IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ucp/jlstud/doi10.1086-649032.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Witness Intimidation

Author

Listed:
  • Brendan O'Flaherty
  • Rajiv Sethi

Abstract

Witness intimidation involves strategic complexity and two-sided uncertainty: criminals cannot know whether threats will deter witnesses, and witnesses cannot know whether threats will be carried out. We model this interaction and explore how rates of intimidation, testimony, and conviction respond to changes in the value of testimony, relations between the police and the community, and witness protection programs. If the value of testimony rises, criminals face stronger incentives to threaten, but threats are less credible. The increase in threats may be large enough to offset the greater value of testimony, with the paradoxical outcome that fewer criminals are convicted. Counterintuitive results are most likely when witness intimidation is a severe problem: few witnesses testify although prosecutors are competent. When the harm faced by witnesses depends on whether the criminal is convicted, communities can be trapped in equilibria with collective silence: no witness testifies because none expects others to testify.

Suggested Citation

  • Brendan O'Flaherty & Rajiv Sethi, 2010. "Witness Intimidation," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 39(2), pages 399-432.
    • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jlstud:doi:10.1086/649032
    DOI: 10.1086/649032
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/649032
    Download Restriction: Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.
    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/649032
    Download Restriction: Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1086/649032?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Arun S. Malik, 1990. "Avoidance, Screening and Optimum Enforcement," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 21(3), pages 341-353, Autumn.
    2. Steven Shavell & A. Mitchell Polinsky, 2000. "The Economic Theory of Public Enforcement of Law," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 38(1), pages 45-76, March.
    3. Marvell, Thomas B & Moody, Carlisle E, 2001. "The Lethal Effects of Three-Strikes Laws," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 30(1), pages 89-106, January.
    4. Rajiv Sethi, 2009. "Why Have Robberies Become Less Frequent but More Violent?," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 25(2), pages 518-534, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. O’Flaherty, Brendan & Sethi, Rajiv, 2015. "Urban Crime," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 1519-1621, Elsevier.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chopard, Bertrand & Langlais, Eric, 2009. "Défaut de paiement stratégique et loi sur les défaillances d'entreprises [Strategic default and bankruptcy law]," MPRA Paper 14366, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Bowles, Roger & Faure, Michael & Garoupa, Nuno, 2000. "Economic analysis of the removal of illegal gains," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(4), pages 537-549, December.
    3. Giovanni Immordino & Marco Pagano, 2010. "Legal Standards, Enforcement, and Corruption," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 8(5), pages 1104-1132, September.
    4. Timothy Stanley, 1995. "Optimal Penalties for Concealment of Crime," Law and Economics 9507001, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 27 Dec 1995.
    5. Dahm, Matthias & González, Paula & Porteiro, Nicolás, 2018. "The enforcement of mandatory disclosure rules," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 167(C), pages 21-32.
    6. Kugler, Maurice & Verdier, Thierry & Zenou, Yves, 2005. "Organized crime, corruption and punishment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(9-10), pages 1639-1663, September.
    7. Hugh Gravelle & Nuno Garoupa, 2002. "Optimal Deterrence with Legal Defense Expenditure," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 40(3), pages 366-379, July.
    8. Dhammika Dharmapala & Nuno Garoupa, 2004. "Penalty Enhancement for Hate Crimes: An Economic Analysis," American Law and Economics Review, Oxford University Press, vol. 6(1), pages 185-207.
    9. Philip A. Curry & Steeve Mongrain, 2008. "What you don't see can't hurt you: an economic analysis of morality laws," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 41(2), pages 583-594, May.
    10. Nøstbakken, Linda, 2008. "Fisheries law enforcement--A survey of the economic literature," Marine Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 293-300, May.
    11. Parikshit Ghosh, 2009. "Making the Punishment Fit the Crime or Taliban Justice? Optimal Penalties Without Commitment," Working papers 175, Centre for Development Economics, Delhi School of Economics.
    12. Tihitina Andarge & Erik Lichtenberg, 2020. "Regulatory compliance under enforcement gaps," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 57(3), pages 181-202, June.
    13. Kugler, Maurice & Verdier, Thierry & Zenou, Yves, 2004. "Organised crime, corruption and punishment," Discussion Paper Series In Economics And Econometrics 0407, Economics Division, School of Social Sciences, University of Southampton.
    14. Langlais, Eric, 2007. "Too much or not enough crimes? On the ambiguous effects of repression," MPRA Paper 1575, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Anna Rita Germani, 2007. "The Environmental Enforcement in the Civil and the Common Law Systems. A Case on the Economic Effects of Legal Institutions," Quaderni DSEMS 22-2007, Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche, Matematiche e Statistiche, Universita' di Foggia.
    16. Timothy Stanley, 1995. "Radar Detectors, Fixed and Variable Costs of Crime," Law and Economics 9507002, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 27 Dec 1995.
    17. Eric Langlais, 2008. "Detection Avoidance and Deterrence: Some Paradoxical Arithmetic," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 10(3), pages 371-382, June.
    18. Garoupa, Nuno, 2007. "Optimal law enforcement and criminal organization," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 63(3), pages 461-474, July.
    19. Nuno Garoupa & Jonathan Klick & Francesco Parisi, 2006. "A law and economics perspective on terrorism," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 128(1), pages 147-168, July.
    20. Rousseau, Sandra, 2009. "The use of warnings in the presence of errors," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 191-201, September.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ucp:jlstud:doi:10.1086/649032. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Journals Division (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/JLS .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.