Patterns of Prosecution: Suspects and Victims of Violent Crime in Historic and Contemporary Statistics

Suspects of violent crime are disproportionately male, socio-economically disadvantaged, and from marginalised groups; this is as true today as it is for medieval England. Nevertheless, criminal statistics can often be misleading. My work draws on criminology and socio-legal studies to recognise that the received historical record of crime reflects prosecutions, rather than criminal activity. Therefore, historic crime is very difficult to quantify. Despite this, medieval studies have focused on describing how, when, and why crime was perpetrated and these scholars have treated criminal statistics as a realistic representation of criminality. I argue for a methodological shift away from counting historic crimes and criminals to examining patterns of prosecution. Across time and space, prosecution is shaped by social and cultural ideas about gender, ethnicity, and socio-economic status. My research reveals the impact of legal privileges and social norms upon indictments and prosecutions in Yorkshire (1345-85).

A key theme of my research is how gendered perceptions of the suspects and victims shape statistics of violent crime. Despite estimates from the ONS that up to half of the members of criminal gangs are female, the database of the Metropolitan Police listed three thousand male gang members known to the authorities in London, compared to just eighteen females. Anne Longfield, who was the Children's Commissioner for England, said that girls were less likely to be stopped and searched by the police (Phillips 2019). My research shows that medieval women were often prosecuted in a supporting or subordinate role, as an accomplice or a co-suspect, whereas men were more likely to be named as the principal suspect. My research also shows that due to ideas about masculinity and honour, men were more likely to engage in, and be excused of, violent behaviour. It is clear that the ways in which gender is performed and conceived continues to have huge impacts for both the perpetration of crime and composition of criminal statistics.

This project aims to bring together historians, policymakers, legal practitioners, women's and youth organisations, government committees, and researchers interested in the study, understanding, and prevention of serious violence. By sharing innovative historical research on the prosecution of violence, this project intervenes in modern debates about violence against women and girls, knife crime, male victims of domestic violence, overrepresentation in criminal statistics, and access to justice. It will create an interdisciplinary and transhistorical space for experts on serious violence, and as a result, will have a lasting impact on current perceptions and policies surrounding serious violent crime. The project will advance new ways of thinking about patterns of prosecution in historical and modern contexts.

In addition, this project will make publicly available a 'Map' of all the suspects and victims of homicide in Yorkshire (1345-85). This will allow people to learn about criminal prosecution in the middle ages and the people named as suspects and victims. Currently, all of this information is inaccessible to those without Latin and palaeographical training. The diligent and complex nature of criminal investigations in an age before modern policing will be revealed through coroners' inquests. It will be shown that local experts were gathered to investigate suspicious deaths. The Map will share the juries' conclusions including the wound inflicted and the weapon that caused it. However, this project goes beyond a study of crime, it allows for an insight into the world of ordinary medieval people. The information provided will cover names, sex, occupation, marital status, place of origin or nationality, and economic status. It will view those named in the records as people, not just suspects and victims.