RATING OF CRIME SERIOUSNESS

AN EMPIRICAL TEST

Abstract

The study investigated the public ratings of crime seriousness. The principal objectives of the study were to investigate whether the pupil actually grades crimes in terms of levels of seriousness and to find out the comparative seriousness ratings assigned to five criminal offences by the Nigerian public. Two findings merged from the study: a) there is high consistency among sample subgroups, and between sample subgroups and the total sample, on the relative seriousness ranking of the five surveyed, this meant that in the public view; the five crimes surveyed are rated unequally in terms of seriousness. Based on the rank-ordering, the crime of drug trafficking was rated as the most serious crime out of the five criminal acts surveyed, followed by counterfeit and fake drug, fraud, stealing, and receiving stolen property in that order.