This webinar discussed victim costs and methods for estimating them. Tina Stanford from the New York State Office of Victim Services outlined tangible costs like medical expenses and intangible costs like pain and suffering. Kathryn McCollister from the University of Miami described methods like cost-of-illness and willingness-to-pay that can place dollar values on victim costs. These cost estimates are important for cost-benefit analyses of criminal justice programs and policies to fully account for the impacts of crime. The webinar provided examples of estimating costs for specific crimes like robbery.

1. Demystifying Victim Costs
July 25, 2011
Tina Stanford, Director, New York State Office of Victim Services
Kathryn McCollister, Assistant Professor, University of Miami, School of Medicine
Valerie Levshin, Policy Analyst, Cost-Benefit Analysis Unit, Vera Institute of Justice
Slide 1

2. Welcome
Demystifying Victim Costs
The webinar will start at 2pm.
Call 1-800-659-6930 for the audio portion of the
webinar.
Slide 2

3. Demystifying Victim Costs
Tina Stanford Kathryn McCollister Valerie Levshin
Director Assistant Professor Policy Analyst
NYS Office of University of Miami Vera Institute of
Victim Services School of Medicine Justice
Slide 3

4. Why Examine Victim Costs
• The justice system seeks to
prevent and address
victimization and its
consequences
• Analysis of criminal justice programs and policies
has to account for victim costs
Slide 4

5. Today’s Agenda
The Role of Victim Costs in Cost-Benefit 5 minutes
Analysis
Overview of Victim Costs 15 minutes
Methods for Estimating Victim Costs 15 minutes
Discussion and Q & A 20 minutes
Slide 5

6. Housekeeping items
Questions
 Use the chat feature to send us your
questions at any time during the webinar.
 We will address your questions after
each section of the presentation.
Slide 6

7. Housekeeping items
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This webinar is being recorded
The recording and PowerPoint will be posted to
cbkb.org
Slide 7

8. The Role of Victim Costs in
Cost-Benefit Analysis
Valerie Levshin
Policy Analyst
Vera Institute of Justice
Slide 8

9. What is Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA)?
• A tool to assess the pros and
cons of policies and programs
• A method for finding out what
will achieve the greatest net
benefit to society
• An approach to policymaking
Slide 9

10. CBA in Five Steps
1. Determine the impact of the initiative
2. Determine whose perspectives matter
3. Measure costs
4. Measure benefits (in dollars)
5. Compare costs and benefits
Slide 10

11. The Role of Victim Costs in a CBA
• Crime imposes costs on victims
• If a program or policy affects crime, CBA needs to
account for victim costs
• If it increases crime, measure the victim costs
• If it decreases crime, measure the victim benefits
(avoided victim costs)
Slide 11

12. Measuring Victim Costs?
• Placing a dollar value on rape? Murder?
• Is it possible?
• Is it ethical?
• Is it necessary?
Slide 12

13. Research Progress
• Researchers have
developed methods to
measure the monetary and
the non-monetary victim
costs
• These estimates can be
used in CBA and other
analyses
Slide 13

14. Why It Matters
• Measuring victim costs helps measure the full
benefits of programs and policies that reduce crime,
and compare them to costs
• Brings victims’
perspectives into the
conversation on policy and
budget decisions.
Slide 14

15. Overview of Victim Costs
Tina Stanford
Director
NY Office of Victim Services
Slide 15

16. New York State Office of Victim Services
• Compensates victims for
out-of-pocket expenses
• Funds community-based
services for victims
• Advocates for victims’
rights
Slide 16

17. Why Measure Victim Costs in Policy
Analysis?
• To educate criminal justice professionals and
policymakers on victimization costs
• To justify increased funding for crime prevention
initiatives
• To understand the importance of restitution and
compensation
Slide 17

18. Monetary (Tangible) Victim Costs
• Medical expenses
• Counseling services
• Essential personal property
• Lost earnings
Slide 18

