unnecessary because the problem is solving itself? One common response to worries over crime and lack of punishment is that it reflects perennial fearmongering about an ever-diminishing crime problem. Aren't we enjoying historically low rates of crime? Are failures of justice really a pressing problem for policymakers if serious crime is continually shrinking? We consider this argument about crime rates in our book's first chapter.

[T]he truth is that America is not enjoying historically low rates of crime, and serious crimes such as murder, rape, and aggravated assault are on the rise again, especially in urban jurisdictions, after falling from their peak in the early 90s. If the graph showing crime rate trends is framed to start in the 1970s, 80s, or 90s, this may suggest that America is enjoying historically low crime rates.

But, in reality, those three decades represented America's abnormal highs in crime. If one looks at the broader historical record, it becomes clear that when compared to before the devastating crime wave starting in the late 1960s, our current crime rates are higher today. For example, comparing the FBI's crime data reported by the Library of Congress from 1960 with 2019 (the last year the Library of Congress chose to report these inconvenient statistics) shows that total offenses per 100,000 increased from 1,887 to 2,489, a 32% increase. Violent crime increased even more dramatically, as shown in the table below. Modern violent crime rates are well above double the 1960 benchmark, mainly due to the explosion in aggravated assault:

Year	Total Offenses per 100,000	Violent	Murder	Forcible Rape	Robbery	Aggravated Assault
1960	1,887.2	160.9	5.1	9.6	60.1	86.1
2019	2,489.3	379.4	5.4	42.6	81.6	250.2

This data does not even account for the recent surge in homicides since 2019 which saw the murder rate rise by nearly 30% from 2019 to 2020. Even the 2019 data understates the size of the problem as the murder-rate comparison is deceptive: enormous advances in emergency medical care since 1960 have dramatically improved the survivability of a shooting or aggravated assault. Victims now arrive at hospitals sooner due to better ambulance and helicopter response times, and most hospitals now have dedicated trauma centers skilled in treating severe wounds. For example, serious gunshot wounds treated in hospitals increased almost 50% between 2001 and 2011 even as the death rate decreased, causing the murder rate to drop from 5.6 to 4.7. Studies show that if 1960s medical technology prevailed today, the murder rate would be more than five times higher than it is. In 2020, 22,000 homicides took place in America. Without modern technologies, this number would be closer to 110,000. America is not in a period of historically low violent crime but rather a period of advanced emergency care saving many victims from death despite steady or increasing severe violence in many jurisdictions. Addressing failures of justice is more important now than ever as America is caught in a vicious cycle of rising severe violence and falling clearance rates.

It is worth noting that official crime statistics fail to tell the whole story due to non-reporting. Less than half of violent crime is even reported to police, a fact that can obscure trendlines. For example, while reported violent crime fell 2% between 2021 and 2022—a fact many journalists loudly touted to suggest worrying over crime was fearmongering—total violent crime incidents (including non-reported crimes) rose by around 40%. Violent crime in 2022 was almost 20% higher than the 2015-2019 average.

In addition to serious crime rates increasing or stagnating, clearance rates are also dismal and getting worse in many jurisdictions. National homicide clearance rates decreased from around 90% in 1960 to under 50% in 2020, and the true homicide clearance rate is even lower due to police declaring "solved" cases that never even lead to an arrest, much less a conviction. Despite advances in investigative technology, killers are escaping justice at increasingly high rates. Police departments are sitting on over 250,000 cold murder cases, and each year six to ten thousand get added to that number. If one added attempted murder cases (those aggravated assaults that would have led to death in the past), this number would be well over a million.

Clearance rates in many large cities have reached truly abysmal levels. In 2022, in cities with populations larger than a million, only about 8.4% of violent crime and 1.4% of property crimes even led to an arrest. The sheer scale of unpunished crime is deeply disturbing and unknown to most Americans. And contrary to the dismissive claims of some, it is not a problem that is solving itself. Our next post will consider the costs of these massive and routine failures of justice.

Comments

[apedad]

"For example, comparing the FBI's crime data reported by the Library of Congress from 1960 with 2019 (the last year the Library of Congress chose to report these inconvenient statistics) shows that total offenses per 100,000 increased from 1,887 to 2,489, a 32% increase."

