Who is the real victim?

[Archangel M]

I just read a great blog post:

http://beatandrelease.blogspot.com/2010/04/innocent-victims-where-are-they.html

The worst day on this job is the day you realize you really aren't helping as many people as you thought you would. The majority of crime victims are victimized because they choose to live a specific lifestyle, e.g. drug users who get robbed or murdered while trying to purchase their drug of choice. Or the dealer who gets murdered by the competition. I could go on and on with the examples, but why bother? It won't change anything. Most of the time, WE won't change anything - or anyone.

I came to this realization many years ago when I was a young, idealistic investigator. It didn't take long for me to discover that the first order of business when assigned a case was to check out the victim. A lot of the time they had outstanding warrants. I would have them come in and give me a statement regarding their case, then hook them up on the warrant, clearing two cases in one fell swoop. After a short time I managed to get over the fact that there were very few truly innocent victims anymore. I know that doesn't sound right to the average person. We should rejoice because of that fact. For those of us who are dedicated to a long career helping others it proves to be a disappointment. I simply supplanted the disappointment with a fascination of what one person could do to another, or to themselves.

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