Correlates of Crime Reporting Among Victims in Lagos, Nigeria

ABSTRACT

 Crime reporting practices are critical for effective policing and reduction of crime. Studies have shown that more crimes are committed than reported, while little research attention has been paid to the determinants of crime reporting among Nigerians. This study, therefore, examined the correlates of crime reporting among crime victims in Lagos State, Nigeria because its high crime rates are disproportionally reported.  The Weberian Social Action theory provided the theoretical framework for the study. It adopted the survey research design. Multistage sampling consisting of purposive and simple random techniques was used to select study locations and respondents respectively. A structured questionnaire was used to obtain data on socio-demographic characteristics, incidence of crime, and reporting practices from 948 randomly selected crime victims across the three LGAs from the senatorial districts of Lagos. Four hundred and seventy five respondents from Mushin local government area to represent Lagos west,291 respondents from Lagos Island local government area for Lagos central and182 respondents from Ibeju Lekki local government area for Lagos east senatorial districts. Sixteen in-depth interviews were conducted with traditional rulers and religious leaders with one purposively selected respondent from each senatorial district. Twelve key informant interviews with two relations of victims, a crime officer and one landlord association chairman were also conducted in each senatorial district. Quantitative data were analysed using descriptive statistics, chi-square and regression at 5% level of significance, while qualitative data were content analysed.   Respondents’ age was 35.04±11.2 years; 66.1% were males, 46.5% were single and 61.2% had tertiary education. While 93.4% male respondents experienced crime, 50.2% reported crime. Also, 70.0% of the respondents had no confidence in the police, 19.3% had confidence and 10.7%were indifferent. Major reasons for non-reporting were: police inability to solve crime (56.3%), lack of confidence in the Nigeria police (25.6%) and crime as a private affair (11.0%). Victims reported minor (53.3%) and major (46.7%) crimes. Respondents who identified fear of offenders’ revenge (odds ratio [OR] = 2.140) and court processes (OR = 2.061) as their special considerations for reporting were twice more likely to report crimes relative to loss of value (OR=1.000). While only marriage was significantly related to crime reporting among male respondents (X2 = 0.00), religion (X2 = 0.002), education (X2 = 0.000), ethnicity (X2 = 0.001) and marital status (X2 = 0.045) were significantly associated with crime reporting among female respondents. Crime reporting among respondents was lower from rural (59.1%) through semi-urban (52.9%) to urban Lagos (47.1%). Stigmatisation of reporting as unbeneficial was dominant in rural communities. In urban Lagos, reporting crime to the police was not the usual practice. Self help was the familiar alternative to police notification. Generally, residents avoided reporting crime to the police because some officers had connived with criminals.

Crime reporting was generally low among residents of Lagos. Government should empower victims to enrich police crime data bank, by reporting, so as to enhance the efficiency of the entire criminal justice system. Also, the police should be trained to inspire improved crime reporting through confidence building among residents.