Oh FFS, how good was the national reporting of cases in 1960?!?

Even in 1990 (when I became a federal agent), there were still a lot of inconsistencies in national reporting.

As the story subsequently mentions, better emergency medical care has lessened deaths from violent crime; well better national reporting has obviously increased the numbers.

As former Pres. Trump stated, "If you don't test, you don't have any cases," so if you don't report then you won't have as many cases.

[Mr. Bumble]

“The beaches are open and people are having a wonderful time…”

[Frank Drackman]

so maybe Paul Pelosi's attacker was just an angry boyfriend

[ReaderY]

This is a serious argument, although I have no idea if it’s true. Reported crime rates might have increased between 1960 amd 2019, not because actual crime rates increased, but because more of it was reported.

[Frank Drackman]

The FBI? they've sucked since J. Edgar died (and lets see, he was 1/2 Black, a Homo, and a Transvestite, (he wasn't) shouldn't the "Progressives" make him one of their heroes? I know "He wiretapped Martin Lucifer!!!!!" only because RFK ordered him to.

Frank

[Brett Bellmore]

The war on drugs IS inevitably going to drive up crime rates, both directly and indirectly, and drive down clearance rates. Prohibition did the same, and the war on drugs is just Prohibition Mk II, larger and more stubborn, with all the same pathologies on a larger scale.

It's difficult to end, though, because you have to accept that if you relegalize drugs, (I must emphasize that it's "Re"-legalize, because they used to be legal!) a lot of people will self-destruct.

It's just preferable that self-destructive people self-destruct, than that sensible people get destroyed in the process of trying (And failing!) to save them.

[Jaypd]

It's just preferable that people I've never met die because I'm a selfish prick, I think is what you meant to say

[Brett Bellmore]

No, what I meant to say is what I did say.

There are a lot of self-destructive people in this world. If you're not careful, the attempt to save them doesn't reduce suffering, it just displaces the suffering onto innocents. Compounding suffering with injustice.

[apedad]

But if you don't attempt to save them, then the innocents still suffer, i.e., funerals, EMTs, police, maybe higher insurance, etc.

[Brett Bellmore]

But the current effort to save drug addicts by prohibition has resulted in a massive black market, and hugely expanded our urban gang problem by providing them with a lucrative source of income as muscle for drug dealers.

At the same time, the effects in terms of public corruption and erosion of civil liberties have been awful. The massive cash flow allows for bribery at scale, and when the legal system attempts to enforce victimless crime laws procedural safeguards always erode because enforcement is impossible while respecting them.

From civil forfeiture to not being able to buy decongestants that actually WORK, the collateral damage throughout society has been enormous. While predictably, the addicts still get the drugs!

The same dynamic as we saw during Prohibition, on on a larger scale due to the war on drugs going on longer, and involving more doubling down.

I really think we're just better off entirely surrendering in this war, and just devoting some effort to limit the damage from addiction to just the addicts themselves.

[Absaroka]

That's one side of the ledger. But the current WoD has downsides, too.

We gave up with the war on ethanol. I used to see winos sleeping by dumpsters when I went to work early; legal alcohol had surely ruined their lives, and no doubt severely impacted the lives of their families.

But we tried banning booze, and it didn't seem to reduce the number of drunks enough to justify the other downsides.

A crack addict surely ruins his own life, and his family's, as thoroughly as a wino does. But the winos could panhandle enough for a bottle of Mad Dog, and so they weren't breaking into houses to fund their habit, and liquor store owners weren't having shootouts over territory.

I don't think there are any great solutions, and I'm also not sure what the least-bad one is.

There was a post Civil War epidemic of opiate abuse among soldiers. Does anyone know what the eventual course of that was? That link, and a few others I tried, never got into the eventual outcome.

[TwelveInchPianist]

"Does anyone know what the eventual course of that was?"

Drug stores with soda fountains?

[EscherEnigma]

Next time you're in Vegas and have an afternoon or morning free, I suggest you check out the "Mob Mueseum". Talks a lot about prohibition, how it was never equally enforced, how it led to a stark increase in organized crime (which would eventually lead to the drug-trade after prohibition was repealled) and so-on.

