Working with Victims of Crime: A Manual Applying Research to Clinical Practice

2.0 The Basics - Victimization and Recovery

• Casarez-Levison (1992) discussed victimization as a process where a person moves from a pre-crime state (Previctimization), to the crime event itself (Victimization), to initial coping and adjustment (Transition), and finally to a state where being a crime victim is just part of one's life experience (Resolution).

Figure 1: The process of victimization and recovery
(Casarez-Levison 1992)

• Workers need to be cautious of engaging in "trauma bias" where one assumes that crime victims are automatically traumatized when they may not be (Nelson et al. 2002).
• Workers should ensure that victims understand that treatment may mean getting worse before getting better (Nishith, Resick and Griffin 2002).
• Workers should be watchful of poor coping strategies such as drug and alcohol abuse, worsening of personal relationships, increased isolation or withdrawal (Casarez-Levison 1992). These poor responses should be addressed as quickly as possible by teaching the victim new, more effective coping techniques.
• Victims do not return to a pre-crime state - they need to make sense of the crime and its effects, and this becomes part of their life experience (Norris et al. 1997).
• Interventions appear to be able to help victims many years after victimization (Resick et al. 2002).