Sorry Reporters-Why Crime Has No Easy Answers

Highlights

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After decades in the justice system (six years in law enforcement) with multiple university degrees, I conclude that there are few universal agreements or precise explanations as to why crime occurs. 

So when reporters ask for explanations about a crime (i.e., he beat his wife and killed her and her children; please tell me why) or ask for clarifications of current rates of crime, I understand that there are no simple answers.

There is a huge difference between knowing the data and providing answers that make sense.

It’s time to understand that there are few easy answers when it comes to crime.

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Note

This article uses the term reported crimes. The vast majority of crime is not reported to law enforcement, per USDOJ research.

Opinion

This article addresses common questions from reporters, policymakers, and the public, and the difficulty of answering them.  There is a difference between knowing the data and providing precise, understandable answers. 

Economists like to think of their discipline as the queen of the social sciences. Unfortunately, the vocation is more likely to be berated as “the dismal science” for a variety of reasons, including the complexity of its explanations. 

But I’m guessing that criminology could replace economics as the new dismal science. There are so many competing explanations and proposed remedies for crime that it boggles the mind.

No Easy Answers

So when reporters ask for explanations about a crime  (i.e., he beat his wife and killed her and her children; please tell me why), I know that there are no simple answers. Without going into detail about every aspect of the criminal’s life, how would I know?

I’ve had access to the criminal, psychological, social, and medical histories of hundreds of criminals, and even then, I can’t give you a precise answer as to why they committed their crimes. I’ve interviewed hundreds of offenders.

I can partially understand why they commit their crimes, but the reason for their actions may be based on something not in their files. It may be something as simple as an opportunity that appears unexpectedly.

I spoke to a criminal in prison who explained that his assault of a woman was based on the premise that, “if she was stupid enough to come on my street and ask for directions, she deserved to get what she got.” 

I may know about his absent father and abuse by his mother and mental health and substance abuse issues, but how does that translate into a sexual assault of someone asking for directions?

Most criminals are generalists; they commit crimes based on unexpected opportunities rather than careful planning.

Another reporter question, “Why do we have teen takeovers?”  Teenagers and young people have been taking over parks, shopping malls, and multiple public places for decades. It’s not a new phenomenon. Why do they do it? Beyond boredom, a show of strength, the lack of enforcement, and the urge to socialize, I don’t have a clue. But I can suggest that some takeovers now seem to be overtly criminal in nature.

Explaining crime is a frustrating and challenging endeavor because multiple “experts” bring numerous explanations, understandings, and advocacy to the table.  Beyond sex (males commit most crimes), age (crime is a young person’s game), and income (lower-income communities have much higher rates of crime), there isn’t a lot of agreement as to why and what to do about crime.

Do GLP Drugs, Overdose Deaths And Wildfires Explain Crime?

What’s below are just a few examples in our emerging understanding of crime. 

There are endless theories and explanations for crime. Those presented below are recent examples. But they are just some of the possibilities crime writers examine when asked about emerging trends. 

“GLP-1 Drugs Reduce Crime-Linked Behavior“

Crimes reported to law enforcement have recently declined. Do we know why?

So a new hypothesis is that GLP-1 drugs greatly dampen the use of drugs and alcohol and impulsive behaviors, all of which are strongly connected to criminality.

A national survey published in the journal Criminology found that current users of GLP-1 medications were significantly less likely to escalate impulsive feelings or alcohol use into violent crime compared to former users.

So do we have a chemical solution to crime? As GLP drugs work their way into mainstream society, will crime fall? There have been endless theories as to biological reasons for crime.

Wildfires: Results show that wildfire smoke significantly increases crime, with particularly notable impacts on violent and drug-related crimes. Wildfire smoke leads to increases of 0.49% in overall crime, 0.88% in violent offenses, and 1.35% in drug-related crimes. Will better firefighting reduce crime? 

Overdose Deaths: One possible explanation for fewer reported crimes is that exceptionally high overdose mortality among chronic substance users (the toll approaches two million deaths) may have had some effect on reported crime. It is reasonable to ask whether overdose mortality removed enough high-rate offenders from the community to influence crime. To date, however, this possibility has received little direct empirical study.

Considering the strong link between drug and alcohol use and criminal behavior and acknowledging that a smaller number of criminals are responsible for most crimes, drug overdose deaths “may” have contributed to less reported crime.

Older Explanations

Other explanations range from an increasingly older population (older individuals commit fewer crimes) to a decline in marriage (there is a large body of empirical literature showing that marriage reduces criminal activity) to massive histories of child abuse and neglect within the offender population to poor decision-making skills on the part of offenders (likely due to child abuse and neglect) to the impact of proactive police strategies, to rates of incarceration (now becoming a preferred strategy in multiple nations) to cultural norms that tolerate or glorify violence, to the declining use of alcohol, all contribute to crime and disorder, they all have an impact.

The question on all the above is how much influence. The conundrum is which has the strongest impact and which remedies society is willing to embrace.

Many want a root causes of crime approach when there is no universal agreement as to which root causes apply. Poverty comes to mind, but I’m unaware of any society ending it. 

Crime Statistics

Not only are there no easy explanations for crime and widely embraced remedies, we also can’t agree if crime has increased or decreased. 

The FBI states that violent and property crimes have decreased beginning in 2023 (3 percent) and 2024 (4.5 percent). The latest data from the FBI’s website states that crime continues to fall.

From The Hill: “Nobody believes Patel crime statistics.” Bannon, a former adviser to President Trump, said “nobody believes” crime statistics from the FBI and its director, Kash Patel. 

Per the USDOJ’s Bureau of Justice Statistics 50-year-old National Crime Victimization Survey (what the US Census and USDOJ call the premier method of counting crimes in America), we had a large increase in rates of violent crime in 2022 (44 percent), and rates have remained almost unchanged for 2023 and the latest-most recent full report for 2024.

You can make any case about crime you want based on USDOJ data. Different sources allow for differing interpretations.

Conclusions

Reporters, most of your questions about crime have no clear answers. 

Why did a person with a mental health background and a drug user who is mad at the world kill his wife and her children? The answer requires an exhaustive examination of his background, but even then, how does someone know? Is it because he was badly beaten as a child? Or was it because of an argument that exploded into a delayed rage? 

What about crime policies? Advocates insist that they can prove that their approaches to crime work, but it’s mostly opinion based on political leanings.  They don’t know because no one truly knows.

At the moment, the only strategy grounded in over 1,000 studies from the National Academies of Sciences indicating success is proactive policing. Among criminal justice interventions, proactive policing has the backing of one of the largest and strongest research literatures.

Yet there are advocates with impressive credentials who want proactive policing greatly reduced or ended. They want fewer prisons. They want no monetary bail for everyone. They want a kinder, gentler justice system. 

Politicians will tell you that their strategies work because reported crime is down in their city. But reported crime is down in 80 percent of American cities per recent data.

If I had advice for people seeking answers to crime, then they should include people with extensive real-world experience in the justice system. Relying solely on left-leaning sources (they create 80 percent of what’s written about crime policy) will get you a politically oriented answer from people with superb academic backgrounds but with little to no real-world experience within the justice system.

Few organizations dealing with crime are nonpartisan. Nearly every organization studying crime brings its own philosophical assumptions and policy preferences, even when it strives for objectivity.

It’s up to reporters, policymakers, and the rest of us to view public pronouncements about crime and justice skeptically. There are few easy answers or explanations. Nonpartisan sources are extremely rare. Mayors will tell you that their strategies work without independent, methodologically sound research or replication in other locations. 

It’s time for reporters and others to understand that there are few easy answers when it comes to crime.

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