Learn how the criminal legal system impacts survivors and the ways in which that system does not always meet the needs—or answer the questions—of people harmed.
In Step 1A: Youth Criminalization, you learned about the historic roots of the criminal legal system and its devastating impact on youth and communities of color. This step covers the negative impact this system can also have on survivors.
Crime impacts large numbers of people in the United States every single year, even as this has declined in recent years. In 2022, the US Department of Justice’s National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) reported about 3.5 million people aged 12 or older nationwide experienced at least one violent crime. Additionally, households in the United States experienced 13.4 million property victimizations in 2022. The Alliance for Safety and Justice’s 2022 report Crime Survivors Speak: National Survey of Victims’ Views on Safety and Justice states that more than 6 in 10 people have been harmed by a crime in the last ten years and roughly half of those have experienced a violent crime. Additionally, survivors of violent crimes are three times as likely to experience four or more crimes.
People who have been harmed are, unsurprisingly, a very diverse group. Despite the tendency of news media to highlight stories about crime when the survivors are young white women, people of color are disproportionately impacted by crime. The Alliance for Safety and Justice survey found that Black people have faced serious violent crimes at a rate that is 150 to 200 percent the rate among white people; Latinx people at a rate 120 to 150 percent as high, and among Indigenous people it is 240 percent as high. Statistics also clearly indicate that young people, people from low income communities, LGBTQ+ people, people with disabilities, people who are unhoused, and people with records are all disproportionately impacted by crime. Understanding the landscape and demographics of survivors in the US can help guide how we respond to harms in our communities. The voices of people harmed should be considered first and foremost when we evaluate our current system and imagine different possibilities.
Harm often has medical, economic, and emotional impacts on survivors. However, few people harmed report that the criminal legal system provided any assistance to them.
In fact, 87 percent of survivors surveyed for the Crime Survivors Speak report did not receive financial or economic assistance to help recover what they lost and 74 percent did not receive counseling or other mental health support to help heal. Roughly 80 percent of survivors received help from friends or family or the health care system, while roughly 20 percent received help from the justice system. Only 1 in 4 surveyed found the justice system helpful in providing information about recovering from crime or referrals for support services. Further, many crimes are never reported to authorities because of a common belief that the criminal legal system simply won’t help. The 2022 National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) found that only about 2 in 5 violent crimes were ever reported to police. Survivors are seeking a system of justice that values their voice and their individual healing process.
In fact, the wishes and needs of survivors are often impossible to address in the setting of legal proceedings. Judith Lewis Herman wrote in, “Justice from a Victim’s Perspective”:
Victims need social acknowledgement and support; the court requires them to endure a public challenge to their credibility. Victims need to establish a sense of power and control over their lives; the court requires them to submit to a complex set of rules and bureaucratic procedures that they may not understand and over which they have no control. Victims need an opportunity to tell their stories in their own way, in a setting of their choice; the court requires them to respond to a set of yes-or-no questions that break down any personal attempt to construct a coherent and meaningful narrative. Victims often need to control or limit their exposure to specific reminders of the trauma; the court requires them to relive their experience… Indeed, if one set out intentionally to design a system for provoking symptoms of traumatic stress, it might look very much like a court of law.
Survivors are often characterized as being weak and in need of protection by the criminal legal system. This line of thinking justifies the legal system in taking the case fully and completely out of the hands of people harmed. People who have been harmed lose their right to participate fully in determining the consequences for the harm they’ve experienced when judges and lawyers take over this determination. People harmed lose the opportunity to heal through being fully heard. This “protection” of survivors not only discounts their strength and agency, it also ignores the reality that they know their story and their needs best. The Justice Policy Institute’s report, Smart, Safe, and Fair: Strategies to Prevent Youth Violence, Heal Victims of Crime, and Reduce Racial Inequality, found that survivors of harms caused by young people want a voice in the process that resolves the young person’s behavior.
It would be wrong to assume that people harmed align with “tough on crime” advocates who favor harsh sentences and long periods of incarceration for those who have caused harm. The National Survey on Victims’ Views found that the overwhelming majority of survivors strongly prefer investments in prevention and treatment over more spending on prisons and jails. These views are consistent across all demographics of survivors, regardless of race, sex, gender, age, income, political party affiliation, or whether the crime experienced was violent or nonviolent.
It is time that we listen and respond to the experiences, opinions, feelings, and needs of people who have been harmed. Watch the video below, Survivors Speak 2023, to see and hear what the power of the annual gathering of survivors is like in the voices of survivors.
Restorative justice, and the approach to restorative justice diversion described in this toolkit in particular, provides people harmed with the opportunity to have their voices heard and their needs met. This model offers people harmed with an alternative path to justice that doesn’t rely on the harmful practice of incarcerating young people. Continue on to the next step to learn more about restorative justice.
LEARN about how the criminal legal system impacts people harmed through reading this section and accessing other resources
WATCH the short video Survivors Speak 2023
