At what point does a victim of a crime have to pursue criminal charges?

Factual Questions
1

Excuse me for my extreme inadequate knowledge of the basic aspects of criminology specifically dealing with the law of the Western world, but watching Law and Order and the SVU version of the show,I’ve seen victims not pressing charges for crimes and for other crimes deemed more ‘serious’, the cops seem to mention that “It’s not up to the victim whether charges are brought or not”.

Is this true in real life or not? I was discussing on another forum of a real life case involving an Oxford student who attacked her boyfriend with a knife in a drug induced high this year and might be spared jail for the judge. Some users were saying that they would let her off if it was their girlfriend provided it was a once off situation but others pointed out that it’s not up to the victim whether not to prosecute or not.

I assume for things like murder, the family members cannot pardon the murderer even if they forgave them and wanted no criminal charges. Is this the same for less obvious crimes like rape, theft, stalking, doxxing, sexting etc…?

2

Victims don’t press charges. The State/Crown/government body does. The victim is a witness

3

Correct me If I’m wrong but what about cases involving theft and the victim chooses to let it go? Perhaps I must have seen this in a movie and thought that the scenario is genuine in law.

What if the witness refuses to testify?

4

This is the correct answer. The victim has no power to decide whether or not an individual should be prosecuted. The idea of “pressing charges” is a myth that gets perpetuated by television, movies, etc. Law enforcement (police/sheriff, etc.) decides whether to arrest or not. The county/district attorney decides whether to prosecute, or not.

There are cases where the victim is the only witness and they might elect to sort of passively refuse to assist in the prosecution. With an unwilling victim/witness, the county prosecutor may opt not to prosecute based on the difficulty in getting a conviction without the assistance of the victim and the nature of the crime (more trouble than it’s worth - the “petty” crimes, etc.).

Conversely, the victim may have a burr up their butt and pester every elected official they can to gently persuade the county to prosecute for whatever moral injustice has been done to them. But either way, the decision is up to the county/state/fed.

5

Refusing to testify or general non-cooperation is what the victims are really doing. It isn’t technically their decision to “press charges” but it generally influences the decision a great deal for anything short of a heinous crime. Prosecutors are the ones that decide whether to pursue criminal charges or not and they don’t generally pursue the ones that they don’t think they can win.

For example, I was the “victim” of two people engaged in a spree of armed robberies even though I fought back, they lost and I didn’t lose anything. Most of their other victims weren’t so lucky. They were quickly caught but the other victims dropped out one by one because some of them were traumatized and others just didn’t want to go through the whole trial process. The Boston DA really wanted them back in prison so they used me and the maximum charge on my report, attempted armed robbery, to put them back in prison for a few more years. The DA treated me like gold because I was the only one left and there was no way he could get a conviction on any of the others without cooperative witnesses. That is what happened. They committed a whole string of crimes but only went back to prison for the lesser one with a cooperative victim and witness.

6

First, someone has to report the crime if it’s not known to the police. Often the state won’t prosecute if the victim doesn’t cooperate because they don’t have enough else to prove their case. A prosecutor may drop charges against a criminal on the wishes of the victim even if they have sufficient evidence such as in a case of theft or fraud where the perpetrator agrees to return the stolen property to the victim if the charges are dropped and recovery would be impossible otherwise. But it’s always up to the state, they don’t need the consent of the victim to prosecute.

7

Not necessarily. In my state, for misdemeanor offenses committed outside the presence of a policeman, the victim has to sign a sworn affidavit to commence a prosecution. In most instances, that same victim can drop the charges if desired. Felonies are handled in the way you describe.

8

As a practical matter, it’s usually very difficult to prosecute successfully if the victim of the crime is a reluctant or uncooperative witness. So, outside situations like that described by Oakminster, the victim doesn’t usually have a legal right to prevent prosecution, in practice their attitude can usually exert a consderable influence over the state’s decision to prosecute or not.

But not always. In some cases there’s be abundant evidence even without the testimony of the victim (this is always so in succesful murder prosecutions, obviously) and the state can proceed regardless of the victim’s attitude.

9

That is not true for everything. First, laws - not just individual law but the underlying philosphy - varies by country. The continental system is based on the Code Napoleon, where written law gives the spirit, and the courts decide each individual case. What court A, B and C decided in the past 20 years can be taken into account, but is not binding, because circumstances differ between each case. (If there is a trend where judges think the law is not right anymore, they will kick the case upstairs to the constitutational court, which can decide that the law is no longer valid in this form, and hand it over to legislature to fix or get rid of.)