Also talks about the very shady things the US Gov. did, including literally putting nerve toxins into medicinal alcohol so that people getting drunk off it wound up partially paralyzed.

[Absaroka]

In a lot of ways, the current War on Drugs seems to deliver the worst of all worlds: we get the disruption of heavy handed enforcement, without seeming to reduce the supply/number of users much. I knew a fellow once who advocated that anyone found with any, say, cocaine at all would just be summarily executed. If that actually reduced usage significantly you would at least get the benefit from that side of the ledger. You'd probably have fewer movie stars and Wall Street financial wizards, though.

(In fairness, Oregon provides a counterargument: they largely removed drug penalties, then fairly soon reversed themselves. I didn't really follow the particulars, but it is at least a cautionary tale for the 'let's just legalize' argument)

[Brett Bellmore]

Oregon didn't relegalize drugs, it was still illegal to sell them. They just lifted the penalties for the users.

"Decriminalization" gets you the worst of both worlds: More addicts, and yet you still have to deal with a black market.

[apedad]

Sweden did the opposite with prostitution.

They penalized the users/buyers but not the sellers.

[Mr. Bumble]

How did it work out? Is it still the policy?

[apedad]

Apparently not as intended.

It's called the Nordic Model and was enacted in 1999.

One report (2013), showed that street prostitution was halved in the previous decade but escort advertisements "increased from 304 to 6,965; however, the report also stated that an increase in advertisements did not necessarily mean that the number of escorts had increased." (wiki)

I'm guessing the rise in advertisements also is due to the increase in internet traffic and usage.

[EscherEnigma]

I'm not sure that a measurement of advertisements would persuade me it's not a success.

Full disclosure, this is one of those issues I'm fairly libertarian on: I see nothing wrong with buying or selling sex acts between consenting fully-informed adults.

So if the model is replacing modern-day sex-slaves beholden to their pimps and underage girls with independent contract workers who are no more coerced then burger flippers are†, I'd call that a win.
_________
†No matter how you cut it, "work this job or starve" is still coercive, but it is a level of coercive that all societies are generally okay with.

[Noscitur a sociis]

without seeming to reduce the supply/number of users much.

What’s your basis for saying this?

[Absaroka]

Fair question! It's based on no more than it seems like everyone who wants drugs gets them.

As another not-quite-anecdotal data point, at one point we started the Sudafed Wars to eliminate the scourge of meth. IIRC within a couple of years the price of meth had dropped (it seems it's cheaper for the cartels to mass produce and smuggle than to grind up sudafed).

I'm sure open to contrary data.

[Noscitur a sociis]

The legal changes pretty much completely eradicated meth production in the United States (basically all meth today is made in cartel super labs in Mexico and smuggled across the border).

Basically all of the data I’m aware shows a marked decrease in drug use, especially among young people, over the last 30-40 years—though to be fair, I believe you see similar results for other disfavored behavior, like sex, smoking, and drinking, so there may be another causal factor.

[Absaroka]

I think that's important, and why I'd be curious how the post Civil War opiate thing wound up. One incentive to not, say, use crack is to grow up seeing what it does to people.

Both my parents started smoking in WWII, along with a lot of other people. Watching what happened to them is a pretty powerful disincentive.

Or it could be Nancy Reagan was very persuasive 🙂

It would be fun to know the relative contributions of various factors.

[EscherEnigma]

Too many kids are staying inside playing video games on their smart phones instead of going outside and getting high with their friends in the park.

This war on drugs is tearing apart the social fabric of this nation!

That said, yeah, the trendline --for a few decades now-- has been that kids are less interested in drugs (including nicotine and alcohol) then the generation before them. It might be one of those things where it's shown in enough media (rather then being hidden away) that instead of being this mysterious "cool" thing, it's more likely to be "that lame thing that makes you act dumb".

Exception, of course, being marijuana. 'cause it turns out you have to be a super dedicated pothead to be half as self-destructive as a casual alcoholic.

