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Prosecutor Perceptions of Crime Seriousness
Jerey A. Roth
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9901-4169/78/6902-0232502.00/0
THE
JOURNAL
OF
CRIMINAL
LAW
&
CRIMINOLOGY
Copyright
©
1978
by
Northwestern
University
School
of Law
PROSECUTOR
PERCEPTIONS
OF
CRIME
SERIOUSNESS*
JEFFREY
A.
ROTH**
INTRODUCTION
In
explaining
the
need
for
a
measure
of
the
degree
of
seriousness
of
delinquent
acts, Sellin
and
Wolfgang
1
point
out
that
classification
of
crimes
by legal
nomenclature
obscures
an
important
qual-
itative
dimension
of
crime,
with detrimental
effects
to criminological
research:
[I]nnumerable
variables
have
been
statistically
cor-
related
with
the
events
covered
by
the
legal
terms
"crime"
and
"delinquency"
and
provocative
theo-
ries
about
these
phenomena
have
been
formulated,
but
even
in
the
most
sophisticated
researches
little
o'r
no
account has
been
taken
of
the
great
diversity
of
conduct
represented
...
by
such
legal
categories
as
"offenses
against
the
person,"
"offenses
against
property," criminal
homicide,
rape,
robbery,
bur-
glary, larceny,
and
others.
This,
we
think,
is
a
cogent
reason
for
the
dissatisfaction
with
present definitions
ofjuvenile
delinquency
and
the
demand
that
some-
thing
be
done
about
it.
2
Their
well-known
solution
to
the
problem
was
the
development
of
an
index
scale
of
crime
serious-
ness.
3
This
pioneering
effort
opened
a
new
area
of
criminological
inquiry
and
allowed
examination
of
perceptions
of
crime
seriousness
in
a
variety
of
settings. Recent
articles
by
Wellford
and
Wia-
trowski
4
and
by
Figlio
5
exemplify such
studies
and
provide
references
to
earlier related
analyses.
*
The
author
wishes
to
thank
Ronald Farnan,
Robert
Figlio,
Sherrie
Hammoudeh,
Susan
Katzenelson,
Terence
Thornberry and
Marvin
Wolfgang
for
suggestions,
assist-
ance
and
comments.
All
errors
that
remain
are
solely
the
responsibility
of the
author.
This
research
was
supported
by
J-LEAA-016-76
awarded
by
the
Law Enforcement
Assistance
Administration,
U.S.
Department
of
Justice,
under
the Omnibus
Crime
Control
and
Safe
Streets
Act
of
1968,
as
amended.
Points
of
view
or opinions
stated
in
this
document
are
those
of the
author
and
do
not
neces-
sarily represent
the
official
position
or
policies
of
the
U.S.
Department
of
Justice.
**
Senior
Economic
Analyst,
Institute
for
Law
and
Social
Research
[hereinafter
INSLAW],
Washington,
D.C.
IT.
SELLIN
& M.
WOLFGANG,
THE
MEASUREMENT
OF
DELINQUENCY
(1964).
2
Id.
at
72.
3
Id.
at
289.
4
Wellford
&
Wiatrowski,
On
the
Measurement
of
Delin-
quency,
66J.
CRIM.
L.
&
C.
175
(1975).
5
Figlio,
The
Seriousness
of
Offenses:
An
Evaluation
by
Of-
fenders
and
Nonoffenders,
66
J.
CRIM.
L.
&
C.
189
(1975).
The
hiding
hand
of
legal
nomenclature
creates
difficulties
for
criminal
justice
practitioners
as
well
as
researchers.
With
respect
to
prosecution,
Ham-
ilton
and
Work
have
written:
No
prosecutor
would
find
it
difficult
to
compare
the
priority
of
a
first-degree
murder
case
with
that
of
a
petty
larceny
case.
However,
it
is
a
great
deal
more
difficult ...
to
differentiate
among
all
assault
cases
in
terms
of
priority
....
The
need
for
priorities
is
most
obvious
in
major
urban
centers
where
the
public
prosecutor
must
handle
thousands
of
cases
on
an
assembly-line,
mass-production
basis.
The
combination
of
a
high-volume
work load
and
in-
adequate
staffing
means
that
there
is
little
time
for
the
prosecutor to
prepare
most
of
his
cases.
