Effects of Legal Education and Work Experience on Perceptions of Crime Seriousness

Abstract

Sellin and Wolfgang (1964) reported that respondents exhibit a remarkable degree of consensus as to the seriousness of crime, and that this consensus is explained by a few salient dimensions of the crimes (such as loss of life, loss of property and extent of injury). Subsequent research has supported these findings for the most part. To reconcile these findings with theories of consensus formation, we surveyed a sample of 154 criminal justice bureaucrats, including judges, prosecutors, public defenders and probation officers. Our analysis of these data shows that both formal legal education and work experience underlie consensus. Although there is a high degree of consensus between these criminal justice bureaucrats and a sample of citizens, there are substantial areas of disagreement—especially about the characteristics of various crimes. While citizens perceive the relative seriousness of a crime in terms of only a few dimensions, criminal justice bureaucrats perceive seriousness in terms of many dimensions. This finding has some consequences for conflict theories of criminology.