Comments on a study

There are times when, despite deep ignorance about something, things just seem to make sense. That was just how an article, to which a Russian author could have given a name, invited me to share with you the present ramblings.

The issue revolves around crime and punishment. This is not Dostoyevsky’s old novel, but a research on crime and prisons in present times. The newspaper article commented a study showing that the number of crimes in a given country had declined consistently in recent years. Simultaneously, the number of prisoners in its jails had, with one exception, increased.

A priori one could think that there is a contradiction. If fewer crimes are committed, fewer people are committing them and the population in jail should decrease. However, the apparent contradiction may be explained by the reversal of the cause – effect relation: fewer crimes are committed precisely because more criminals are prisoners and therefore have fewer opportunities of committing crimes. In addition, some abstain because they feel that offending is very risky, that by doing so they may go quickly behind bars. It tries to fight the sin by preventing sinners from recidivism, by sending them to the purgatory as quickly as possible, so good men and women can walk without fear of darkness and without worrying about snakes.

But, in a city of that country, the exception was that the crime rate and the number of prisoners have fallen together. In that city, high-risk situations were analyzed to systematically mitigate risks. For example, crimes were analyzed and it was verified that many assaults occurred at service stations and convenience stores in certain places and at certain times. Police increased the number of patrols in those places and those hours. Thus, potential offenders, when seeing the police around, refrain and decide to go to the next potential victim where, with some luck, another patrol will be there to discourage them. And so it is likely that some crimes will be prevented, partly by vigilance, and partly because, out of boredom or frustration, some criminals will decide to leave the criminal path and to make a more conventional living. Although maybe some of those potential criminals, being forced to postpone their misdeeds, will feel they are already in purgatory.

Of course something must be done to reduce the problem: Put more criminals in jail or increase surveillance of potentially dangerous places: many will say that the problems are more complex and structural, and long-terms conditions and circumstances need to be improved,  for instance with more jobs, less drug, etc. What is clear is that the mere promise of hell and purgatory seems to have ceased long ago to be a very reliable deterrent, at least “through these streets where compassion no longer appears and pity went off traveling”.(1)

As a practice, let’s think about these concepts in another well-known area.  High-speed driving: some may say: Let’s put in jail those who drive above the allowed speed limit. On another hand, some could say let’s increase surveillance by cameras and radars on avenues and highways, let’s photograph offenders and fine them. Both methods, if implemented, discourage those who want to speed above the limit. And even if some take the risk or buy a GPS device telling them where radars and cameras are located, the final result will be less high-speed.

I wonder and I ask you, what about tax evasion? How do we implement those patrols, those cameras, those radars? Are the efforts to exchange information, lift banking secrecy, and eliminate anonymous shareholding similar to good patrols? On the other hand, are the withholding and collection mechanisms, the implementation of electronic invoices and integral transmission of data, of tax equipment, similar to good radars and cameras? Are fines or other sanctions, public outrage, and rewards for denouncing crimes convincing enough to prevent tax evasion? Do we use risk analysis as a management practice oriented to detect and punish crime, or to prevent it?

If you ask me, I choose prevention: patrol more, install more radars and more cameras. I think if the majority of people know that there are ten cameras on an avenue, most of them, even if they like speed, will drive under the limit. Moreover, this majority, if seeing someone passing them like a lightning, will say, sometimes with solidarity or as consolation: “Yep, this one will pay big fines.”

Sure, as long as all the radars and cameras work, and the fines are charged and paid. But that’s another story.

In one of his songs, Serrat was asking if “we would not like to overcome the temptation by succumbing completely to it?”.(2) I cannot agree more with him when it comes to “Eve and Apples”, but I admit that for more than one  Eve,  eating the apple would have resulted costly, if next to the snake a guard had been watching. Of course someone will say it would be more effective to grab the snake before he speaks and lock him under six transparent walls in a zoo that could be called purgatory.

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