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victimology (Ramljak and Simovic; 2006:16). However, Hans von Hentig, criminologist who is the founder
of victimology, had detected long ago an unbreakable connection between the perpetrator and the victim in
detecting and proving responsibility for the crime, which is why he stated “a criminal, even when working
in rubber gloves, leaves inerasable trace on the victims”. Hans von Hentig, defines and determines the victim
using the following words ”A victim becomes victim by perpetrator‟s criminal acts, with his or her own
behavior, social environment reactions
on perpetrator, and acceptance of the role of the victim” (Ramljak and
Halilovic; 2004:12). Thus, it is clear that there is no crime without a victim, and that if the state seeks to
democracy and the rule of law, it must ensure the enjoyment and protection of the rights proclaimed by the
Constitution and laws for all its citizens. If the state is incapable to protect rights derived from the
Constitution, then we are all victims of nonfunctioning justice or it could be said that the rule of law and
justice are absent in that country.
Throughout 19
th
and the beginning of 20
th
century several scientists had been debating and writing
about the role of the victim in a criminal act, but the real interest for victimology begun in 1940, precisely in
1941, following the publishing of Hans von Hentig papers “Remarks on the Interaction between the
Perpetrator and the Victim” (1948) and books “Criminal and His Victim” (1947), Mendelsohn‟s paper “New
Bio-Psycho-Social Horizons: Victimology”(1954), and Ellenberg‟s studies “Psychological Relationship
Between Criminal and His Victim”. In the last quarter of the 20
th
century there was even a greater interest of
all the sciences for the victim suffering, and particular importance of this research is reflected in finding the
right measures and programs for prevention of victimization.
3.
VICTIM AS AN ACTIVE AND PASSIVE SOURCE OF INFORMATION OF COMMITED
CRIME
Victimology is especially important in the investigation procedure, not only because it tells us who the
victims were, about their health and personal life, social habits and their personalities, but also because it
provides prerequisites why exactly they were chosen as victims. In many situations, the perpetrator shall
refrain in victims‟ selection, until he or she encounters the one that eventually would
allow him fulfillment of
some of his fantasies or needs that he has. Just because of this, the way that a victim was selected is
important and enables an insight in the way the perpetrator thinks, what affects his further modus operandi
afterwards, which is not possible without victimology profiling. All these are victimology factors or causes
of victimization which are very closely related to victimologic profiling in discovering of the perpetrator of
crimes, a very important victim approach method, victim assault method and victimization risk assessment.
In the case where the characteristics of the victim are known it is
possible to determine, together with the use
of crime scene analyses, the overall picture about who the victim is and what motivated the perpetrator in
choosing the victim.
Approach method is a term which refers to the way the perpetrator approached the victim, and should
provide information about the attacker, like what are his social abilities, physical structure and ability to
manipulate and allure the victim. Generally, there are three approach methods described as: deception,
surprise, and surprise attack. In case when the victim is attacked by deception method, it could be concluded
that the attacker has very good social skills. When it comes to surprise or surprise attack methods, it is
indicative that the attacker is agile and strong with lack of strong social or verbal skills. It should be clear
that it is rarely obvious how the attacker attacked his victim, unless in cases where
the witness is present or if
the victim is alive and could witness.
The attack method is related to the way the attacker overpowered his victim, when he approached the
victim, therefore it is the best way to describe the intensity of the forces applied, use of any kind of weapon,
and their role in the attack. The type of attack can vary from mild (verbal threat) to serious (exaggerated use
of physical power with use of weapon) and should not follow the approach method (i.e. the attacker was
hindered and the victim succeeds to escape). It should be emphasized that the approach method and the
attack method should be considered separately and analyzed separately, and later combined to ensure the
exact event and information course. The method of attack is vital in understanding of what an attacker is
capable of and whether he feels comfortable in specific circumstances with chosen victim. These questions
have a very strong influence in many fields, and especially in term of future victims, because if an attacker
does not use too much of the physical forces
or weapons at the beginning, that does not necessarily mean that
in the future it would not change.
