Victim selection Importance Essay

Paragraph 1: Understanding Victim Selection in Research on Sexual Violence

Because it enables law enforcement officials to better comprehend the characteristics that make someone vulnerable to sexual predators, victim selection is a crucial component of research on sexual violence. Although the primary focus of the law is to hold violators accountable, there are effective alternatives to waiting for offenses to occur before taking action. Many assaults could be avoided if the profile of a victim for sexual offenses was known. Preventing such crimes is the ideal method to uphold order because the primary purpose of law is to ensure social order. Understanding the offender as well as the victim is crucial in criminal law and criminology. Theories such as Lombroso’s theory have attempted to explain both the mind and physic of a criminal in the hope of preventing crimes.

Paragraph 2: Patterns of Sexual Predators

Sexual predators tend to have a pattern that they follow. Some choose to assault brunettes or single mothers, whereas others profile their victims along social lines. Acknowledging the fact that being a brunette or single is bound to attract a criminal to attack you is by no means a manner of blaming the victim. Instead, it is an attempt to protect victims from such heinous crimes in the future.

Paragraph 3: Utilizing Victim Selection Information to Protect Potential Victims

Information that is obtained from victim selection can be used to arm potential victims. For instance, if predators tend to attack women from certain neighborhoods more than others then security can be increased in such areas. Conversely, once it has been determined what types of people are more susceptible to attacks notices can be sent out to potential victims to have them staying alert. All in all, victim selection is done for the benefit of the victims not to blame them. Once victims have been identified and a pattern is noted, then it becomes possible to profile and set up safeguards to prevent new attacks.

Reference

Trujillo, O.R. (n.d.). Living with dissociative identity disorder: One woman’s experience. Retrieved from http://www.latinodv.org/docs/Living%20with%20DID.pdf.