Identifying Victims of Criminal Exploitation: Understanding Law Enforcement’s Decision-making in Organised Crime

• In Event: Youths’ Involvement in Organized Crime - Panel 1

Abstract

Organised crime presents challenges for law enforcement, especially in distinguishing between individuals who willingly participate in criminal networks and those who are victims of criminal exploitation. This distinction is often unclear, resulting in exploited individuals being misclassified as offenders, which impacts their access to justice, protection, and rehabilitation. As it is largely unknown how these distinctions are operationalized in practice, the current study explores how the criminal justice system classifies individuals as "victims of criminal exploitation" or "offenders" in organised crime cases, as well as the subsequent social and legal implications.
The study employs a qualitative approach, using around 40 in-depth interviews with experts from the criminal justice and social support systems. Guided by a constructivist grounded theory framework, the study integrates theoretical insights and existing literature to inform the development of interview topics. During analysis, this framework guides an iterative process of inductive coding, to identify emerging patterns and insights, and deductive reasoning, to link findings to existing theoretical concepts.
This study will present preliminary findings on the decision-making process of criminal justice actors in identifying victims within organised crime. The results are organized around several key themes: perceived differences between victims and offenders, the decision-making process, professional responses to these labels, the consequences of these labels and potential ways to improve identification and support of victims. These findings aim to contribute to the broader literature on victim identification in human trafficking and to deepen the understanding of the consequences of victim classification in organised crime cases.

Authors

• Fallon Cooper, Leiden University

• Ieke de Vries, Leiden University

• Babette van Hazebroek, Leiden University

• Arjan Blokland, NSCR

• Maarten Kunst, Leiden University