[Noscitur a sociis]

There are three basic types of drug-related crime:

-Crimes designed to acquire or maintain control of drugs and drug proceeds. I would expect to see this decrease significantly if drugs were legalized.

-Crimes designed to gain access to money to buy drugs. I wouldn’t expect legalization to affect this significantly.

-Crimes committed because people are under the influence of drugs. I’d expect higher usage driven by legalization to increase this.

So whatever you think about it as a matter of libertarian philosophy, I don’t think you can say that legalizing drugs would fix all our problems. (You also have the empirical difficulty that the height of the war on drugs coincided with one of the most massive drops in crime in history.)

(I must emphasize that it’s “Re”-legalize, because they used to be legal!)

The drugs that cause the problems weren’t illegal for most of history, but they also didn’t exist for most of history either.

[Ridgeway]

The other big issue is urban quality of life. Even if drug users are not actively committing crimes, they are much more likely to be homeless, zombified and/or manic.

Portland seemed like a great test case. It is a pretty wealthy city, and very much wanted to make legalization work. Instead, it failed so miserably that they gave up within a couple of years.

[Noscitur a sociis]

This is also a fair point. Perhaps Brett Bellmore would be more receptive if we framed it as a zoning issue?

[Brett Bellmore]

There's a fourth category, though: Crimes committed because of the drug dealers being flush and needing to hire muscle. (Since they don't have access to police protection.) This results in an enormous amount of money ending up in the hands of urban gangs, which accordingly expand.

[Noscitur a sociis]

I’m sure there are any number of other categories that exist only in your imagination.

(There are certainly criminal organizations that revolve around drug dealing—that falls in my first category. The category you’re postulating—gangs that get paid by non-gang drug dealers to finance non-drug-related criminal conduct—isn’t really a thing.)

[Brett Bellmore]

"gangs that get paid by non-gang drug dealers to finance non-drug-related criminal conduct"

Gangs that get paid by no-gang drug dealers to provide said drug dealers with security. But end up growing, and engaging in non-drug related criminal conduct.

[Noscitur a sociis]

I understand that dynamic you’re postulating, but this is another illustration of how sometimes a little knowledge of how things actually work is more useful than a lot of theorizing, because what you’re describing isn’t really how it works.

In reality, gangs don’t get hired by drug dealers—gangs are made up of drug dealers, and are organized around drug dealing. The non-drug dealing crimes that they commit are generally based around

-Protecting their drugs/drug proceeds
-Stealing drugs/drug proceeds from other criminals
-Intimidating people into letting them sell drugs in a particular place (though that dynamic is becoming less important as the internet supersedes street based sales)
-Retaliating against people for stealing their drugs/drug proceeds or cooperating with law enforcement
-Facilitating illegal behavior to help users pay for drugs

[TwelveInchPianist]

Yup. It's called an economy of scope. Just like it's cheaper to make cognac if you also have a winery, it's probably cheaper to run a burglary ring or an extortion ring if you have a drug ring.

Not to mention that if you're already at risk of jail for your drug crimes, the additional risk for other crimes isn't as bad.

[Absaroka]

Good post.

"Crimes designed to gain access to money to buy drugs. I wouldn’t expect legalization to affect this significantly."

Winos seem to fund their habit by panhandling or dumpster diving for cans to recycle etc. If legalization dropped the cost of crack enough, crack heads could do the same instead of stealing. And I think legalization implies at least some drop in price, or junkies will just keep buying cheaper illegal drugs.

Of course, having crack be a lot cheaper might lead to more addicts, as well. Or not? What's the demand curve look like for a product that is guaranteed to utterly ruin your life? There are certainly arguments that price matters for e.g. meth, i.e. addicts saying they started because it was cheaper.

[Noscitur a sociis]

Winos seem to fund their habit by panhandling or dumpster diving for cans to recycle etc.

I think you’ll find that most “winos” are also committing crimes to support their habit. (And I think you’ll find that they’re using illegal drugs in addition to alcohol!)

And I think legalization implies at least some drop in price, or junkies will just keep buying cheaper illegal drugs.

I’d expect legalization to change both the demand and supply curves, resulting in greater quantities produced and consumed at a roughly similar price.

