Crime, Culture and the Media


Book Description

Why are newspapers and television programs filled with stories about crime and criminals? Is their portrayal of crime accurate? How do the media transform our attitudes to crime? Is fear of crime, for example, really created by the media? The book introduces the different ways in which relationships between crime and the media have been understood, including classic debates about the media's effects, news production, and moral panics, as well as more cutting-edge studies of the representation of crime in the contemporary media.




The City That Became Safe


Book Description

Discusses many of the ways that New York City dropped its crime rate between the years of 1991 and 2000.




Studies in Crime


Book Description

The study of forensic evidence using archaeology is a new discipline which has rapidly gained importance, not only in archaeological studies but also in the investigation of real crimes. Archaeological evidence is increasingly presented in criminal cases and has helped to secure a number of convictions. Studies in Crime surveys methods of searching for and locating buried remains, their practical recovery, the decay of human and associated death scene materials, the analysis and identification of human remains including the use of DNA, and dating the time of death. The book contains essential information for forensic scientists, archaeologists, police officers, police surgeons, pathologists and lawyers. Studies in Crime will also be of interest to members of the public interested in the investigation of death by unnatural causes, both ancient and modern.




Crime and Media Studies


Book Description

"Crime and Media Studies concisely and efficiently pulls the curtain back on the reality of crime and punishment and the role media has played in the United States becoming the world's leader in incarceration. By addressing literacy rates that have remained virtually unchanged since 1935, the stark ramifications of the communication disconnect between those who study key issues and the ordinary citizen is explored. Crime and Media Studies calls for the dismantling of ideological divides between qualitative and quantitative researchers in favor of a united multidisciplinary front to create an informed citizenry. Divided into the key parts of the criminal justice system (crime, law enforcement, courts, corrections, etc.), the text explores prominent issues (drugs, domestic violence, race, gender, etc.) facing the criminal justice system. Each section contains crime and media research articles that analyze a variety of media (print news, broadcast news, movies, court TV, crime dramas, comic books, hip-hop, etc.) using quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methodologies. In the tradition of Gregg Barak's ""News Making Criminology,"" each section contains discussion questions (designed for traditional and online classrooms), writing assignments (blog posts, press releases), literacy level exercises, brownbag sessions, and community engagement projects to help students understand the importance of being able to effectively communicate both with the press and the public. Crime and Media Studies is well suited for undergraduate and graduate courses in the social sciences that seek to address the role of media in policy and legal issues. The text, its test questions, discussion sessions, and writing assignments are designed to be used in both traditional and online classrooms. Franklin T. Wilson is an associate professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Indiana State University. He received his Ph.D. from the College of Criminal Justice at Sam Houston State University and has taught crime and media studies courses for over a decade. Dr. Wilson is the founding and current chair of the Annual International Crime, Media, and Popular Culture Studies Conference and is the editor of the Journal of Criminal Justice and Popular Culture. He is also a member of the Board of Directors for CRIMCAST. His research has been published in such noted journals as The Prison Journal, Journal of Criminal Justice and Popular Culture, Race & Justice, and Women & Criminal Justice. Dr. Wilson's research has also been featured in a variety of media outlets including the New York Times, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Houston Chronicle, and Texas Tribune. "




Doing Research on Crime and Justice


Book Description

Focusing on the problems that novice researchers encounter when translating neat and tidy textbook methodologies into real life situations, this guide explains how to undertake research in the fields of criminology and criminal justice.




The Great American Crime Decline


Book Description

Many theories--from the routine to the bizarre--have been offered up to explain the crime decline of the 1990s. Was it record levels of imprisonment? An abatement of the crack cocaine epidemic? More police using better tactics? Or even the effects of legalized abortion? And what can we expect from crime rates in the future? Franklin E. Zimring here takes on the experts, and counters with the first in-depth portrait of the decline and its true significance. The major lesson from the 1990s is that relatively superficial changes in the character of urban life can be associated with up to 75% drops in the crime rate. Crime can drop even if there is no major change in the population, the economy or the schools. Offering the most reliable data available, Zimring documents the decline as the longest and largest since World War II. It ranges across both violent and non-violent offenses, all regions, and every demographic. All Americans, whether they live in cities or suburbs, whether rich or poor, are safer today. Casting a critical and unerring eye on current explanations, this book demonstrates that both long-standing theories of crime prevention and recently generated theories fall far short of explaining the 1990s drop. A careful study of Canadian crime trends reveals that imprisonment and economic factors may not have played the role in the U.S. crime drop that many have suggested. There was no magic bullet but instead a combination of factors working in concert rather than a single cause that produced the decline. Further--and happily for future progress, it is clear that declines in the crime rate do not require fundamental social or structural changes. Smaller shifts in policy can make large differences. The significant reductions in crime rates, especially in New York, where crime dropped twice the national average, suggests that there is room for other cities to repeat this astounding success. In this definitive look at the great American crime decline, Franklin E. Zimring finds no pat answers but evidence that even lower crime rates might be in store.