The
prosecutor
does
not
have
sufficient
staff
to
assign
each
case
individually
and,
consequently,
cannot
hold any
one
of
his
assistants
responsible
for
a
case
from
beginning
to
end.6
As
an aid to
the public
prosecutor
in
the
District
of
Columbia,
Hamilton
and
Work
were
instrumen-
tal
in
the
development
of
a
computerized
Prose-
cutor's
Management
Information
System
(PROMIS),
which
maintains
information about
defendants,
charges
and the
progress
of
cases
through
the
judicial
process.
7
To
assist
the
high-
volume
prosecutor's
office
in
assigning
priorities
to
cases
within
a
single
legal
category,
PROMIS
com-
putes
and
displays
a
crime
seriousness score
for
each
case,
based on
the
original
Sellin-Wolfgang
index.
In
recent
years,
PROMIS
has
attracted
wide
attention
from
prosecutors
and
courts,
and
instal-
lation
of
the
system
is
either
complete
or
in
process
in
at
least
ninety-one
jurisdictions!
Moreover,
PROMIS
is
providing
a
rich
source
of
data
on
the
criminal
justice
system
useful for
research
by
crim-
6
Hamilton
&
Work,
The
Prosecutor's
Role
in the
Urban
Court
System:
The
Case
for
Management
Consciousness,
64
J.
CRIM.
L.
&
C.
183
(1973).
For
an
overview
of
PROMIS,
see
Institute
for
Law
and
Social
Research,
PROMIS
Briefing
Series,
Papers
I
to
21
(INSLAW, Washington,
D.C.,
1976).
8
For
a
description
of
the
PROMIS
transfer program,
see
D.
Merrill, Accelerating
Reform
in
the
Courts
through
Technology
Transfer (paper
presented
to
the
NATO
Advanced
Study
Institute
on
Industrial
Technol-
ogy
Transfer,
Les
Arcs-Bourg
St.,
Maurice, France,
June,
1975).
Vol.
69,
No.
2
Printed
in
U.S.A.
PROSECUTOR
PERCEPTIONS OF
CRIME
SERIOUSNESS
inologists,
economists
and
operations
research
an-
alysts.
9
Thus,
through PROMIS,
the
Sellin-Wolf-
gang
index
is
helping
practitioners
to
manage
crim-
inal
justice
processes
as
it
helps researchers
to
un-
derstand
them.
Over
time,
issues
have
arisen
concerning
the
use
in
PROMIS
of
the
Sellin-Wolfgang index.
Practi-
tioners
installing
the
system
have
questioned
the
validity
of
assigning
priorities
today
on
the
basis
of
perceptions measured
in
1964.10
Moreover,
in
spite
of
the
many
successful
replications
of
the
Sellin-
Wolfgang
experiment
in
a
variety
of
settings,
the
practitioners
hesitate to
generalize from
the
origi-
nal
sample
to
their
own
jurisdictions.
Researchers
attempting
to
use
the
index
as
an
explanatory
variable
in
analyses
of
PROMIS
data
have
en-
countered
a
different
problem.
Since
the
PROMIS
algorithm
is
based on
only
the
Primary
Index
Scale
crimes,
no
validated
index
is
computed
for
cases
in
such
high-volume
categories
as
drug-related
crimes
and
vice,
or
for
cases
in such
newly
prominent
categories
as
organized
crime
and
terrorism.
These problems
stimulated
the
present
study:
an
attempted
revision
of
the PROMIS
crime
serious-
ness
index,
based on replications
of
the
Sellin-Wolf-
gang
experiment
in
interested
PROMIS jurisdic-
tions. Since
systematic
sampling
of
each
jurisdic-
tion's
general
population
was
impractical,
assistant
prosecutors
were
used
as
raters.
When
it
was
learned
that
Wolfgang
and
others
had
recently
expanded the
list
of
stimulus
crimes
to
include
additional
crime
types
in
a
survey
of the
National
Crime Panel,
permission
was
requested
and
granted
to
use
the expanded
list
in
the
present
effort.
Besides
producing
a
new
crime
seriousness
index
for
use
in
PROMIS,
11
the
replication
permitted
analyses
of
four
interesting
research
questions:
(1)
Do
crime
seriousness
perceptions
of
assistant
prosecutors
differ
systematically
by
place
of
res-
idence?
(2)
Are
prosecutor
perceptions
of
crime
seriousness
affected
by
such
rater
characteristics
as
age,
9
For
examples
of
PROMIS-based
research,
see
F.
CANNAVALE
&
W.
FALCON,
WITNESS
COOPERATION
(1975);
Forst
&
Brosi,
A
Theoretical
and Empirical
Analysis
of
the
Prosecutor,
6
J.
LEGAL
STUD.
177
(1977);
and
Insti-
tute
for
Law
and
Social
Research,
PROMIS
Research
Project,
Publications
1-17
(Washington,
D.C., forthcom-
ing).
'n'
Indeed,
Figlio
found
that
while
the
relative
percep-
tions
of
offense
seriousness
among
University
of
Pennsyl-
vania students
had
remained
fairly
constant
over
a
10-
year
period,
absolute
perceptions
were
only
about
one-half
as
serious
in
the
later
sample.
See
Figlio,
supra
note
5.
1
The
revised
PROMIS
crime
seriousness
index
will
be
described
in
a
forthcoming
paper.
race,
sex
and
length
of
experience
as
a
prose-
cutor?
(3)
Do
prosecutors
relate
seriousness
and
dollar
val-
ues
according
to
the
power
function
for
money
observed
by
Sellin
and
Wolfgang?
(4)
How do white-collar,
drug-related
and
other
crimes
compare
in
seriousness
to
street crimes
analyzed
in
previous
studies?
The
present
study
can
also
provide
data
which,
in
conjunction
with
the
soon
to
be
completed
National
Crime
Panel
survey,
can
be
used
to
ana-
lyze
what
jurisdictional
characteristics
affect
the
degree
of
agreement
between prosecutors
and
their
constituents
on
perceived
crime
seriousness.
The
next
section
of
this
article
describes
the
rater
sample
and
the
derivation
of
scores
from
the
ex-
perimental
data.
The
two
sections
following
state
hypotheses
concerning
the
effects
of
place
of
resi-
dence
and
rater
characteristics
on
crime
seriousness
perception
and
present
test results
for
those
hy-
potheses.
Following
these
sections
an
estimated
power
function
for
money
based
on the
prosecutors'
responses
is
presented.
The
article
concludes with
some
observations
concerning
the
seriousness
of
crimes
not
previously
analyzed.
CONSTRUCTION
OF
INDEX
In
October,
1976,
representatives
of
twenty-three
prosecutors'
offices
agreed
to
participate
in
a
rep-
lication
of
the
Sellin-Wolfgang
experiment.
The
purpose
of
the
replication,
as
noted
above,
was
the
revision
of
the
PROMIS
Crime
Seriousness
Score.
Based
on
the
estimated
number
of
assistant
prose-
cutors
in
each
office,
1,549
test
booklets
were
pre-
pared,
each
containing
thirty-six
crimes
from
a
list
of
263.
Thirteen
of
the
crimes
were
designated
as
Primary
Index
items,
included
in
all
booklets;
the
remaining
twenty-three
items
in
each
booklet
were
randomly
selected
from
the
remaining
250.
A
ten
dollar
larceny
was
the
fi-st
stimulus
crime
in
each
booklet;
the
other
thirty-five
were
presented
in
random order.
Each
booklet
contained instructions
similar
to
those used
by
Sellin
and
Wolfgang
for
the Magnitude
Estimation
Scale, except
that
no
anchor
score
was
preassigned
to
the
first
crime.
1
2
Each
booklet
concluded with
a
short
series
of
op-
tional
questions
concerning
the rater's
age,
sex,
race,
and
length
of
experience
with
his
or
her
present
office
and
elsewhere.
Each
office's
booklets
were
mailed
to
its
PROMIS
coordinator,
together with
individual
stamped
return-addressed
envelopes.
A
cover
letter
asked
each
representative
to
circulate
booklets
and
12
See
note
1
supra,
at
254.
1978]
JEFFREY
A.
ROTH
envelopes
to
the
raters,
together with
a
memoran-
dum
from
the chief
prosecutor
encouraging
partic-
ipation
and
instructing
each
rater
to mail
his
com-
pleted
booklet
directly
to
the
researchers.
(It
was
believed
that
scores
would
be
more
spontaneous
if
the
responses
were
not
centrally
collected
in
the
offices.)
Of
the
1,549
booklets
distributed,
909
us-
able
responses
were
returned.'
3
To
compute
scores
for
all
263
crimes,
a
Primary
Index
scale
was first
computed
for
the
first
thirteen
crimes,
which
were
presented
to
all
raters;
then
a
relationship
was
estimated
between
Primary
Index
scale values
and
standardized
log
scores,
and
the
relationship
was
used
to
generate
scores
for
the
remaining
250
crimes.