19. Monetary (Tangible) Victim Costs
• Transportation to court
appearances
• Crime scene cleanup
• Moving expenses
• Occupational rehabilitation
expenses
• Cost of services of domestic violence shelter
• Burial expenses
Slide 19

20. Non-Monetary (Intangible) Costs
• Pain and suffering
• Fear
• Decreased quality of life
• Psychological distress
Slide 20

21. Case Study #1: Physical Injury Claim
• Child sexual abuse
• Over $200,000 to date
• Dissociative Identity Disorder
• In-patient and out-patient counseling
Slide 21

22. Case Study #2: Personal Property Claim
• Petit Larceny
• Claimant over 60
• Over $900 for boxspring and mattress
• Over $800 for suitcase of clothing
• $1,000 deductible
• $500 maximum paid
Slide 22

23. Questions
Slide 23

24. Methods for Estimating
Victim Costs
Kathryn McCollister
Assistant Professor
University of Miami, School of Medicine
Slide 24

25. Health Economics Research Group
(HERG) at the University of Miami
• Members include health economics faculty
from departments of Sociology, Epidemiology
and Public Health, and affiliated institutions
• Conducts research on the economics of:
• substance abuse treatment and prevention
• HIV/AIDS
• criminal justice programs
• mental health
• other
Slide 25

26. Background
• 2010 Study: The cost of crime to society: New crime-
specific estimates for policy and program evaluation.
• Measured the main components of the societal cost of
crime:
 Criminal justice system costs
 Crime career costs
 Victim costs
Slide 26

27. Victim Costs
• Our 2010 study estimated the
societal cost of crime
including victim costs across
13 offenses.
• Crime cost estimates are used to measure the
economic impact of substance abuse treatment and
crime prevention programs.
Slide 27

28. Costs Included in the Study
Monetary Non-Monetary
(Tangible) Costs (Intangible) Costs
medical care pain and suffering
lost wages decreased quality of life
property loss/damage psychological distress
cash losses
counseling
risk-of-homicide
(lifetime earnings)
Slide 28

29. Why Include Intangible Costs?
• True societal impact of crimes such as aggravated
assault, rape/sexual assault, and robbery would be
underestimated if intangible victim losses were not
included.
• Direct/tangible costs only account for 12 – 47% of
total crime costs for these offenses.
Slide 29

30. Methods for Estimating Victim Costs
• Cost-of-illness (COI)
• Jury compensation method
• Willingness-to-Pay (WTP)
Slide 30

31. Cost-of-Illness Method
• Used to measures tangible victim costs
• Tangible victim cost per crime =
total national cost / number of crimes
• Department of Justice collects data on medical
expenses, cash losses, property theft/damage, and
lost earnings for 6 crime categories.
• Federal Emergency Management Agency collects data
on arson-related damages.
• Bureau of Justice Statistics collects data on the
number of crime in each category
Slide 31

32. Cost-of-Illness Method (cont)
• Mental health costs
• Cohen & Miller (1998) surveyed mental health care
professionals about treatment provided to patients
that had been victims of crime
• Estimated value of counseling/treatment by victims
per offense
Slide 32

33. Cost-of-Illness Method (cont)
• Risk-of-homicide costs
• Multiply the probability that a certain type of offense
will lead to a homicide by individuals’ average
lifetime earnings
• Lifetime earnings used to value lost life
Slide 33

34. Jury Compensation Method
• Used to measure intangible (pain and suffering)
costs
• Intangible cost = jury award – tangible cost
• Tangible costs here included medical expenses and
lost wages.
• Study measured intangible costs for 4 categories:
murder, rape/sexual assault, robbery, aggravated
assault
Slide 34

35. Jury Compensation Method
• Jury awards are for injuries, not for crimes,
• But, we can link the two based on probability of
sustaining typical crime-related injuries such as
broken bones, gun shot wounds, etc.
• National Crime Victimization Surveys report per
offense probability of an injury resulting from crime
• Intangible cost per crime =
probability of an injury per crime x
intangible award per injury
Slide 35

