Abstract

The analysis of unreported crimes in Umbria was the object of a research carried out in 2016 by the Law and Society team of the Law Department of the University of Perugia, funded by Regione Umbria and summarized in this paper. A qualitative approach was adopted. The research highlights an already well recorded fact: the level of moral panic expressed by thoseinterviewed (shop-owners, students and the elderly) neither corresponds to the evidence emerging from official data, nor from interviews conducted with expert informants (i.e. municipal police officers). Rather, the most significant scarcely reported illegalities have to do with illegal labour, discrimination against foreigners, and gender violence, whereas the comparatively low level of social alarm regarding crimes such as usury and extortion is in contrast with the increase of the number of complaints in the last 3 years, and the interview given by the President of the Anti-usury Foundation in Umbria.