The criminal courts confront a double bind with regard to victims. On the one hand, victims are valued for the cases they bring to the system; their misfortunes become the raw material of the court process. On the other hand, individual victims represent a potential source of irrationality in the process. The personal and often emotional involvement of victims in the crime experience can generate particular demands for case outcomes that have little to do with the public interest. Members of the courtroom work group know that the same individual may, at different times, be: