David Finkelhor
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195342857
- eISBN:
- 9780199863631
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195342857.001.0001
- Subject:
- Social Work, Children and Families, Crime and Justice
This book presents a vision of childhood victimization, one that unifies the conventional subdivisions like child molestation, child abuse, street crime, bullying, and exposure to community violence. ...
More
This book presents a vision of childhood victimization, one that unifies the conventional subdivisions like child molestation, child abuse, street crime, bullying, and exposure to community violence. It shows how children are the most criminally victimized segment of the population, with over one-in-five facing multiple, serious “poly-victimizations” during a single year. Developmental Victimology, the book’s term for this new integrative perspective, looks at how victimization changes across the span of childhood and offers insights about how to categorize juvenile victimizations and how to think about risk and impact developmentally. It presents new data about unexpected declines in childhood victimization during the 1990s and early 2000s and suggest some of the reasons for this drop. The book also provides a new model of society’s response to child victimization — the Juvenile Victim Justice System — and a fresh way of thinking about barriers that victims and their families encounter when seeking help.Less
This book presents a vision of childhood victimization, one that unifies the conventional subdivisions like child molestation, child abuse, street crime, bullying, and exposure to community violence. It shows how children are the most criminally victimized segment of the population, with over one-in-five facing multiple, serious “poly-victimizations” during a single year. Developmental Victimology, the book’s term for this new integrative perspective, looks at how victimization changes across the span of childhood and offers insights about how to categorize juvenile victimizations and how to think about risk and impact developmentally. It presents new data about unexpected declines in childhood victimization during the 1990s and early 2000s and suggest some of the reasons for this drop. The book also provides a new model of society’s response to child victimization — the Juvenile Victim Justice System — and a fresh way of thinking about barriers that victims and their families encounter when seeking help.
Marian Duggan (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781447338765
- eISBN:
- 9781447339182
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Policy Press
- DOI:
- 10.1332/policypress/9781447338765.001.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
Revisiting the ‘Ideal Victim’ is a collection of academic responses to the late Nils Christie’s (1986) seminal piece on the ‘ideal victim’ in which he addressed the socially constructed concept of an ...
More
Revisiting the ‘Ideal Victim’ is a collection of academic responses to the late Nils Christie’s (1986) seminal piece on the ‘ideal victim’ in which he addressed the socially constructed concept of an idealised form of victim status or identity. Highlighting the complex factors informing the application or rejection of victim status, Christie foregrounded the role of subjective and objective perspectives on personal and societal responses to victimisation. In sum, the ‘ideal victim’ is: “a person or category of individuals, who – when hit by crime – most readily are given the complete and legitimate status of being a victim” (1986: 18, original italics). This concept has become one of the most frequently cited themes of victimological (and, where relevant, criminological) academic scholarship over the past thirty years. In commemoration of his contribution, this volume analyses, evaluates and critiques the current nature and impact of victim identity, experience, policy and practice in light of Christie’s framework. Demonstrating how the very notion of what constitutes a ‘victim’ has undergone significant theorisation, evaluation and reconceptualization in the intervening three decades, the academic contributors in this volume excellently showcase the relevance of this ‘ideal victim’ concept to a range of contemporary victimological issues. In sum, the chapters critically evaluate the salience of Christie’s concept in a modern context while demonstrating its influence over the decades..Less
Revisiting the ‘Ideal Victim’ is a collection of academic responses to the late Nils Christie’s (1986) seminal piece on the ‘ideal victim’ in which he addressed the socially constructed concept of an idealised form of victim status or identity. Highlighting the complex factors informing the application or rejection of victim status, Christie foregrounded the role of subjective and objective perspectives on personal and societal responses to victimisation. In sum, the ‘ideal victim’ is: “a person or category of individuals, who – when hit by crime – most readily are given the complete and legitimate status of being a victim” (1986: 18, original italics). This concept has become one of the most frequently cited themes of victimological (and, where relevant, criminological) academic scholarship over the past thirty years. In commemoration of his contribution, this volume analyses, evaluates and critiques the current nature and impact of victim identity, experience, policy and practice in light of Christie’s framework. Demonstrating how the very notion of what constitutes a ‘victim’ has undergone significant theorisation, evaluation and reconceptualization in the intervening three decades, the academic contributors in this volume excellently showcase the relevance of this ‘ideal victim’ concept to a range of contemporary victimological issues. In sum, the chapters critically evaluate the salience of Christie’s concept in a modern context while demonstrating its influence over the decades..
