Variation in Perceived Adequacy of Services for Victims of Crime from Marginalized Groups: Results from Logistic Regression of Organizational Survey Data

Background and Purpose: Victims of crime need a variety of services, ranging from short-term (e.g., court transportation, financial resources) to long-term support (e.g., counseling, legal aid). Availability and adequacy of services vary across crime victim population sub-groups. Using data from a statewide survey of organizations serving victims of crime in North Carolina, this study examines the relationship between organizational characteristics and staff perceptions that victims of crime who belong to marginalized groups are adequately served in the community. This study is part of a larger multi-method, community-engaged needs assessment of services for victims of crime in North Carolina that focused on service needs, availability, accessibility, and adequacy for members of underserved or marginalized groups (e.g., LGBTQ+ individuals, refugees, veterans, people with disabilities, BIPOC individuals, and others).

Methods: Data were collected via a web-based survey distributed to representatives from organizations serving victims of crime across the state. Respondents answered questions about adequacy of existing services for victims of crime in several marginalized or underserved groups. A total of 330 organizational responses were included in this analysis: 161 law enforcement agencies, 114 crime victim service organizations, and 55 organizations serving culturally specific groups (e.g., local LGBTQ+ centers). Logistic regression was used to estimate the relationship between type of organization and perceived service adequacy for several underserved groups. Standard errors were adjusted to account for clustering by geographic region.

Results: Compared to respondents from other organization types, those from law enforcement agencies were 4.5 times (for victims of crime with psychiatric disabilities) to 8.8 times (for Latinx victims of crime) more likely (p < .001) to indicate that services for victims of crime were adequate, when controlling for county urbanicity, organization size, and whether an organization serves one or multiple counties. The direction and significance of relationships between organization type and perceptions of service adequacy were consistent across multiple underserved populations (e.g., Black individuals, Latinx individuals, biracial individuals, people with criminal legal system involvement, people with psychiatric disabilities, and others). Likelihood Ratio and Hosmer-Lemeshow Goodness of Fit Tests indicated that models fit the data well.

Conclusions and Implications: It is unclear why perceptions of service adequacy differ between organization types, but the discrepancies themselves are important to highlight. The notion that services for marginalized victims of crime are adequate contradicts findings from this study and others that indicate considerable gaps in service availability and adequacy for these groups (e.g., due to limited cultural responsiveness and duration). Furthermore, services for victims of crime are often located within law enforcement agencies, and law enforcement is often a referral source to victim services. If law enforcement—and other entities that provide and/or refer victims of crime to services—perceive services as adequate, little effort may be exerted to make much-needed improvements. Future research should investigate why perceptions of service adequacy differ so greatly across organization types and seek to understand service adequacy from the perspectives of victims of crime. Interventions may be needed to rectify perceptions and realities of service adequacy for marginalized victims of crime.