Does Wrongful Conviction Lower Deterrence?

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dc.contributor.author	Lando, Henrik	en_US
dc.date.accessioned	2009-02-04T10:24:53Z
dc.date.available	2009-02-04T10:24:53Z
dc.date.issued	2004-10-15T00:00:00Z	en_US
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/10398/6803
dc.description.abstract	Does wrongful conviction lower deterrence and can this explain society’s aversion to sanctioning the innocent? This paper argues that for some of the most important categories of crime such as murder, assault or robbery, the answer to both questions is no. For these categories of crime, a potential offender need not fear wrongful conviction for any particular criminal act he or she chooses not to commit. For example, if a potential offender decides not to murder another person, he or she should not fear being wrongfully convicted of it, since the person will not be dead, and there will therefore be no investigation and no trial. He of she may risk being wrongfully convicted of another crime, but that risk exists independently of his or her own actions. It may be argued that wrongful conviction lowers deterrence in more indirect ways. First, the possibility of being sanctioned for a crime one does not commit may lower the threat of being sanctioned for a crime one commits, if two sanctions are not twice as threatening as one. Second, if wrongful conviction halts further investigations that may lead to the true offender, and third, if a potential offender thinks that if he or she does not take advantage of a crime opportunity, he or she may be wrongly convicted in the event that some other person grasps the same opportunity. However, it will be argued that wrongful conviction may also increase deterrence, and the three indirect effects are in any event unlikely to be quantitatively important in the real world. An implication of the present analysis is that society’s aversion to sanctioning the innocent cannot be rationalized by or reduced to a concern for deterrence.	en_US
dc.format.extent	9 s.	en_US
dc.language	eng	en_US
dc.relation.ispartofseries	Working paper;2004-009	en_US
dc.subject.other	kep	en_US
dc.title	Does Wrongful Conviction Lower Deterrence?	en_US
dc.type	wp	en_US
dc.accessionstatus	modt04okt15 miel	en_US
dc.contributor.corporation	Copenhagen Business School. CBS	en_US
dc.contributor.department	Institut for Industriøkonomi og Virksomhedsstrategi	en_US
dc.contributor.department	Center for Law, Economics and Financial Institutions at CBS
dc.contributor.departmentshort	IVS
dc.contributor.departmentshort	LEFIC
dc.contributor.departmentuk	Department of Industrial Economics & Strategy	en_US
dc.contributor.departmentuk	Center for Law, Economics and Financial Institutions at CBS
dc.contributor.departmentukshort	IES
dc.contributor.departmentukshort	LEFIC
dc.idnumber	x656444311	en_US
dc.publisher.city	København	en_US
dc.publisher.year	2004	en_US