Marian Duggan
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781447338765
- eISBN:
- 9781447339182
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Policy Press
- DOI:
- 10.1332/policypress/9781447338765.003.0019
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
This chapter reiterates the importance of Christie’s work, and this volume’s reinterrogation of the ‘Ideal Victim’, both historically and in our modern age. The chapter then explores the relationship ...
More
This chapter reiterates the importance of Christie’s work, and this volume’s reinterrogation of the ‘Ideal Victim’, both historically and in our modern age. The chapter then explores the relationship between Christie’s work and the development of restorative and transitional justice movements. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the limitations of the volume and suggests further work to be undertaken both in keeping with Christie’s work and in the field of victimology more generally.Less
This chapter reiterates the importance of Christie’s work, and this volume’s reinterrogation of the ‘Ideal Victim’, both historically and in our modern age. The chapter then explores the relationship between Christie’s work and the development of restorative and transitional justice movements. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the limitations of the volume and suggests further work to be undertaken both in keeping with Christie’s work and in the field of victimology more generally.
Roger N. Lancaster
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520255654
- eISBN:
- 9780520948211
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520255654.003.0009
- Subject:
- Anthropology, American and Canadian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter explores the connection between the punitive turn, with its expressly authoritarian politics, and the liberal political tradition, with its emphasis on individual rights. It also ...
More
This chapter explores the connection between the punitive turn, with its expressly authoritarian politics, and the liberal political tradition, with its emphasis on individual rights. It also explores how the punitive state is related to capitalism, especially the privatized, deregulated variant known as neoliberalism. The “victimology trap,” the need to see victims of injustice as pure, innocent, and good, disapproves of the accuser's subsequent harsh treatment. In the nineteenth century, liberal conceptions of freedom implied “property and personhood” for some and poverty and deracination for others. Twentieth-century variations of liberalism, with their emphasis on victimized identities, foster new forms of power and control. If liberalism begins with the idea that there might be too much law, it might be better to say that victimist statutes represent a disintegration or involution of liberal norms. Neoliberal penal policy aims at a balance between the curves of the supply of crime and negative demand, before notions of risk, cost, and benefit came to be distorted by panic. The point is to show how the implications of liberalism and capitalism are worked out in unpredictable ways under changing conditions. The history presented here suggests a reworking of the usual causal claims about the relationship between neoliberalism and the punitive state. The punitive turn prepared the way for the neoliberal turn, not vice versa.Less
This chapter explores the connection between the punitive turn, with its expressly authoritarian politics, and the liberal political tradition, with its emphasis on individual rights. It also explores how the punitive state is related to capitalism, especially the privatized, deregulated variant known as neoliberalism. The “victimology trap,” the need to see victims of injustice as pure, innocent, and good, disapproves of the accuser's subsequent harsh treatment. In the nineteenth century, liberal conceptions of freedom implied “property and personhood” for some and poverty and deracination for others. Twentieth-century variations of liberalism, with their emphasis on victimized identities, foster new forms of power and control. If liberalism begins with the idea that there might be too much law, it might be better to say that victimist statutes represent a disintegration or involution of liberal norms. Neoliberal penal policy aims at a balance between the curves of the supply of crime and negative demand, before notions of risk, cost, and benefit came to be distorted by panic. The point is to show how the implications of liberalism and capitalism are worked out in unpredictable ways under changing conditions. The history presented here suggests a reworking of the usual causal claims about the relationship between neoliberalism and the punitive state. The punitive turn prepared the way for the neoliberal turn, not vice versa.