Algebraically, "Aggregate
Primary Index
Scale"
values,
So,
were
computed
for
the entire
group
of
raters
for
crimes,
c=
1,
2,
... ,
13,
according
to:
(1) Sc = antilog
*
11
I
N
c
where
ycs
denotes
the
raw
score
assigned
to crime
c
by
rater
i,
and
Nc
is
the
number of
usable
scores
for
crime
c.
For
each
of
the
twelve
separate
jurisdictions
being
considered,
a'
"Jurisdiction
Primary Index
Scale"
was
computed
analogously
by:
,-
jlog
-
'
il
ci
Scj
=
antilog
I
1
N.j
where
c-
1, ... ,
13,
denotes
the
thirteen
crimes,
j
=
1,...,
12,
denotes
the
twelve
jurisdictions, and
Nci
is
the
number
of
usable
scores
for
crime
c
in
jurisdiction
j.
"
Participating
offices
and
their
response
counts
were
as
follows:
Los
Angeles
Co.,
Cal.
(273);
Suffolk
Co., N.Y.
(70);
St.
Louis, Mo.
(28);
Jefferson
Co.
(Louisville),
Ky.
(20);
San
Diego
City
and
County,
Cal.
(91);
Orleans
Parish
(New
Orleans),
La.
(33);
Salt
Lake
City,
Utah
(25);
Milwaukee
Co.,
Wis.
(44);
Wayne
Co.
(Detroit),
Mich.
(90);
Multnomah
Co.
(Portland), Ore.
(50);
Mar-
ion Co.
(Indianapolis),
Ind.
(44);
and
New
York
Co.
(Manhattan),
N.Y.
(74),
all
of
which
are
treated
as
separate jurisdictions
in
this
paper.
Because
of
small
sample
sizes,
the
following
six
offices
were
combined
into
a
composite
jurisdiction
for
PROMIS
case
rating
pur-
poses:
Norman,
Okla.
(8);
Leon
Co.
(Tallahassee),
Fla.
(14);
Little
Rock,
Ark.
(17):
Charlotte,
N.C.
(10);
Savan-
nah,
Ga.
(1);
and
Dayton, Ohio
(8).
These
responses
plus
nine
additional
responses
from
four
other
offices
were
used
in
the
aggregate
analyses in
this
paper, but
were
not
considered
in
the
cross-jurisdictional analysis.
To
construct
aggregate
scores,
measured
in
Pri-
mary Index
Scale
units,
for
the
remaining
250
crimes,
each
raw
score
was first
converted
to
its
logarithm,
then
standardized
according
to
the
ra-
ter's
mean
and
variance.
Then,
letting
y
denote
the raters'
standardized
log
scores,
a
mean
z-score
for
each
crime,
ze,
was
computed
as:
N¢
i-
C
--
,
C-.
..
263.
NC
Then
a
relationship
was
estimated,
based
on
crimes
c=
1,
... ,
13:
(3)
log
Sc
i
1.24346
+ 0.23102 z
c
. R7 = 0.9921
(0.00969) (0.00621)
where
figures
in
parentheses
are estimated
coeffi-
cient
standard
errors.
Equation
(3)
was
used
to
generate aggregate
scores,
S,
measured
in
units
of
the
Primary Index
Scale,
for
the remaining
250
crimes.
The
Primary
Index
Scale
values
for
the
first
thirteen
crimes,
together with
their
standard
errors,
are
shown
in
Table
1
for
the
entire
sample
and
for
the
twelve
separate jurisdictions.
Sellin
and
Wolfgang
originally
stated
two
con-
ditions
for
assuring
the
validity
of
replications
of
their
experiment.
As
a minimum
condition,
a
rep-
lication's
Primary
Index
Scale
should
bear
a loglin-
ear
relationship
to
the original.
At
a
maximum,
the
loglinear
relationship
would exhibit
a
slope
coeffi-
cient
of unity.
Before
proceeding
further,
it
was
of
concern
whether the
aggregate
prosecutor
index
constituted a
valid
replication
of
the
crime
serious-
ness
scale,
and,
given
the
small
sample
sizes
in
some
offices,
whether the
twelve
separate
jurisdic-
tion
scales
constituted
valid replications
of
the
aggregate
scale.
These
issues
are
addressed in Figure
1,
a
graph
drawn
on
log-log
paper.
Lines
A,
J
and
L
compare
the
aggregate prosecutor
scale
with
prosecutor
scales
from
jurisdictions
A,
J
and
L.
(These
juris-
dictions
represent,
respectively,
the
largest
sample,
the
scale
with
the
smallest
range,
and
the
scale
with the
largest
range.)
Although of
the three
only
line
A
is
smooth,
the
other
two
lines
satisfy,
with
slight
deviations,
the
minimum
condition
of
a
lin-
ear
form.
Line
S
compares
the
aggregate
prosecutor
scale
with
the
original
Sellin-Wolfgang
values
(divided
by ten
to
make
the
graphs
comparable)
for
the
six
crimes
common
to
both
experiments.
4
Except
for
14
See
note
1
supra,
at
289.
[Vol.
69
19781
CRIRE
TYPE
PROSECUTOR
PERCEPTIONS
OF
CRIME
SERIOUSNESS
TABLE I
AGGREGATE AND
JURISDICTIONAL
PRIMARY INDEX SCALE VALUES FOR CRIMES PRESENTED
TO
ALL
RATERS
(STANDARD
ERRORS
IN
PARENTHESES)
SCALE
VALUES
A~5regate
(N-909)
1.
$10
Larceny
4.904
(3.945)
2.
$50
Larceny
I
7.188
(3.342)
3.
$100
Larceny
8.515
13.342)
4.
S1000
Larceny
13.789
(3.784)
5.
$10.000
Larceny
20.373
1
(4.345)
14.90
6. 510
Buglary (4.920)
7.
510
Unancu
Robbery
28.318
(4.539)
8.
$10
Ared
Robbery
I
((4.943)
9.
Assault-Death
s
74.865
(9.908)
10.
Assault-Hospital
36.270
(4.932)
11.
Assault-Physician
23.468
(4.603)
12.
Assault-No
Injury
;(23.895
(24.60)
13.
Entice
Minor
Auto
25,644
(8.750)
Jur
A I
Jur
B I
Jur
C
(N-273) (N-70)
(5-28)
4.848
(3.342)
7.198
(3.516)
8.730
(3.381)
16.030
(4.159)
28.336
(4.721)
18.199
(4.529)
34.387
(5.272)
47.378
(5.662)
84.124
(13.772)
46.064
(5.433)
28. 870
(5.224)
4.038
(28.973)
30.234
(9.795)
4.892
(2.924)
6.754
(2.951)
7.93S
(3.155)
12.610
(3.243)-
20.484
(3.908)
13.185
(3.381)
23.820
(3.758)
34.324
(4.345)
7S.027
(13.583)
34.904
(4.842)
19.950
(3.606)
4.385
(3.999)
24.829
(5.675)
Jur
D
Jur
E IJur F)
(N-20) ( -91) ( -44)
4.302
(2.891)
6.283
(3.40)
8.531
(3.396)
10.601
(3.4 3)
15.256
(3.548)
13.460
(3.281)
28.548
(3.733)
31.708
(2.704)
72. 578
(4.788)
38.186
(4.487)
21.853
(3.673)
1.622
(164.059)
18.898
(3.767)
6.659
(3.483)
10.106
(4.018)
11.141
(4.188)
20.056
(4.266)
36.309
(6.223)
16.563
(17.783)
41.160
(6.152)
54.646
(7.161)
131.877
(9.311)
54.058
(6.237)
36.062
(6.095)
8.472
(3.990)
34.780
(26.303)
7.108
(2.133)
9.736
(2.58)
11.381
(2.443)
19.145
(2.477)
29.640
(2.679)
18.135
(2.82)
45.252
(2.773)
63.058
(3.055)
122.438
(3.681)
60.744
(3.133)
41.511
(3.58)
9.837
(3.999)
59.202
(3.38)
Jur
G
Jur
H
(N.90) (N-50)
4.459
4.13M
(3.750) (28.840)
6.244 9.240
(3.451) (3.090)
7.167 10.823
(3.350)
(2.979)
10.S11 15.493
(3.420)
(3.724)
12.866
17.8:2
(3.524)
(3.656)
14.346
16.892
(4.677)
(3.524)
25.200
23.693
(4.887) (3.428)
35.687
28.487
(5.893) (3.565)
89.901
50.388
(7.311) (4.093)
27.511
30.800
(4.797) (4.256)
20.845
,
20.811
(4.721) (3.890)
4.613
8.A01
(17.219)
(4.130)
27.748
25.677
(5.188)1
(4.808)
IJar
1
1 .u. I Ju, Y. I
Ju,
L
(N-44)
(.25)
(.33)
j (N.74)
4.717
(2.710)
5.292
(2.891)
6.181
(3.897)
7.351
(3.236)
9.150
(3.289)
9.439
(3.093)
18.420
(3.148)
24.171
(3.811)
76.20
(49.545)
28.128
(3.846)
18.066
(3.412)
1.214
(04.752)
15.888
(3.758)
2.393
(4.833
(2.28)
(3.516)
3.203 7.620
(1.972) (3.251)
4.220 8.805
(2.208) (3.055)
5.438 11.743
(2.132) (3.532)
6.824 15.315
(2.123) (3.508)
5.737 12.763
(2.178) (3.524)
7.420 21.281
(2.037)
(3.938)
8.888
21.649
(2.061) (3.622)
14.069 53.636
(3.0551 (4.887)
8.918 24.014
(1.919 (3.784)
7.221 19.604
(2.576) (3.648)
'2.212
6.322
3 975
1(2:784)
5.631
((3.192)
6.463
(3.097)
11.155
(3.556)
17.211
(3.707)
11.630
(3.396)
23. 827
(3.:30)
34.941
(4.83)
71.501
(5.8m0)
3D.364
(4.236)
16.106
(3.715)
1.220
(2.065)
1 3.304)1
(99.083)
6.248
22.378 1 13.698
(2.312)
(3.715) (22.961)
assault
leading
to
the
victim's
death,
line
S
is
very
close
to
straight.
With
respect
to
that
exception, it
should
be
noted
that
the
original
Sellin-Wolfgang
score
for
assault-death
was
3.89
times
the
score
for
assault-hospital.
The
corresponding
multiple
was
3.00
in
Figlio's retest
of
Pennsylvania
students,
ten
years
after the
original experiment;
5
the
multiple
is
only
2.06
in
the
aggregate prosecutor
scale.
Thus,
Figlio's results
suggest
a
secular
decline in
the
relative
seriousness
of
taking
a
life;
our
results
are
consistent
with
such
a
decline,
and further
suggest
that
prosecutors
consider
homicide
more
similar
to
other
assaults
than
does
the
general
public.
In
connection
with
prosecutors'
perceptions
of
crime
seriousness,
it
is
instructive
to
examine
line
R, which compares
the
aggregate prosecutor
scale
with
the
scale
obtained
in
Figlio's survey
of
Rah-
way
Prison
inmates.
Its
near-coincidence
with
line
L,
based on
the
ratings
of
prosecutors
from
the
same
metropolitan area
as
Rahway
Prison,
suggests
that
those
who
administer
criminal
justice
may
share
a
view
of
crime
seriousness
with
those who
are
administered
by
it.
It
is
pertinent
that
several
prosecutor-raters
stated their
view
that
whether a
particular
assault
victim
dies
is
a
random
event.
While
the
assailant
can
affect
the probability
of
death,
the
outcome
in
any
single
case
is
beyond
his
control.
Similarly,
15
See
note
5
supra,
at
197.
they
argued
that
the amount
stolen
in
a
larceny
is,
to
some
extent,
a
matter
of
opportunity:
having
.entered
an
unoccupied
room,
the
thief
will
take
$50
if
he
finds it,
or
S1,000
if
he
finds it.
For
this
reason,
in
determining
crime
seriousness
these
ra-
ters
did
not
consider
degree
of
injury
or
amount
stolen
as
important
as
the
fact
that
an
assault
or
theft
took
place. While
the perpetrators
of
crime
may
share this "accidental"
view
of
crime
out-
comes,
members
of
the
general
public,
considering
themselves
potential
victims,
probably
do not.
This
could
explain
the disparity
of
perceptions
between
felons
and
prosecutors
on
the
one
hand,
and
the
general
public
on
the
other.
It
is
important
to
note
that
despite this
disparity,
the maximum
condition
for
a
valid replication
was
satisfied.
Using
the
scores
for
the
six
crimes
in
common,
loglinear
regressions
were
estimated*
re-
lating the
prosecutor
scores
(Sp)
to
the
Sellin-Wolf-
gang
scores
(Sw,)
and
to
Figlio's
Rahway
scores
(SR).
The
results
were
as
follows:
(4a) log Sp = -0.581 + 0.976 log S
,
R:=
.925
(0.139)
and
(4b)
log Sp . 0.153 + 0.956 log S
R
- R2 .995
(.034)
1
,
I T
f