Anglo-American law meanwhile places a lot of weight on previous court’s opinion to interpret the written law.

Second, not all crimes are equal in law. There are severe crimes and lesser crimes. The general attitude of law philosophy is that a crime is not only done against one victim, but it breaks the code and rules of society, and if the perpetrator is not brought to justice, he will do it again, so for the safety of the rest of society, he needs to be caught and put on trial.

However, there are exceptions: college campuses in the US have swept rape under the rug for decades, as have fundie Christian pastors (by not reporting sexual abuse of minors, acting as “counselors” for the men) or the Catholic Church (by reassigning priests who molested children) Some of that was illegal (hence the Boston scandal) some of it are still existing loopholes (not in all US states are counselors required to report on abuse) and therefore not illegal.

Lastly, with minor crimes, the law can give a leeway and say “this is technically illegal, so if the victim wants to sue the perp, we will, but if the victim wants to forget it and reconcile because it’s not worth a big fuss over, we will let it go, too”.

E.g. in my country it is illegal to insult somebody. But the state only automatically prosecutes insults against state officials, cops and soliders. If Joe and Charles are at a bar, both drunk, and call each other names, they can go to the police and sue each other. Or they can say “we were drunk, let’s forget it and stay friends” and then the cops/ state won’t get involved.

Or: theft is illegal. But if somebody steals sth. of very low value and doesn’t seem to suffer from kleptomancy (which needs treatement) or be a habitual thief, but rather a one-time thing - e.g. a teen doing a dare - the owner can decide a stern talking-to is enough warning, and next time the thief will not do it again.

10

It depends on the jurisdiction. In some jurisdictions, a private person can prosecute some criminal matters to a greater or lesser degree. Look up “private prosecution” in Wikipedia and take it form there.

11

I’ve experienced 2 criminal prosecutions in Canada where I either knew or was the crown’s witness&victim. In both the prosecution (as they often do) offered the defendant a plea deal early on, but then asked the victims if they were ok with it. In both cases the victims were not ok with the plea so the prosecution proceeded to trial; they used the wording “so you want your day in court?”, to which the victims answer was yes.

So, what was going on there? It seemed as though the victims had a considerable influence in how far the prosecution went even though in neither case did they ever indicate they wouldn’t be cooperative. In both cases the crown already had the victims’ written statements (therefore didn’t need them to provide anything further) and the defense wanted to accept the plea deal. The prosecution even seemed slightly disappointed that the victims wanted to go to trial, yet pursued it anyway. Did the crown have some sort of legal obligation that wasn’t mentioned or was it simply being extremely accommodating?

12

If there are people in society that are considered to be a danger to society, then it is the state’s responsibility to ensure that these people are prosecuted and that society is protected from them. The state also has to decide how it spends its resources and the likelihood of a successful conviction, etc.

If a victim of a crime is reluctant to testify against their perpetrator, the victim can be compelled to testify. This can be problematic for the state, but it is a decision the state makes, not the victim.

The decision of “pressing charges” by a victim is more of a process of reporting a crime. As mentioned “charges” are brought by the state, not the victim.

13

The Crown was being accommodating.

Each province or territory has it’s own policy on how involved the victim is in the process. In general, the policies are to inform the victim on how the prosecution is progressing if that the victim so requests. Manitoba leads the pack with legislation requiring that the Crown consult with the victim if the victim so requests. Nowhere in policy or legislation in Canada is it mandated that Crowns must prosecute or not prosecute in accordance with the wishes of the victim.

Victims who are not informed, who are ignored by the Crown, and who are not consulted before the Crown makes major decisions, tend not to be as satisfied as those who are. Victims tend to be more satisfied if they feel invested in the process. Victim satisfaction is very important at a policy level, and it is also very important for the prosecutors whom I know.

Here is a good read on the issue. Table of Contents - Victim Participation in the Plea Negotiation Process in canada

14

I was essentially tricked out of charges being pressed.

A housemate stole my bicycle when he moved out. There’s little doubt it was him, as the only person with a key to the locked storage shed was me and, I was startled to suddenly discover, the offending housemate, who had been given a key by the landlord the week before moving out specifically because the landlord knew he was desperate for money (and thus intended to allow him to use the lawnmower to raise cash). I guess the landlord could also be a suspect, but the fact that the housemate called me afterward and apologized for stealing my bike pretty much nails it.

