International Journal on Criminology Volume 2, Number 1, Spring 2014 | Page 53

The Impact of Victimological Theories on the Rights of Crime Victims in France
it is necessary to differentiate between two,
nonreducible situations. In civil proceedings
before the CIVI, blame on the part of
the victim can reduce or exclude their (and/
or their family’s) right to compensation.
This may be the case, for example, where the
victim provokes the accused using insults
or threats (sometimes under the influence
of various toxic products), and in cases of
score settling in large-scale crime. In criminal
law, the issue is somewhat trickier. The
first victimologists suggested that victim
responsibility should be taken into account,
constructing highly controversial typologies.
Penal decisions may still discharge or
acquit of the perpetrator, when the crime is
committed in response to domestic abuse
(Fattah 2004; Fattah 2011).
The everyday observations of practitioners
within victim support services in
particular, relayed by victimological doctrine,
have further broadened the field of
redressable damage, both in nature and in
terms of the sums paid. A wide range of
temporary, permanent, current, and future
damages are taken into account. The right
to reparation is first of all available for economic
damages as a result of losses suffered
in the wider sense: medical costs, loss of
independence, and practitioner’s fees (for
doctors, lawyers, and so forth). Similarly,
compensation is available for lost profits
(mainly job loss, incapacity to work, loss of
opportunities, and a child’s loss of amenity).
Compensation can also be obtained for
nonpatrimonial damages. Since these relate
to the person, they are not subject to payment
from a third-party payer. Temporary
functional deficit concerns reduced quality
of life (suffering, fear, withdrawal, and so
forth). Permanent functional deficit primarily
includes disfigurement and the inability
to indulge in certain activities (leisure, sexual
pleasures, procreation, starting a family,
anxiety linked to waiting, and so forth).
The theoretical and clinical impact of
victimology is also seen in the right to compensation
for damages for specific offense
situations and/or their consequences in the
short or long term. For example, compensation
for victims of terrorism and their families
has changed greatly, particularly thanks
to the work of the founder of the victim
association SOS-Attentats (Rudetzki 2002;
Rudetzki 2004), who is now “terrorism delegate”
within France’s National Federation
for Victims of Collective Attacks and Accidents
(Fédération nationale des victimes
d’attentats et d’accidents collectifs, fenvac.
org). The epidemiological inquiries carried
out at the request of SOS-Attentats in 1987
and 1989 specifically emphasize that severe
physical, psychological, and social suffering
(primarily post-traumatic stress, ongoing
effects on hearing, loss of social and professional
aptitude, and lasting depression) can
continue for varying and extended periods
of time after the event. This is particularly
worrying in terms of public health. These
very complicated, collective victimizations
require immediate and high-quality medical
and psychological intervention, via the
establishment of multidisciplinary teams
who are specifically trained to help these
physical and/or psychological victims. Exclusively,
the suffering of victims of terrorist
attacks still justifies reparation for specific
harm, set at 40% of the capital for partial
permanent incapacity, with a minimum of
€2,300. It is also worth examining several
additional particularities concerning the
compensation rights of entitled persons,
particularly for harm caused by the media
(for example use of photographs taken on
the site of an attack), and for the psychological
distress, problems in the living community,
and frequent medical visits related to
dealing with the suffering of a dying loved
one (Cario 2013). The “security and terrorism”
law of December 21, 2012, responded
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