As a matter of fact, no specific definition of victim is provided by domestic law. This is considered too general and vague a concept, which is why more technical wording is preferred whereby reference is occasionally made to "injured person" (i.e. the holder of the legal interest that is protected by the criminal law provision) or "harmed party" (i.e. the person that was harmed, which need not be the same as the injured person - e.g. in murder cases, the person injured by the criminal offence is the deceased, whilst the harmed parties are his/her family members, including the partner, who were harmed both psychologically and in pecuniary terms), or else "party claiming damages", i.e. a harmed party who has decided to file a claim for damages in a trial (for additional details, see P. Tonini, Manuale di procedura penale, Giuffrè, 2003, p. 137 et seq.).
Conversely, recent international instruments have turned to less scientific, though more common, wording - the word "victim" is mentioned in several such instruments where it has replaced, by and large, legal wording that is technically more accurate. Under Article 1 of the Framework Decision of the Council of the EU dated 15 March 2001 (Framework Decision no. 2001/220/JHA as published in the Official Journal of the EC of 22 March 2001, no. L 82/1), victim means ?a natural person who has suffered harm, including physical or mental injury, emotional suffering or economic loss, directly caused by acts or omissions that are in violation of the criminal law of a Member State". Additionally, an "expanded" concept of victim is commonly received by legal scholars, whereby a victim is the holder of the legally protected good, be it an individual or a community, that is affected by the offence directly or indirectly and experiences suffering or pain as a consequence. Accordingly, this definition applies both to primary and to secondary victims - more specific considerations on these two categories of victim can be found in G. Mannozzi, La giustizia senza spada, Giuffrè 2003, p. 48 et seq.
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