Vigilantism

Question 1

What are the key readings?

Question 2

Who defined vigilantism?

Answer 2

Sederberg 1978

Question 3

What is vigilantism?

Answer 3

Vigilantism is a desire to preserve social stability in the face of behaviour which deviates from social norms

Question 4

What are the emotional reactions to crime?

Answer 4

Anger
Feeling the need to retaliate against criminals but is rare

Question 5

What is the 1988 Israeli study?

Answer 5

Over one quarter of the males surveyed reported that they had engaged in some form of vigilante action (with over 6% admitting to having taken part in violent vigilante acts either against people or property).

Question 6

What did Johnson (1996) say?

Answer 6

There is no empirical research on the topic in the UK, while in the USA the quantity of research is small and its quality patchy

Question 7

What did a survey say about guns?

Answer 7

Adults use guns for ‘protective purposes’ in the States over 2.5 million times each year. This is a figure nearly five times higher than the actual number of crimes committed with guns.

Question 8

Who looked at potential victims?

Answer 8

Kovandzic et al 1998

Question 9

What did Kovandzic (1998) find?

Answer 9

Annually, potential victims of crime kill between 1,400 and 3,200 criminals and injure a further 7,700 - 18,500

Question 10

Why do people not intervene or respond to a criminal act?

Answer 10

Diffusion of responsibility effect

Question 11

What is the Kitty Genovese case?

Answer 11

Was attacked outside the apartment building she lived in
38 witnesses but no-one intervened

Question 12

Who looked at bystander intervention?

Answer 12

Shotland & Straw (1976)

Question 13

What did Shotland & Straw (1976) find?

Answer 13

Less than a third of people who witnessed the event intervened to assist a woman who was being assaulted by a male attacker.

Of those who did intervene, the typical response was to approach the struggle slowly but in plain view in the hope and expectation that the attacker would take flight.

Only two individuals (out of a total of 41) rushed immediately and directly to help the victim.

Significantly both of these individuals had received unarmed combat training and both reported afterwards that they felt they could handle the situation.

Question 14

What did Huston et al do?

Answer 14

interviewed people who had directly intervened in a criminal episode, were injured as a result and later received compensation for their injury.

Question 15

What did Huston et al find?

Answer 15

Interveners:
had witnessed considerably more crime in the years prior to the incident
were more likely to have been personally victimised themselves
more likely to have been trained in police work, first-aid techniques
were physically larger than the controls.

Question 16

What did Shotland & Stebbins (1980) find?

Answer 16

78% of the people who directly intervened were trained in self-defence techniques or boxing.

Question 17

What links with direct interveners?

Answer 17

The same forces at work for vigilantes

Question 18

Who looked at Israeli vigilantes?

Answer 18

Weisburd (1988)

Question 19

What did Weisburd (1988) find?

Answer 19

Majority is male, more likely to have been personally victimised than non-vigilantes, individuals who belonged to smaller communities
among communities of similar sizes it was the ones with higher rates of victimisation which were most likely to produce vigilantes.

Question 20

What is the issue of community?

Answer 20

Social psychology has long been aware that people from large cities are less likely to help strangers than people from smaller communities.

Question 21

What occurs with vigilantism with cohesive communities?

Answer 21

More cohesive communities and communities which feel particularly threatened by the deviant behaviour in question are much more likely to show signs of vigilantism.

Question 22

Who looked at the 3 requirements for vigilantism for it to occur?

Answer 22

Shotland & Goodstein (1984)

Question 23

What are the 3 requirements for vigilantism to occur?

Answer 23

1. The crimes must generate strong identification with the victim;
2. The crimes themselves are perceived as being particularly threatening to the community’s standards
3. There is frustration with and a lack of confidence in the formal justice system.

Question 24

What is a prediction for vigilantism?

Answer 24

Vigilantism will be most common in communities which are reasonably cohesive but which suffer from relatively serious crime problems

Question 25

Who looked at precincts in New York?

Answer 25

Shotland (1976)

Question 26

What did Shotland (1976) find?

Answer 26

71 police precincts in New York city, the 5 precincts where spontaneous acts of vigilantism had occurred were also the ones with the most serious crime problems

Question 27

What is the Tony Martin Case?

Answer 27

April 2000, a Norfolk farmer, Tony Martin, was jailed for life for shooting dead one of two burglars who he discovered in his house.
Martin was found guilty of murder and was sentenced to life imprisonment.

Question 28

What is the For Sarah Campaign?

Answer 28

July 2000, began a campaign of publishing the names, addresses and photographs of convicted paedophiles

Vigilante groups, composed mainly of parents who believed they now had convicted paedophiles living in their local areas, mounted aggressive protests outside the houses of suspected paedophiles.

Question 29

What occurred for suspected sex offenders in Plymouth and Whitely?

Answer 29

Gang attacks on suspected sex offenders occurred in Plymouth and Whitely, and other incidents occurred throughout the rest of the UK.

Question 30

Who looked at surveys?

Answer 30

Neapolitan 1987

Question 31

What did Neapolitan (1987) find?

Answer 31

Usually at least 40 to 50% of the population are supportive of vigilante actions

Question 32

Who looked at support increases?

Answer 32

Weisburd 1988

Question 33

What did Weisburd (1988) find?

Answer 33

Support increases to between 70 to 90% in communities where there is a greater perceived risk of victimisation

Question 34

What is the Guardian Angels Movement?

Answer 34

Sub-way patrols
61% reduced their own fear of crime.
66% believed that the Angels actually reduced crime.
74% of people reported that they approved of the Angels and their methods (Kenney, 1987).

Question 35

Who looked at individual vigilantism?

Answer 35

Johnston 1996

Question 36

What did Johnston (1996) find?

Answer 36

Stephen Owen was acquitted by a jury after he had admitted shooting the lorry driver who had been sentenced to 18 months in prison for knocking down and killing his son (Johnston, 1996). The driver had held no driving licence and had a string of convictions for motoring and violence offences.

Question 37

What is the danger of organised group vigilantism?

Answer 37

Having acquired power, some vigilante groups will be loathe to quietly relinquish it.
A number of vigilante groups have gradually progressed into full-scale terrorist campaigns
Israel in the 1980s and 1990s
South Africa in the 1990s.

Question 38

What is the popular support for vigilantism?

Answer 38

Paedophile-related vigilantism in the UK in July and August, 2000.
Paulsgrove estate, Portsmouth
Katrina Kessell.
While Kessell was giving a television interview during the height of the disturbances, her three-year-old son was found wandering alone near a busy road half-a-mile from their home

Question 39

Who looked at approval of vigilantism?

Answer 39

Neapolitan 1987

Question 39

What did Neapolitan (1987) find?

Answer 39

Research has shown that it is who you identify with (the vigilante or the victim) determines whether you will approve of vigilante behaviour