Contesting Crime Science


Book Description

"In this eye-opening critique, Ronald Kramer and James C. Oleson interrogate the promises of crime science and target our misplaced faith in technology as the solution to criminality. This book deconstructs crime science's most prominent manifestations--biological, actuarial, security, and environmental sciences. Rather than holding the technological keys to crime's resolution, crime sciences inscribe criminality on particular bodies and constitute a primary resource for the conceptualizations of crime that many societies take for granted. Crime science may strive to reduce crime, but in doing so, it reproduces power asymmetries, creates profit motives, undermines important legal concepts, instantiates questionable practices, and forces open new vistas of deviant activity"--




Developments in Crime and Crime Control Research


Book Description

"One of the central features of modern German criminology in revealing the 'true nature of crime' follows the tradition of enlightment" instead of accommodating the approach of the criminal justice system. This contention is made by the editors of Developments in Crime and Crime Control Research, Drs. Sessar and Kerner, as they continue to bridge the traditional gap between Anglo-American scholars in criminology and their German counterparts. The language barrier has long been another contributing circumstance to the division of philosophy among countries, but recently, substantial attempts are being undertaken to examine more closely the differences among specific criminological schools of thinking. Drs. Sessar and Kerner point out that, although crime has its universality, a clear understanding of the various approaches to the problem of crime will prove of benefit to those in the field in all countries.




Routledge International Handbook of Crime and Gender Studies


Book Description

Criminological research has historically been based on the study of men, boys and crime. As a result, the criminal justice system’s development of policies, programs, and treatment regimes was based on the male offender. It was not until the 1970s that some criminologists began to draw attention to the neglect of gender in the study of crime, but today, the study of gender and crime is burgeoning within criminology and includes a vast literature. The Routledge International Handbook of Crime and Gender Studies is a collection of original, cutting-edge, multidisciplinary essays which provide a thorough overview of the history and development of research on gender and crime, covering topics based around: theoretical and methodological approaches gender and victimization gender and offending gendered work in the criminal justice system future directions in gender and crime research. Alongside these essays are boxes which highlight particularly innovative ideas or controversial topics – such as cybercrime, restorative justice, campus crime, and media depictions. A second set of boxes features leading gender and crime researchers who reflect on what sparked their interest in the subject. This engaging and thoughtful collection will be invaluable for students and scholars of criminology, sociology, psychology, public health, social work, cultural studies, media studies, economics and political science.




Deterrence and Crime Prevention


Book Description

Deterrence is at the heart of the preventive aspiration of criminal justice. Deterrence, whether through preventive patrol by police officers or stiff prison sentences for violent offenders, is the principal mechanism through which the central feature of criminal justice, the exercise of state authority, works – it is hoped -- to diminish offending and enhance public safety. And however well we think deterrence works, it clearly often does not work nearly as well as we would like – and often at very great cost. Drawing on a wide range of scholarly literatures and real-world experience, Kennedy argues that we should reframe the ways in which we think about and produce deterrence. He argues that many of the ways in which we seek to deter crime in fact facilitate offending; that simple steps such as providing clear information to offenders could transform deterrence; that communities may be far more effective than legal authorities in deterring crime; that apparently minor sanctions can deter more effectively than draconian ones; that groups, rather than individual offenders, should often be the focus of deterrence; that existing legal tools can be used in unusual but greatly more effective ways; that even serious offenders can be reached through deliberate moral engagement; and that authorities, communities, and offenders – no matter how divided – share and can occupy hidden common ground. The result is a sophisticated but ultimately common-sense and profoundly hopeful case that we can and should use new deterrence strategies to address some of our most important crime problems. Drawing on and expanding on the lessons of groundbreaking real-world work like Boston’s Operation Ceasefire – credited with the "Boston Miracle" of the 1990s – "Deterrence and Crime Prevention" is required reading for scholars, law enforcement practitioners, and all with an interest in public safety and the health of communities.