CCJS105 Final Review Defining Crime Criminology scientific discipline that studies crime criminal behavior closely linked to sociology but interdisciplinary o Definition of criminality o Forms of criminal behavior and what explanations they correspond to o Causes of crime o Societal reaction how we deal with people who break the law Theory wide question for why crime happens why people engage in criminal Methodology technique set of methods used to answer wide questions collect behaviors data to test explanations Definitions of Crime o Crime Prohibited by law A criminal act took place actus reus Social harm injury to the state or people Guilty mind or intent mens rea Decision or act must be causally linked to harm ex speeding Concurrence Actus Reus and Mens Rea match criminal meant to Commission rape murder Omission doctors refusing to take care of patients you knowing about terrorist plots and fail to let officials know Felonies offenses punishable by a year or more in prison Misdemeanors less serious offenses punished by less than a year drugs do it in jail Violations usually punished by small fines Relativity of Crime time o Not all people or cultures view the same behavior as criminal at the same o Time behavior at one time in violation of legal codes may later be decriminalized or be acceptable then later be criminalized o Space What is defined as crime may differ from one country to another or between locations within a specific country Consensus vs Conflict o Conflict members of higher class are said to make laws o Consensus laws are made to equally represent the entire society Mala in se some behaviors are prohibited by criminal law because everyone agrees they are bad ex murder rape Mala prohibita Behaviors are criminalized but we don t all agree they should be speeding underaged drinking smoking Criminal Justice concerned with societal and particularly official reactions to o Rely on the knowledge of patterns of crime and criminal behaviors Criminal Justice System crime and criminals methodology Goals o Deterrence dissuade people from committing crime in the future o Incapacitation stop people from committing crime again by capturing them and putting them in jail o Retribution you broke the law you pay for it Process o Police courts corrections o 1 in 100 are put behind bars o 1 in 31 under corrections Measuring Crime Uniform Crime Reports UCR official data o Published by the FBI o Data from the police departments voluntary but 95 of population is covered o Primary source of crime rates for the media or criminal agencies o Hierarchical Rule only consider most serious crime if commit 2 times then the most serious crime is reported o Part 1 crimes index Believed to be serious to occur frequently and have a greater likelihood of being reported to the police Criminal homicide forcible rape robbery aggravated assault burglary larceny theft motor vehicle theft arson Violent crimes top 4 property crimes bottom 4 o Part 2 Crimes non index reported to the FBI o Strengths redundancy possible o Limitations Less serious not used to calculate the crime rate only arrest data Simple assault embezzlement vandalism disorderly conduct DUI Collaboration between the relevant agencies minimizes Offers nationwide crime statistics city and regional comparisons Has been collected since 1930 crime trends analysis possible Not all crimes reported Emphasizes conventional street crimes and excludes other serious crime Most crimes captured by index crimes Vulnerable to changes in reporting recording Vulnerable to political manipulations National Incident Based Reporting System NIBRS victimization data o Strengths More comprehensive incident based statistics o Location time presence of weapon attempted vs completed o Limitations Adoption slow covers only 20 of the nations population National Crime Victimization Surveys NCVS participant observation o Survey of approximately 40 000 70 000 households o Collected by the US Census Bureau for the Bureau of Justice Statistics o Uncover dark figure of crime o Strengths Allows measure of victimless crimes and crimes not reported to the police The researcher studies a group through direct observation and various levels of involvement Great source of qualitative data o Weaknesses Hard to survey adult population Mistaken or dishonest report Difficulty in gaining access Potential ethical legal dilemmas Time consuming Triangulation o Every method has both strengths and weaknesses o Whenever possible researches use more than one method to obtain data o Methods are combined so that the strengths of one method overcome the weaknesses of another Dark Figure of Crime crime not reported to the police Generalizability inferences possible beyond individual or place studied Validity Accuracy of measurement Reliability consistency and or stability of measurement Causality correlation between the variables Experiments o Two groups Control and experimental o Randomly assign people to the two groups o Treat the experimental group by manipulating the IV o Compare the DV differences in the experimental and control groups o Ineffective through experiments DARE Macro used to explain group level behavior Micro used to explain individual behavior Longitudinal Researching method that gets information from more than one point Cross Sectional Researching method that gets information from one point What does Crime look like Prevalance of Crime o UCR over 10 million index crimes recorded in 2010 11 million arrests made for part II crimes in 2010 12 of UCR index crimes were violent offenses o NCVS approximately 20 million criminal victimizations in 2007 Violent Crimes 22 Property Crimes 78 Victimization rates higher than those reported by the UCR Geographic distribution o Violence South UCR and West and Midwest NCVS o Violence Higher in Urban areas UCR NCVS Crime Trends o Changes over time in the levels and patterns of crime o Murder and Robbery well defined well measured well reported o More crime in July August December at night and weekends Age o Property crime tends to peak earlier age 16 than violent crime 18 o Crime commission declines with age white collar crime exemption o Conundrum most adult offenders had been juvenile offenders but most juvenile offenders do not go on to become adult offenders o Age crime curve arrests at each age divided by the population of that age o of all arrests are those 25 or younger o Juveniles are 8 of population but account for 20 index crimes 14
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