The bike in question was a relatively new $599 model, which was a lot of money for me 20 years ago. The police came and took statements and looked around, then asked me “if the bike was recoverable, would you want it back?” Sure, I’d like it back.

That was all it took – no charges were filed and the police dropped the “investigation” like a hot rock. I eventually got someone at the police dispatch number to admit that they willfully interpreted my answer to indicate that I was unwilling to prosecute and ONLY wanted the bike back, because “these domestic cases” usually involve people unwilling to put the hammer down on their loved ones.

But this was NOT a “domestic” case in the usual sense of the word, and this criminal was NOT one of my loved ones – he’d only been in the house a couple of months, brought in by the landlord as a charity project.

The police in my area appear quite willing to prosecute for theft of this kind normally, according to the things I see in the local papers. It was just in my case that they inferred things I didn’t want from what I hadn’t said and decided to wash their hands of the whole affair.

At least I helped out a homeless guy for $599 plus tax.

15

You could have taken your roommate to small claims court.

16

My credit card was stolen out of my gym locker some years ago. The thief then went to a gas station to find out if I had noticed it was stolen yet. I hadn’t, so he drove over to (IIRC) Best Buy and started buying electronics. Apparently the thief did this kind of thing a lot, and the clerk recognized him, and remembered that the last time he was in the store, it was a different name on the credit card. Said clerk called the police, who stopped the thief, and had the credit card company call me to verify that my card had been stolen.

I met with a detective - as mentioned, the thief apparently did this kind of thing a lot - gave him a sample of my handwriting to show that it wasn’t me who signed for the electronics, verified that I had not given him permission to use the card, and that it was really my card and I hadn’t stolen it myself. He asked if I was willing to testify, and I said Yes.

Fast forward a few months. I was contacted by the ADA who checked that I was intending to show up on the court date and testify. Again I said Yes, I would be happy to, and put the court date on my calendar. She called me again the night before the court date to check again, and again I said Yes.

The morning of the court date she called again and said I needn’t bother to show up - she was able to use the fact that I intended to testify to force the thief to plead Guilty. And she thanked me for being the only one who was willing to show up. She also said it could have been worse - sometimes defendants will wait until the morning of the trial to see if the complaining witness shows up, and take a plea if they do, and go to trial if they don’t.

Regards,
Shodan

17

It might be worth mentioning here that both America and Canada have jurisdictions where the Code Napoleon is the underlying legal system, because both were French colonies before being integrated into the largely Anglo (and, therefore, Common Law) jurisdictions of their respective countries: Louisiana in the US, and Quebec in Canada.

Yes. That’s stare decisis, Latin for [del]“Hey, look at the weirdo”[/del] “Let the decision stand”, and is why judge-made law has always been a part of the Common Law.

Right, and that’s one reason that basing the process on the victim pressing charges is contrary to public policy for serious crimes: There might be pressure on the victim to not make waves, to keep the lid on things, and society is harmed by having rapists running around unpunished.

I can never keep up with this Fourth Edition stuff…

(It’s kleptomania, or an obsession with stealing. Kleptomancy would be the practice of using magic to steal, like pyromancy is using magic to start fires.)

18

In Québec, criminal law matters are dealt with under the federal common law system, not Québec’s provincial civil law system. The Canadian Constitution is an uncodified constitution that has been developing for the last 150 years (and goes back hundreds of years before that via constitutional documents included by reference e.g. English Bill of Rights 1689 etc.; unwritten constitutional sources e.g. constitutional conventions such a the job of Prime Minister, Royal prerogative and Parliamentary privilege etc.; unwritten constitutional principles e.g. federalism, democracy, constitutionalism and the rule of law, respect for minorities, responsible government, representation by population, judicial independence, parliamentary supremacy, and implied bill of rights etc.) In 1867, federal and provincial jurisdictions were set out, with criminal law being entirely under federal jurisdiction (have a look at s. 91 and following in the Constitution Act 1982 (which includes the Constitution Act 1867 as amended). When there is conflict over whether a power is federal or provincial, the courts try to fit it into the most appropriate box, and failing that, give it to the feds under the peace, order and good government (POGG) residual power at s. 91 and/or under the doctrine of paramountcy.

19

In the vein of movies/Tv, the movie Liar Liar actually had some truth in it;

“I can take you to small claims court but you probably won’t show up and if you do you’ll stiff me anyway…”

Usually unless its many thousands of dollars, small claims court still isn’t worth the effort.

20

Sorry, mistranslation. Thanks for the correction. (Though if there were People around using -mancy that actually works - that would be a serious public threat! :p)