Tim Newburn
David Downes and Dick Hobbs (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199580231
- eISBN:
- 9780191702280
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199580231.001.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
This book features contributions from criminologists from the UK, the US, and Australia, brought together to honour the work of Paul Rock, former Professor of Social Institutions at the London School ...
More
This book features contributions from criminologists from the UK, the US, and Australia, brought together to honour the work of Paul Rock, former Professor of Social Institutions at the London School of Economics. It offers an exploration of the theories which underpin much of current criminological thinking. The resulting thirteen chapters all examine and build upon the central themes associated with Paul Rock's work: social and criminological theory, policy development and policy-making, and victims and victimology. Together, the chapters draw on some of his landmark publications for inspiration and discuss the key findings presented over his fifty-year career. These include his contribution to the theoretical development of symbolic interactionism and approaches to sociological theory and practice, as well as an analysis of the concept of criminal justice as a social institution and the resurgence of treatment programmes for women offenders. Also of note is a critical study of the Macpherson enquiry into the death of Stephen Lawrence, an ethnographic exploration of the repercussions of incarceration on prisoners' families and inmates, and two chapters drawing on Paul Rock's work with victims and secondary victims of homicide.Less
This book features contributions from criminologists from the UK, the US, and Australia, brought together to honour the work of Paul Rock, former Professor of Social Institutions at the London School of Economics. It offers an exploration of the theories which underpin much of current criminological thinking. The resulting thirteen chapters all examine and build upon the central themes associated with Paul Rock's work: social and criminological theory, policy development and policy-making, and victims and victimology. Together, the chapters draw on some of his landmark publications for inspiration and discuss the key findings presented over his fifty-year career. These include his contribution to the theoretical development of symbolic interactionism and approaches to sociological theory and practice, as well as an analysis of the concept of criminal justice as a social institution and the resurgence of treatment programmes for women offenders. Also of note is a critical study of the Macpherson enquiry into the death of Stephen Lawrence, an ethnographic exploration of the repercussions of incarceration on prisoners' families and inmates, and two chapters drawing on Paul Rock's work with victims and secondary victims of homicide.
Kevin Hearty
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781786940476
- eISBN:
- 9781786944993
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9781786940476.003.0006
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Modern History
Viewing Irish republican policing memory primarily through a transitional justice lens, this chapter critically examines how Irish republicans, as a principal party to the conflict, approach the ...
More
Viewing Irish republican policing memory primarily through a transitional justice lens, this chapter critically examines how Irish republicans, as a principal party to the conflict, approach the difficult issue of ‘dealing with the past’ as both collective victims and perpetrators of human rights violations during the conflict. It will interrogate the range of divergent views within modern Irish republicanism on issues such as victimhood, truth recovery, ‘moving on’ and ‘dealing with the past’. In particular, it looks at how the memory of human rights violations framed the wider policing debate and led to a master narrative of ‘never again’ whereby the value of ‘remembering’ past abuses lay in helping to prevent future repetition. This is placed against a more general backdrop of the stop-start ‘dealing with the past’ process in the North of Ireland that has included the establishment, operation and subsequent replacement of the Historical Enquiries Team (HET), the passage of the Civil Service (Special Advisers) Act (Northern Ireland), and proposals like the Haass/O’Sullivan document and the Stormont House Agreement.Less
Viewing Irish republican policing memory primarily through a transitional justice lens, this chapter critically examines how Irish republicans, as a principal party to the conflict, approach the difficult issue of ‘dealing with the past’ as both collective victims and perpetrators of human rights violations during the conflict. It will interrogate the range of divergent views within modern Irish republicanism on issues such as victimhood, truth recovery, ‘moving on’ and ‘dealing with the past’. In particular, it looks at how the memory of human rights violations framed the wider policing debate and led to a master narrative of ‘never again’ whereby the value of ‘remembering’ past abuses lay in helping to prevent future repetition. This is placed against a more general backdrop of the stop-start ‘dealing with the past’ process in the North of Ireland that has included the establishment, operation and subsequent replacement of the Historical Enquiries Team (HET), the passage of the Civil Service (Special Advisers) Act (Northern Ireland), and proposals like the Haass/O’Sullivan document and the Stormont House Agreement.
