Crime Aggregation, Deterrence, and Witness Credibility

TL;DR

This paper develops a model analyzing how legal procedures and witness report handling influence offense frequency and report informativeness, revealing that different legal approaches significantly impact deterrence and information accuracy.

Contribution

It introduces a novel equilibrium model comparing two legal handling methods for multiple accusations, highlighting their effects on witness informativeness and offense rates.

Findings

Severe punishment with aggregate accusations leads to uninformative reports and frequent offenses.

Separately adjudicating accusations results in highly informative reports and fewer offenses.

Lowering punishment severity can sometimes enhance deterrence and report informativeness.

Abstract

We present a model for the equilibrium frequency of offenses and the informativeness of witness reports when potential offenders can commit multiple offenses and witnesses are subject to retaliation risk and idiosyncratic reporting preferences. We compare two ways of handling multiple accusations discussed in legal scholarship: (i) When convictions are based on the probability that the defendant committed at least one, unspecified offense and entail a severe punishment, potential offenders induce negative correlation in witnesses' private information, which leads to uninformative reports, information aggregation failures, and frequent offenses in equilibrium. Moreover, lowering the punishment in case of conviction can improve deterrence and the informativeness of witnesses' reports. (ii) When accusations are treated separately to adjudicate guilt and conviction entails a severe punishment, witness reports are highly informative and offenses are infrequent in equilibrium.