Solving Crime for America's “Others”: Crime Clearance and Asian American Victims

Abstract

Based on the theoretical notion that racial hierarchy influences inequality in criminal justice outcomes, previous crime clearance studies have included victims’ race as a salient predictor of clearance. However, Asian American victims are seldom studied, often dropped from the analysis or combined as “other” with smaller racial groups. The unique and dialectical position of Asian Americans in the U.S. racial stratification system, simultaneously considered as “honorary White” and stigmatized as “perpetual foreigner” and “yellow peril,” should attract more research interest in the area of racial inequality in criminal justice outcomes. Using National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data, the current study examines racial/ethnic differences in crime clearance by arrest, with special attention given to Asian victims in comparison to White, Black, Hispanic, and Native American victims. The survival analysis found no statistically significant difference in crime clearance between White and Asian victims, with their clearance likelihood higher than for victims from other minority groups. The current analysis also found that the use of a simpler White/non-White dichotomy or placement of Asians in a broad “other” category risks obscuring important differences in crime clearance between Asians and other minority groups.