PAUL ROCK
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198267959
- eISBN:
- 9780191683428
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198267959.003.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
This chapter reviews of some of the conventional academic arguments about the principal features of the demography and incidence of criminal homicide. Topics discussed include the penalty for ...
More
This chapter reviews of some of the conventional academic arguments about the principal features of the demography and incidence of criminal homicide. Topics discussed include the penalty for homicide, the criminology of homicide, and the victimology of homicide.Less
This chapter reviews of some of the conventional academic arguments about the principal features of the demography and incidence of criminal homicide. Topics discussed include the penalty for homicide, the criminology of homicide, and the victimology of homicide.
Marian Duggan
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781447338765
- eISBN:
- 9781447339182
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Policy Press
- DOI:
- 10.1332/policypress/9781447338765.003.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
This chapter explores the content and impact of Nils Christie’s seminal essay Revisiting the ‘Ideal Victim’: Developments in Critical Victimology. The chapter outlines Christie’s understanding of the ...
More
This chapter explores the content and impact of Nils Christie’s seminal essay Revisiting the ‘Ideal Victim’: Developments in Critical Victimology. The chapter outlines Christie’s understanding of the ‘Ideal Victim’ and situates his work within a broader exploration of the emergence of victimology as a discrete field within criminology. The introduction goes on to outline the collection, providing summaries of the later chapters.Less
This chapter explores the content and impact of Nils Christie’s seminal essay Revisiting the ‘Ideal Victim’: Developments in Critical Victimology. The chapter outlines Christie’s understanding of the ‘Ideal Victim’ and situates his work within a broader exploration of the emergence of victimology as a discrete field within criminology. The introduction goes on to outline the collection, providing summaries of the later chapters.
Alice Bosma, Eva Mulder, and Antony Pemberton
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781447338765
- eISBN:
- 9781447339182
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Policy Press
- DOI:
- 10.1332/policypress/9781447338765.003.0003
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
Following up on the illuminating article ‘The Ideal Victim’ by Nils Christie, this chapter expands on and reacts to its key arguments. Christie assumes that the most important reasons for perceiving ...
More
Following up on the illuminating article ‘The Ideal Victim’ by Nils Christie, this chapter expands on and reacts to its key arguments. Christie assumes that the most important reasons for perceiving a victim as legitimate and blameless lie in the specific attributions of the victim, and those of the relationship between victim and offender. The article aims at expanding these two arguments on the basis of more contemporary theories in victimology such as the Stereotype Content Model and the Moral Typecasting Theory. However, the importance of two observer related aspects that Christie leaves underdeveloped will also be emphasized. Firstly, the individual’s sense of threat and subsequent coping when confronted with a victim will be discussed. Secondly, the society’s particular interests and values at the time of victimization will be considered. The concept of framing is of particular importance in both aspects, because it can be used to explain how victims may (ex-post) be accepted as ideal or non-ideal, irrelevant of their ‘objective’ attributes, but dependent on the framer, either on collective or individual level.Less
Following up on the illuminating article ‘The Ideal Victim’ by Nils Christie, this chapter expands on and reacts to its key arguments. Christie assumes that the most important reasons for perceiving a victim as legitimate and blameless lie in the specific attributions of the victim, and those of the relationship between victim and offender. The article aims at expanding these two arguments on the basis of more contemporary theories in victimology such as the Stereotype Content Model and the Moral Typecasting Theory. However, the importance of two observer related aspects that Christie leaves underdeveloped will also be emphasized. Firstly, the individual’s sense of threat and subsequent coping when confronted with a victim will be discussed. Secondly, the society’s particular interests and values at the time of victimization will be considered. The concept of framing is of particular importance in both aspects, because it can be used to explain how victims may (ex-post) be accepted as ideal or non-ideal, irrelevant of their ‘objective’ attributes, but dependent on the framer, either on collective or individual level.
