Security issue: Assault

Security issue: Assault

Assault is a crime which involves causing a victim to fear violence. In legal terms, assault is often distinguished from battery, which involves physical contact. For the use in this Securipedia, battery will be included in the use of the term assault.

Description

Assault accounts for a relevant part of the total of recorded crime, e.g. for about 20% in the UK . About one-third of the recorded assault cases are related to the use of alcohol or drugs. The excessive use of alcohol and consequently the access to alcohol in bars, cafes, danceclubs and other places of entertainment, but also liquor dealers or discount stores selling alcohol in places where alcohol is consumed in the street are therefore important attributing circumstances for assault as security issue. Be aware that the type of establishment, as well as the way they are clustered can be of great influence on the extent that assault may result. A practical guide to assessing this can be found on the website of the Center for Problem-Orientated Policing .

Attributing circumstances

• Use of alcohol and/or drugs: increases level of aggression
• Exitement: increases likelihood of conflict. Exitement can be induced for example by competitive sports or aggressive or arousing music.
• Abandoned/secluded areas and low traffic volumes (cars and/or pedestrians): decreases likelihood of detection
• Low level of social monitoring: decreases level of social correction
• Low level of physical monitoring (e.g. cameras): decreases likelihood of detection, which reduces the possibilities of intervening and increases the likelihood of the conflict escalating
• Long reaction times or inadequate action of reaction force
• Presence of vulnerable groups: increases the likelihood of conflict

Socio-economic causes

Together with alcohol consumption, poverty is one of the few socio-economic causes that increases the risk of vulnerable groups such as women, children, adolescents and homosexuals becoming victims of physical violence.

Impacts

Social impacts

From the social point of view, assaults can have various impacts, including generalized fear of crime and over-amplified feeling of insecurity, as well as loss of trust in institutions. There are several approaches to assess and address these impacts in urban planning that is responsive to citizens' security needs. It is particularly important to properly consider the gender perspective and the ecological perspective. The latter addresses the need to find a balance between desigining out crime by infrastructure and providing reason for more assaults by building infrastrucuture that can be perceived by some social groups as unjustly exclusionary.

• Perception of insecurity
• Perception of risk

There are checklists available from research that help address social aspects of security issues such as assault. A recommendable method to involve citizens in urban planning that "designs in" those social aspects is the safety audit.

See also

• Cultural criminology
• Environmental design
• Sociospatial perspective

Economic impact

The economic impact of crime exists mainly of costs. These costs are incurred in anticipation of criminal offences (such as expenditure on security and insurance costs), as a consequence of criminal offences (including phycial impact and health services), and as a responds to crime (costs of the Criminal Justice System).

Costs as a result of a physical assault/battery contain the following categories:

• costs due to the emotional and physical impact on victims
• costs due to a loss of output
• the costs of victim Services
• the costs of Health Services
• the costs of the Criminal Justice System (including Police).

As mentioned above, a common assault accounts for about 19 - 20% of the total of recorded crime and 5% of the total costs of crime. The average costs of a common assault is estimated around £ 500,- (EUR 600,-) per offense. A Dutch study estimated in 2007 for the Netherlands, that the average costs of a psychical assault is EUR 5,500 per offence and a mere threat EUR 2,700.. Moreover, there are the costs due to behavioral changes due to a fear of victimization and harm done to the offender’s and victim’s family, friends and acquaintances. These costs are not quantified in the studies mentioned.

Physical assault and battery don't just create costs to the victim and public authorities, but serious crime like physical assault and battery can also have a negative impact on the local economy (e.g. real estate value, business). This kind of impact is called, secondary economic impact of crime.

Mobility impacts

The mobility impacts depend on the size of the assault. In most cases, if it concerns only a few people, the mobility impact on the traffic flows or transportation system will be negligible.

In case the assault would lead to an obstruction of the road, traffic flows will be deteriorated, depending on the obstruction and the degree of robustness of the road network.

In case the assault would lead to an obstruction of an location of interest, people flows towards this location will be deteriorated. Depending on the type of location (e.g. a household or a commercial business) this obstruction will have an economic impact

When people are injured or in danger, emergency services will be called to assist. These include the police, ambulances or fire brigades. The emergency services need to know the best route to the incident location, taking into account possible obstructions. Incident management assists in reducing the duration an impact of incidents.

Safety impacts

Physical effects of assault include injuries, ranging from relatives innocent bruises to serious injuries like broken bones, cuts or shot wounds.

Measures

Potential measures that can mitigate the likelihood or impact of assault, are:

• Surveillance
• Reaction force
• "designing out" approaches (designing out crime, designing out terrorism)
• Directing flows of people

• Avoid secluded areas

By designing the road network such that traffic flows are spread over the whole area, secluded areas can be prevented. Traffic simulation models (e.g. Urban Strategy, Dynasmart) can help with this by estimating traffic flows for alternative road designs.

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