The transactional nature of certain violent crimes, such as muggings, street robberies and car-jackings, etc., may at first glance lead us to believe that these are relatively simple events i.e. somebody wants something we have and uses force to deprive us of it. However, if we view these and other similar crimes is such a simplistic way, we may in fact misunderstand an incident we are involved in, and engage in dangerous decision-making. Although not all of the information available to us, when we are targeted by a violent criminal(s), is weighted evenly, it is worth taking the time to try to understand some of the lessor factors and components behind such crimes, so that we are better able to deal with them if we find ourselves involved in such incidents.

It is worth noting that criminals choose the activities they engage in – they rarely find themselves committing crimes without engaging in some thought process, beforehand. There is a reason why a mugger chooses robbery, and a burglar engages in break-ins, etc. In some cases, it could be that a peer in their neighborhood introduces them to a particular type of crime, such as having them play a role in a mugging e.g. be a lookout, a decoy, etc., and as they gain more experience, start initiating crimes of their own. However, even in such cases where they are exposed to one form of criminal activity, it is likely that they will compare others, to see if they would be better suited to something else, such as burglary or auto-theft, and their decision-making process gives us a clue as to their personality, which in turn can help us understand a little about the individuals we may have to deal with.

A mugger doesn’t get much out of each incident, due to the fact that most people don’t carry a lot of cash – unless of course they are targeting individuals in districts where there are check-cashing shops, etc., or in neighborhoods where individuals are likely to favor cash over credit/debit cards e.g. low income areas, where individuals have bad credit ratings and are unable to get cards, or are charged at such high rates of interest that they prefer to deal in cash – in such instances a mugger may, every now and again, enjoy a large payout. A burglar, who breaks-in to a property, ultimately gets a greater financial reward, however it takes time to turn the goods they have stolen into cash. Muggers generally don’t want to have to take the time or the effort, to see a profit from their crime, they want their reward immediately. They may also not be “plugged into” a criminal fraternity, where they would have access to a fence who could facilitate such transactions, and/or they may not want to engage in negotiations that could see them get conned out of the true value of the goods they’ve procured. When we start to understand these things, we can start to build a “common profile” of a mugger that helps us to understand who we are dealing with, e.g. they’re unable to delay gratification (they need/want the rewards of their crime immediately), they aren’t deemed significant by other criminals, and they want the full reward of their crimes, without negotiating with others, etc. Basically, they are insecure, volatile individuals, who want what they want, now.

In any violent crime, there are always secondary motivators. Three common ones that are present in all violent crime are: anger, power, and control. If we understand that muggers are generally on the lower social strata of both society at large, as well as the criminal underworld, we can recognize that such individuals have little power and control over their own lives, and will have a certain level of resentment and anger to those they target. Crime affords them the opportunity to dispense anger, as well as enjoy a sense of power as they exert control over their victims. Muggers will talk about targeting people who they believe think a lot of themselves, Black South African car-jackers have talked about selecting white drivers who put the central locking on when they see a black person, and of enjoying the power/control they had when making a rich white driver acquiesce to their demands, etc. When we understand that a mugging, wherever it takes place, involves these three variables, it becomes clear that our best bet of surviving such altercations is to acquiesce to a mugger’s demands – and to follow them to the letter e.g. if we are asked for our wallet, we should not to throw it away from us onto the floor, etc. As hard as it may be on our egos, our safest route out of the incident involves us letting our aggressor have a degree of power and control over us. This is not to say we should comply with a demand that targets us, rather than our resources. If a mugger goes off-script i.e. they stop behaving like a mugger (only wanting our possessions), then we should offer resistance e.g. once we have handed over what they asked for, if they don’t exit the situation but remain, we will need to enact a physical solution.

All criminals enjoy a sense of entitlement. Muggers, Burglars and Car-Jackers are able to easily justify their criminal activities. In a rational moment, they may acknowledge the immorality of what they do, however they will soon be able to excuse their behaviors and actions, so as to commit their next crime; their conscience is fluid and temporary. If you believe that in a mugging incident, you are dealing with a person who has a conscience, think again – if you don’t hand over your wallet, expect to be cut, shot, etc. In the mugger’s mind, it will be your fault for not complying, and you – not them - will be paying the cost for not handing over your wallet, IPhone or laptop, etc. - which they will then take from you. Whatever happens, in their mind, they are leaving the scene with whatever they came for.

Although muggings are usually over in a matter of seconds, it is worth understanding how the person you are dealing with got to this place in their life; the thought processes they went through, and the decisions they came to. If you were desperate for cash, and had to engage in a criminal activity, which one would you choose? Would you be a mugger, a burglar, a shoplifter? Think about those things that would deter you from engaging in certain crimes – could you justify robbing a bank or stealing from a shop, because no individual directly loses out, whereas robbing an individual deprives them of resources, etc? A mugger, to a greater or lesser extent, will have engaged in these same thought processes, and decided that robbing people with a weapon suits them best. Think about this for a moment. The typical burglar hopes that they’re not disturbed, that they won’t have to confront somebody, and that they won’t have to cause harm to someone; a mugger knows that their crime involves confrontation and the possibility of causing serious harm – they’ve reconciled that. This is why compliance to a demand for your resources is favored, as you don’t want to engage in a power struggle with someone who is prepared and comfortable with using this level of violence.  

The good news is that most criminals are lazy individuals who don’t want to put much effort into anything, including their crimes, and this means we don’t have to do much to avoid encountering them; we just have to do more than those around us. If we do end up interacting with them, we should be well aware of the personality type and profile of the person we are dealing with, and behave in an appropriate manner.