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Risk assessment determines why specific person becomes a crime victim. To be precise, that key
factor determines something the victim did or was involved in, which greatly enhances possibility to become
a victim. This does not mean that the person is
guilty for becoming a victim, rather that the
specific factors in
lifestyle or situation increases the chance for victimization. This could include things such as: prostitution,
being drunk, use of drugs, walking late at night in area that is known for criminal activity. Risk assessment
could also include risk research which the attacker is ready to be exposed to in the process of selection of the
victim, which represents attacker risk assessment, while the risk for the victim is divided into three basic
levels: low risk, medium risk, and high risk. They all refer to the percentage of possibility to cause harm to
the personal, professional, and the social lifestyle of a victim. For example, the victims who are exposed to
high risk are prostitutes since they are full-time exposed to a big number of strangers, they can travel alone
late at the night, usually have contact with drugs or drugs users, may be at low priority level for the police
and usually it passes a lot of time before it is discovered that they are missing. A low-level risk life may have
persons who have a regular job, a lot of friends, rarely travel alone and do not have predictable pedestrian
route. The victims‟ lifestyle is related mainly to their personal life, private, social and business environment.
A lifestyle based risk in essence is conditioned with who in fact the victim is and
how is that person linked to
certain surrounding risk. There are specific factors that will increase the risks of person‟s life-style like:
aggression, anger, emotional outbursts, hyperactivity, anxiety, passivity, self-esteem level, and emotional
clam up.
Research has shown that offenders do not choose their victim randomly, which encouraged FBI agents
to start their investigation by creating the victim profiles. This is because the victim‟s identity (specifically if
it is about multiple victims of different characteristics) helps inspectors to determine whether the perpetrator
selects victims with specific characteristic or chooses them by given opportunity. Evolution psychologist
David Buss at Texas University uses the term “efficiency” referring to characteristic catalog which seems to
be attracted for some people to exploit others like: deceiver‟s, sexual, robbery, murderous, and defamation
ability. The exploit defense made pressure for development of additional forms of exploitation in purpose of
evading victim‟s defense, so that it is necessary to monitor the crime trends from the victim‟s perspective
through study of victimology and about victimization. Thus, Buss, Goetz, Easton, and Lewis focused special
attention to research the cause why some person becomes victim of sexual harassment and they concluded
that victim‟s psychological characteristics have a very important role. Namely, the psychological
characteristics indicate whether some specific person can be manipulated emotionally, i.e. intelligence,
maturity, flirting and promiscuity (i.e. to have a prodigal friends, to wear short clothes) and negligence
(indifference, irresponsibility, partying), and research has shown that the key factor is their sexual
appearance. In addition, the reduced consciousness of a person can increase the risk of becoming a victim,
especially when a person is drunk or drowsy. On this basis and other numerous victimology studies,
conclusion was that the victim actively contributes to criminal investigation as a witness or through a
statement of circumstances under which crime was committed as well as through description of the crime
offender, while the passive contribution of the victim is related to clues which crime inspectors could
find on
a victim, as a result of interpersonal reaction between the perpetrator and the victim. Besides, bio-psycho-
social characteristics which are unique for every person lead investigators to the crime perpetuator. At the
end, besides the primary there are secondary victims (people close to the primary victim) who could witness
and help in finding the motives, weapons and other important facts that are important for the perpetuators
identification or to prove responsibility for the committed crimes.
4.
VICTIMOLOGY PROFILE AND CRIMINAL PROFILING
Criminal profiling is a process that makes a series of actions and measures that are aimed at
determining the profile of the perpetrator of certain forms of behavior (i.e. the profile of a serial killer) or
criminal personality profiling or profiling perpetrators. It is in focus of criminological phenomenology that
collects, analyses, and interprets data on a number of perpetrators with specific forms of offensive behavior
(i.e. of serial killers), which then compares and offers conclusion about certain common characteristics of the
perpetrators (age, sex, education, marital status, childhood abuse, sexual preference, etc.). Opposite to
criminology profiling there is a criminal profiling consisted of series of investigation methods used by the
police while discovering the perpetrators of concrete crimes and on the basis of available clues and data is
trying to get a “picture” of the perpetrator, in order to narrow down the possible suspects. Professor Modly
divides criminal profiling in: victim assessment, crime scene evaluation, evaluation of autopsy results,
evaluation of the mental state of perpetrator, assessment of violent act, assessment of act planning or