Female Criminality

When most people think of a criminal they generally envision a man. However, the number of female offenders is on the rise. As a result of woman's tradition role as a nurturer and child rearing many find it difficult to see how this woman could also be violent or criminal. What is it that causes women to turn to crime? The goal of this paper is to present an integrated theory of female criminality.

Prevalence and incidence statistics

According to statistics provided by the National Criminal Justice Reference Service in 2003, 23.2% of those arrested in the United States were women, 20.4% of females arrested were under the age of 18 and 7% were under the age of 15. In 2004 6.9% of prison inmates were women and 1 out of 8 adult parolees 1 out of 4 adult probationers were women. Since 1995, the total number of female State prison inmates has increased 5% a year while male the number of male inmates has only increased on average 3.3%.In regards to female recidivism rates in 2004 57.6% females releases from prison were re-arrested within three years, 39.9% were re-convicted within three years and 17.3% were sent to prison on new charges.

Current Status

Presently there are approximately 100,000 women incarcerated in the United States (Gaines and Miller 2004). The majority of female convictions of nonviolent offenses are for drug crimes. This is a result of the 1980's war on drugs; were it not for this many of the women incarcerated would not have been charged or would have been given much lighter sentences. Only two percent of the women in prison are there for violent crimes. When a woman kills it is usually a male intimate partner and is in response physical aggression from that man. Another common type of female criminal, according in Gaines and Miller, is the single mom/career criminal who commits crime in order to provide for her children or commits turns to drug use in an attempt to escape the pressures of their daily life.

Studies have shown that women are often handled more lightly by the criminal justice community especially in death penalty cases than are their male counterparts (Gaines and Miller 2004). Judges are more likely to see marital problems and family ground as mitigating factors than with men. Many also believe that women should not be incarcerated for nonviolent offenses but should be allowed to serve their time in community based correction programs where they can still care for their children; they same cannot be said for male offenders.

Theoretical Discussion

Gabriel Tarde's theory of imitation is a social learning theory which asserts that "individuals in close and intimate contact with one another imitate one another's behaviors" (Dantzker and Hunger p. 105). The three main influences are family members, life experience and media. Therefore, aggression and criminality are modeled by these influential sources. I believe this is true for many female criminals; they are modeling the behaviors they passively learned, specifically from their family. As the numbers of incarcerated women increases more mothers are therefore modeling a criminal life style for their children to imitate, thus creating a cycle. According to Dallaire (2006)

"...adolescent children of incarcerated mothers drop out of high school at a rate three times that of their peers, and they engage in more delinquent behaviors such as lying, stealing and cheating...it is estimated that children with an incarnated mother are six times more likely that their peers to go to jail...[they] are also more likely to be sexually promiscuous and to experience a teenage pregnancy" (p. 18) which are risk factors for criminal activity.

This is more common with adolescents whose mothers are incarcerated than for those whose fathers are incarcerated. I believe that many women that are evolved in criminal activity are imitating the criminal activity that they have learned from their family, specifically their mothers, as well as from life events and mass media. For example if a girl's mother stole in order to provide for her family there is an increased likely hood that when that girl grows up she will steal in order to provide for her family.

According to Makarios (2007) girls are aggressive just as often as boys; however, while boys are openly and physically aggressive, girls use "covert aggression" and "secretly exploit others while marinating a facade of 'niceness'" (p. 104). I believe that this is a result of modeling the behavior of other female in their lives. They learn how to manipulate and be passively aggressive but in cases where their female role models are more outwardly aggressive they imitate that behavior. For example,

"...parents of minority children teach their daughters to act tough to cope with the harsh reality of racism and sexism that is forced on minority females...although being nice may work to the advantage of young White girls, these privilege are not extended to minority girls" (Makarios, 2007, p. 104).

Girls learn from their family that in order to survive they must be aggressive because if they are "nice" they will be seen as weak and passive and therefore be taken advantage of. I believe that this is a major factor in female criminality

Women offender are also much more likely than their male counterparts to have been victims of abuse; "...victims of childhood sexual abuse are 130% more likely to be arrested for a violent offense as a juvenile while controlling for other factors" (Makarios, 2007, p.104). Of the girls incarcerated in California juvenile correctional facilities 88% report having been emotionally abused and 81% report sexual or physical abuse, while 70% of incarcerated adult females report extreme physical abuse and 59% report extreme sexual abuse (Makarios, 2007). According to the social deviant theory, self-hate and isolation lead to the formation of a deviant subculture (Hunter and Dantzker, 2005). Abused children often develop embarrassment and low self-esteem or self-hatred and as a result they isolate themselves or are isolated by their peers. The abused girls and women may then become deviant and ultimately criminal. This may account for the fact that abuse appears to be such a significant in female criminality.

The feminist theory proposes that women commit crimes as a result of gender inequality or subjugation by a patriarchal society. I do not agree with this line of reasoning. On the other hand, Freda Alder's "liberation hypothesis" argues that as women become liberated/emancipated from their traditional roles they will commit more crime (Gaines and Miller 2004). As women achieve liberation they are no longer forced to assume the role of the nice and "ladylike" female but rather take on more masculine traits which they have always had but were forced to repress (Alder, 1975).

"The question we should be asking is not why women are committing male crimes, but what has taken them so long to start and why is the time now propitious. From this perspective, women are no more enigmatic than men. Like other oppressed classes they have always had the same aspirations as the dominate class but, lacking direct means, have utilized ploys, ruses, and indirection. Their resort to petty social gambits and petty crimes was a reflection more of their petty strengths than their petty drives" (Alder, 1975, p. 11).

In the past women have not had the same access to resources as men. It is a lot harder to commit crimes when you are in the home all day caring for the family. Alder uses the example that it would be difficult for a woman to commit the crime of embezzlement when she has no access to funds from which to embezzle or to get into a bar fight if she never goes to a bar. However, as women are liberated and begin infiltrating areas of the work force or the social community where she was not previously allowed she will have chances to act criminal in the same way that a male would. It can therefore be assumed that women are not less criminal than men they simply have less opportunity to commit crime.

Conclusion

As the rates of female offenders continue to rise the study of female criminality becomes even more important. In order to adequately address this phenomenon the criminal justice community must come to some type of understanding of the factors that lead women to commit crime; major factors being imitation of female criminal influences, deviance caused by self-hatred and isolation and criminality as a product of liberation form the traditional roles of women.

Bibliography

Alder, F, (1975). Sisters in Crime: The rise of the New Female Criminal. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Book Company

Dallaire, D.H, (2006). Children With Incarcerated Mothers: Developmental Outcomes, Special Challenges and Recommendations. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology. 28, 15-24

Dantzker, M.L. & Hunter, R.D, (2005). Crime and Criminality: Causes and Consequences. Monsey, NY: Criminal Justice Press

Gaines, L.K, & Roger, L.M. (2004). Criminal Justice in Action: The Core. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/ Thompson Learning

In the spotlight: Women & Girls in the Criminal Justice System - Facts and Figures last updated on: 9/28/2007, Retrieved November 24, 2006, from http://www.ncjrs.gov/spotlight/wgcjs/facts.html

Makarios, M.D, (2007). Race, Abuse and Female Criminal Violence. Feminist Criminology, 2/2, 100-116