Hannah Bows
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781447338765
- eISBN:
- 9781447339182
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Policy Press
- DOI:
- 10.1332/policypress/9781447338765.003.0014
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
There is now an extensive body of literature examining sexual violence against women and girls. However, there remains an important gap in relation to ‘older’ women, who have been almost entirely ...
More
There is now an extensive body of literature examining sexual violence against women and girls. However, there remains an important gap in relation to ‘older’ women, who have been almost entirely absent from research, policy and practice developments. Traditionally, older age has been reviewed as a protective factor for violent crime, including sexual violence, and both criminologists and feminists have largely neglected those aged over 60 in their scholarship. This chapter examines this absence and argues that ‘real rape’ myths and stereotypes have contributed to the invisibility of older victims. Findings from the first national study to examine sexual violence against people aged 60 and over are presented and discussed in light of the existing literature.Less
There is now an extensive body of literature examining sexual violence against women and girls. However, there remains an important gap in relation to ‘older’ women, who have been almost entirely absent from research, policy and practice developments. Traditionally, older age has been reviewed as a protective factor for violent crime, including sexual violence, and both criminologists and feminists have largely neglected those aged over 60 in their scholarship. This chapter examines this absence and argues that ‘real rape’ myths and stereotypes have contributed to the invisibility of older victims. Findings from the first national study to examine sexual violence against people aged 60 and over are presented and discussed in light of the existing literature.
Claire Cohen
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781447338765
- eISBN:
- 9781447339182
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Policy Press
- DOI:
- 10.1332/policypress/9781447338765.003.0017
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
Lynndie England’s conviction, and highly publicised dishonourable discharge from the United States military, for crimes that included photographically documented acts of sexual violence against male ...
More
Lynndie England’s conviction, and highly publicised dishonourable discharge from the United States military, for crimes that included photographically documented acts of sexual violence against male detainees in her care, finally succeeded in bringing female sexual offending against male victims to the fore, and served as a watershed moment that forever changed the discourse. Except it didn’t. This event did not disrupt orthodox discourse. It did not breach the gendered binary that casts men as offenders and women as victims. A decade later, it can instead be argued to have bolstered it – being pivotal in maintaining ‘discursive equilibrium’ in preservation of those gendered, normative, binaristic, subject positions that serve to cast men outside of legitimate victimhood; particularly men assaulted by women. This Foucauldian analysis of knowledge production in the academy will examine this stasis, and articulate the discursive mechanisms underlying it - arguing that the ideal victim binary, in the area of sexual violence, constitutes a gender-normative taxonomy that functions as a governmentalised ‘regime of truth’. Ironically, this influence is most stymieing amongst those best placed to resist it.This chapter complexifies Christie’s (1986) concept of the ideal victim through the lens of Foucauldian theory, presenting a clarion call to victimology.Less
Lynndie England’s conviction, and highly publicised dishonourable discharge from the United States military, for crimes that included photographically documented acts of sexual violence against male detainees in her care, finally succeeded in bringing female sexual offending against male victims to the fore, and served as a watershed moment that forever changed the discourse. Except it didn’t. This event did not disrupt orthodox discourse. It did not breach the gendered binary that casts men as offenders and women as victims. A decade later, it can instead be argued to have bolstered it – being pivotal in maintaining ‘discursive equilibrium’ in preservation of those gendered, normative, binaristic, subject positions that serve to cast men outside of legitimate victimhood; particularly men assaulted by women. This Foucauldian analysis of knowledge production in the academy will examine this stasis, and articulate the discursive mechanisms underlying it - arguing that the ideal victim binary, in the area of sexual violence, constitutes a gender-normative taxonomy that functions as a governmentalised ‘regime of truth’. Ironically, this influence is most stymieing amongst those best placed to resist it.This chapter complexifies Christie’s (1986) concept of the ideal victim through the lens of Foucauldian theory, presenting a clarion call to victimology.
