An explicit goal in the Dutch victim policy is to offer protection to victims of crime. Based on a EU Directive all member states shall ensure that victims receive a timely and individual assessment, to identify specific protection needs. In this paper the question is: which victims especially do need protection? More specific, it examines whether the victim-offender relationship, controlling for the confounders ‘type of crime’ and ‘gender of the victim’, contributes to the extent in which protection is a reason for reporting crimes to the police. For victims of domestic violence (by partners, ex-partners and (other) family members), the need for protection is an important reason for reporting – not just for women and girls, but also for men and boys. The need for protection is an important reason for reporting for victims by partners, ex-partners and (other) family members of non-violent as well as violent crimes.

From a secondary analysis of data from a survey of victims of crime, commissioned by the WODC, it appears that more than occasionally the registration of the type of offence by the police, the Public Prosecution Service and Victim Support Netherlands does not match the victim’s own reporting of the offence. In this article, the differences between victims’ reports and registrations regarding the nature of the victimization are exposed and the background of the differences is explored. Some offences seem to have an increased chance of being classed by victims in offence categories which differ from those of the registrations.
Based on the secondary analysis, the authors conclude that it is important for the interpretation of future research among victims to identify the registered offence and explicitly verify this with the respondent. It is also good to consider what registration data is useful in samples to be able to identify differences between the registrations and the victims’ reports later. A practical implication of the discrepancy in the nature of victimization is that bottlenecks may occur in the connection between the support needs of victims and the supply.

On September 21th 2012, a sweet sixteen party in Haren (a Dutch village), announced on Facebook as PROJECT X Haren, turned into a riot in which youngsters clashed with the police. The blame was put on the film Project X (2012) that would have inspired adolescents to become aggressive and violent. However, like other adolescent comedies, this movie offers an insight in the adolescent state of mind, the role of humor and their lack of risk assessments. Much violence is (harmless) slapstick-like, boundaries are exceeded (sex, alcohol, drugs) and transgression is often directed against parents, teachers and the police. What is tested in the adolescent imagination is the public order. Film functions as a symbolic rite of passage, with carnivalesque inversions. Reacting in Haren on this adolescent state of mind with an administrative prohibition (‘there is no party’) confirmed the juvenile joke. Acting as if it is not a party but a huge disaster (by enlarging police forces) contributed to make the riot a reality that the youngsters themselves never imagined. The commission of inquiry recommends taking serious film and other forms of public imagination, because they contribute to our understanding of reality, especially concerning the perceptions of societal actors.