Fentanyl is already under $10 a pill in most of the country: if that’s not low enough to support a habit without committing crimes (and for almost everyone who’s addicted, it’s not), it’s hard for me to see how it’s going get better if the pills are made by Merck or Phillip Morris or whatever.

[Absaroka]

“I think you’ll find that most “winos” are also committing crimes to support their habit.”

Not my impression, or what I heard in the day from cop friends, but I will gladly admit it’s pretty far from any (especially current!) expertise I have.

[Krayt]

Studies show that if 1960s medical technology prevailed today, the murder rate would be more than five times higher than it is. In 2020, 22,000 homicides took place in America. Without modern technologies, this number would be closer to 110,000.

This is why I submit the FDA, far from saving lives and protecting consumers, is the biggest mass murderer last century, not wars. The same principle cuts across all diseases and accidents and even aging in general.

Consider a heart medicine that saves 5% of heart patients a year. That’s 30,000 in the US alone. More benefit if you count people who get permanent damage. And multiply that by almost 20 for worldwide.

A delay of almost a decade, to say nothing of denials, means we are running chronically years behind where we should be. This adds up, like compounding interest.

Worse, of course, are generally business-unfriendly policies slowing it down, and especially worldwide with so many dogged economies due to corruption and dictatorship.

Keep opening your yappers about unconscionable profits, politicians. Hitler aspires to be as evilas you.

[Magister]

Of course, the alternative is to rush out bad drugs that haven't been properly tested; thalidomide will probably always be the FDA's greatest success. Even with FDA regulation, there seem to be more than a few drugs with TV ads progressing from "Ask your doctor about wonderdruggium!" to "Were you or a loved one harmed by wonderdruggium? You may be entitled to substantial compensation."

[Brett Bellmore]

Plenty of other countries manage to approve drugs faster and cheaper than the FDA, without having a Thalidomide disaster every few years. I think you're underestimating how many people the FDA's foot dragging prematurely kills.

[Magister]

I'm not making any estimates. I will observe that compassionate drug use is available, and that many people die because they can't afford medications that would keep them alive. But I am happy to look at evidence about other countries; from the recent COVID vaccine, it seems a lot of conservatives in this country thought the FDA went too fast on vaccines, but should have approved quack remedies.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Studies show that if 1960s medical technology prevailed today, the murder rate would be more than five times higher than it is. In 2020, 22,000 homicides took place in America. Without modern technologies, this number would be closer to 110,000. America is not in a period of historically low violent crime but rather a period of advanced emergency care saving many victims from death despite steady or increasing severe violence in many jurisdictions.

You don’t have to believe that outlandish-looking projection is accurate to acknowledge there is probably substance to the argument. If it is substantive, it undercuts gun advocates who dismiss the argument that higher gun prevalence increases gun crime. The argument, “Where is the blood in the streets?,” just gets the reply, “On the emergency room floor.”

[Absaroka]

Sigh.

Your theory would predict, then, a rise in violent crime with a concomitant decrease in deaths. Which doesn't seem to be the case (see Fig 1).

(that's just from 30 seconds of googling; if you want to provide contrary or more nuanced data sources, vice bald assertions, I'm all ears)

[EscherEnigma]

"One common response to worries over crime and lack of punishment is that it reflects perennial fearmongering about an ever-diminishing crime problem."
LOL, wut?

In all the talks I've heard and participated in over the years related to a lack of justice, I don't think I've ever heard this. Maybe you just hang out with weirdos?

And it's not like worrying about injustice and thinking the media exagerrates the prevalence of violent crime are incompatible thoughts....

If that's the thesis statement of chapter 1, I think it might be a bust.

[bacchys]

These two are just liars:

"It is worth noting that official crime statistics fail to tell the whole story due to non-reporting. Less than half of violent crime is even reported to police, a fact that can obscure trendlines. For example, while reported violent crime fell 2% between 2021 and 2022—a fact many journalists loudly touted to suggest worrying over crime was fearmongering—total violent crime incidents (including non-reported crimes) rose by around 40%. Violent crime in 2022 was almost 20% higher than the 2015-2019 average."

The media mostly ignores drops in crime and loudly touts any increases.