Jorge Gracia
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781447338765
- eISBN:
- 9781447339182
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Policy Press
- DOI:
- 10.1332/policypress/9781447338765.003.0018
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
Victimology is about human suffering, often focusing on the consequences generated by crime and how these affect victims and their lives. It analyzes how society manages pain, so concern about ...
More
Victimology is about human suffering, often focusing on the consequences generated by crime and how these affect victims and their lives. It analyzes how society manages pain, so concern about victims’ status and needs are important issues. Yet victimology has an undeserved bad reputation, often being accused of exercising commiseration towards certain victims while forgetting others, or providing excuses for the punitive turn in criminal policy. This chapter argues that another type of victimology is possible. Challenging inadequate understandings of compassion and its limits provides us with a useful tool rooted in public virtue which generates stronger and more accurate victim support. An analysis of victim hierarchies illustrates perceptions of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ victims; those worthy of support and compassion and those that inspire only oblivion or contempt. Further reflection on the ideal victim stereotype present in Nils Christie’s work offers a starting point from which to achieve an inclusive and critical victimology; a victimology that really embraces the conception of useful compassion which is strongly connected with justice as a public virtue in a democratic and decent society. The chapter argues that this may be a way to recover some of the lost prestige of the discipline.Less
Victimology is about human suffering, often focusing on the consequences generated by crime and how these affect victims and their lives. It analyzes how society manages pain, so concern about victims’ status and needs are important issues. Yet victimology has an undeserved bad reputation, often being accused of exercising commiseration towards certain victims while forgetting others, or providing excuses for the punitive turn in criminal policy. This chapter argues that another type of victimology is possible. Challenging inadequate understandings of compassion and its limits provides us with a useful tool rooted in public virtue which generates stronger and more accurate victim support. An analysis of victim hierarchies illustrates perceptions of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ victims; those worthy of support and compassion and those that inspire only oblivion or contempt. Further reflection on the ideal victim stereotype present in Nils Christie’s work offers a starting point from which to achieve an inclusive and critical victimology; a victimology that really embraces the conception of useful compassion which is strongly connected with justice as a public virtue in a democratic and decent society. The chapter argues that this may be a way to recover some of the lost prestige of the discipline.
Cheryl Allsop
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- March 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780198747451
- eISBN:
- 9780191810459
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780198747451.003.0009
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
This chapter debates what forms of expertise can be helpful to cold case reviews. The Specialist Operations Centre, part of the National Crime Agency, can provide specialized help and access to a ...
More
This chapter debates what forms of expertise can be helpful to cold case reviews. The Specialist Operations Centre, part of the National Crime Agency, can provide specialized help and access to a variety of experts who can support detectives in hard-to-solve major crime investigations, and this chapter will include a discussion on how these forms of expertise are used in investigations. What becomes apparent is that the review team were less likely to use external experts, preferring to draw on their own experience and areas of expertise, as well as that from colleagues from other neighbouring forces.Less
This chapter debates what forms of expertise can be helpful to cold case reviews. The Specialist Operations Centre, part of the National Crime Agency, can provide specialized help and access to a variety of experts who can support detectives in hard-to-solve major crime investigations, and this chapter will include a discussion on how these forms of expertise are used in investigations. What becomes apparent is that the review team were less likely to use external experts, preferring to draw on their own experience and areas of expertise, as well as that from colleagues from other neighbouring forces.