36. Willingness-to-Pay Method
• Measures intangible costs
• Estimates society’s willingness to pay to avoid a
victimization by survey
• Survey of more than 1,000 residents revealed that the
average household is willing to pay $100-$150 to
reduce serious crimes by 10% in their area.
• rape/sexual assault $286,277
• armed robbery $280,237
• serious assault $84,555
• burglary $30,197
Slide 36

37. Example: Breakdown of Tangible Costs of a
Robbery
• Economic loss: $1,357
• Total economic loss of all robberies divided by
number of robberies
• $967,280,000 / 712,610
• Risk-of-homicide cost: $1,663
• Mental health cost: $1,047
• Total robbery cost: $3,299
Slide 37

38. Example: Breakdown of Intangible Costs of
a Robbery
Intangible cost per crime = probability of an injury per crime x
intangible award per injury
Type of Injury Average Jury Pain-and-Suffering
Award Estimate
Gunshot wound $63,404 $48,492
Broken bones + internal
injury $34,020 $20,591
Knife wound $34,020 $30,327
Knocked unconscious $6,239 $4,200
Bruises, cuts, etc. $1,826 $1,359
All other injuries $1,826 $1,042
Slide 38

39. Victim Costs
Type of Offense Tangible Cost Intangible Cost Total Cost
Murder $8,442,000
Rape/Sexual Assault $5,556 $199,642 $205,085
Aggravated Assault $8,770 $95,023 $96,254
Robbery $3,299 $22,575 $24,211
Arson $11,452 $5,133 $16,127
Motor Vehicle Theft $16,114 $262 $6,352
Household Burglary $1,362 $321 $1,653
Larceny/Theft $480 $10 $489
Slide 39

40. Challenges and Limitations
• Study uses national data; local costs may be different
• No estimates for drug crimes
• Costs of psychological distress are not included
• Costs of crime prevention efforts like burglar alarms
not included.
Slide 40

41. Discussion
Slide 41

42. Discussion
Use the chat feature to
send us your questions.
Slide 42

43. Wrap-Up
Slide 43

44. References
• McCollister, Kathryn E., Michael T. French, and Hai
Fang. (2010). The cost of crime to society: New
crime-specific estimates for policy and program
evaluation. Drug and Alcohol Dependence, 108, no.
1-2, 98-109.
• Miller, Ted R., Mark A. Cohen, and Brian Wiersema.
(1996). Victim Costs and Consequences: A New
Look. Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice.
• Cohen, Mark A. (1998). The Monetary Value of
Saving a High-Risk Youth. Journal of Quantitative
Criminology. 14, 1, 5-33.
Slide 44

45. Follow-up
Please complete the evaluation form as you leave this
training.
Share your comments and questions with us on Twitter
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Justice at http://cbkb.org.
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Slide 45

46. The Cost-Benefit Knowledge Bank for Criminal Justice (CBKB) is a
project of the Vera Institute of Justice funded by the U.S.
Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance.
• Website (cbkb.org)
• Cost-Benefit Analysis Toolkit
• Snapshots of CBA Literature
• Podcasts, Videocasts, and Webinars
• Roundtable Discussions
• Community of Practice
Slide 46

47. Contact Information
Tina Stanford
Tina.stanford@ovs.ny.gov
Kathryn McCollister
kmccolli@med.miami.edu
Valerie Levshin
vlevshin@vera.org
cbkb@cbkb.org
http://www.cbkb.org
Slide 47

48. This project is supported by Grant No. 2009-MU-BX K029 awarded by the Bureau of
Justice Assistance. The Bureau of Justice Assistance is a component of the Office of
Justice Programs, which also includes the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the National
Institute of Justice, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, and
the Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and
Tracking. Points of view or opinions in this document are those of the author and do
not represent the official position or policies of the United States Department of
Justice.
Slide 48

49. Thank you!
Slide 49