Ethnicity and crime

Prison population statistics

27% of prison pop are from minority background

BAME more likely to be sent to prison at the crown court

Black people are 2.2x likely to be arrested than white people

Demographics- Morris

Patterns of offending link to age

proportion of the population are mroe young people of BAME heritage

Young people = more likely to commit crime

Phillip and Browing

Police targeting- Police act on racial stereotypes BAME people feel over police and under protected

Police more likely to arrest people but not investigate acts against them

lead to labelling of groups and self fulfilling prophecy

Hall

moral panic- Muggings and street crime in 1970s

Racialised and seen as a crime committed by black males

This lead to police targeting and higher arrest rates

ev. Outdated, can link to knife crimes

Gilroy

Political protest- BAME people commit crime as a form of political protest against oppression and past racism + ongoing racism

Ev. if was true there would be high crime rate for first gen. immigrants in the 50’s and it wasn’t

WAddington et al

Locality theory- BAME people are more likely to live in zones of transition

Areas in the cities with poor infrastructure and limited social bonds and populated with first generation migrants and people who are vunerable in poverty

Lea and Young

Left realism- Main reason people commit crime is due to relative deprivation and the existence of subcultures and marginalisation

Reiner

Institutional racism- The canteen culture that exists in the police links to racist behaviours

e.g casual use of racial stereotypes. jokes and names in informal settings impacts on individual police behaviour

Mcpherson report

Published after Steven Lawrence a teen who was murdered by a racist gang

Report focused on how the police failed to investigate the crime properly and enabled the gang to walk free

The report argued the MET was institutionally racist

Sewell

Triple Quandary

Young black males commit crime due to three factors

Absence of a father figure and a need for a male role model

Institutional racism = limited opportunity

the glamourisation of crime through drill music