Plenum Series in Crime and Justice – serie

In this timely volume, the authors provide a penetrating analysis of the institutional mechanisms perpetuating the related problems of minorities' disenfranchisement and their underrepresentation on juries.

This book evolved from our interest in rape as feminists and as sodal sdentists. As feminists, we were concemed about the treatment of rape victims and the attrition in rape cases under traditional rape law, and we welcomed legal reforms designed to improve the situation. As sodal sdentists, we wondered about the efficacy of legal changes aimed at an inherently resistant court system. We also were curious about the lack of studies examining the impact of these changes; we were particularly surprised to find that no one had attempted to ana­ lyze the impact of the reforms in more than one jurisdiction. Con­ vinced that untangling the effects of the reforms from the effects of contextual factors required a multijurisdictional study, we deeided to undertake the project. We quickly discovered that evaluating rape law reform in several jurisdictions would be no easy task. We had deeided that such an evaluation would require monthly data on the outcome of rape cases before and after the reforms were implemented, as weIl as qualitative data on the attitudes of criminal justice officials toward the reforms. Because states do not generate monthly data on case outcomes, we would have to collect the data ourse1ves from court records main­ tained by individual jurisdictions. To obtain an adequate number of cases for the time-series analysis, we would have to select our sites from large urban jurisdictions scattered throughout the United States.

There is nothing uglier than a catfish. With its scaleless, eel-like body, flat, semicircular head, and cartilaginous whiskers, it looks almost entirely unlike a cat. The toothless, sluggish beasts can be found on the bottom of warm streams and lakes, living on scum and detritus. Such a diet is healthier than it sounds: divers in the Ohio River regularly report sighting catfish the size of small whales, and cats in the Mekong River in Southeast Asia often weigh nearly 700 pounds. Ugly or not, the catfish is good to eat. Deep-fried catfish is a Southern staple; more ambitious recipes add Parmesan cheese, bacon drippings and papri­ ka, or Amontillado. Catfish is also good for you. One pound of channel catfish provides nearly all the protein but only half the calories and fat of 1 pound of solid white albacore tuna. Catfish is a particularly good source of alpha­ tocopherol and B vitamins. Because they are both nutritious and tasty, cats are America's biggest aquaculture product.

Reflecting a diversity of thought and intellectual power, this unique volume provides undergraduate students with an important historical context and demonstrates the continuity of many issues in the fields of criminology and criminal justice. Commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the American Society of Criminology, this volume contains previously published articles by the society's president-many of whom are the leading thinkers in the field. Articles examine the philosophy of punishment, policing, the politics of crime and crime control, criminological theory, drug use, white-collar crime, female crime, the study of deviance, parole, prediction studies, and criminal justice policy.

It takes courage to do research on crime and delinquency. Such ideas belittle the contributions of past research and leave us vulnerable to theories, programs, policies, and research agendas that may have only tenuous connections to research of any kind.

The past quarter-century has witnessed a dramatic upsurge of violent crime. This handbook systematically and comprehensively examines the most current psychological approaches with violent criminal offenders. An internationally recognized group of contributors addresses such topics as the major theoretical perspectives on violent crime, violence committed by children and youth, homicide, sexual deviance and assault, and family violence.

When approached by Plenum to put together a volume of social science research on the topic of "youth and justice," I found the interdisciplinary challenge of such a project intriguing. Having spent 2 years as Director of the Law and Social Science Program at the National Science Foundation, I was well aware of the rich diversity of research that could fit within that topic. I also knew that excellent research on youth and justice was coming from different communities of researchers who often were isolated from each other in their respective disciplines as psychologists, sociologists, criminologists, or policy analysts. I saw this project as an opportunity to break down some of this isolation by introducing these researchers-and their work-to each other and to the broader community of social scientists interested in law and justice. There was another gap, or set of gaps, to be bridged as well. The juvenile justice system and the criminal justice system differ in significant ways, and the civil justice system, which is a major venue for issues of youth and justice, is yet another separate world. Few researchers are likely to know the whole picture. For example, a focus on juvenile justice often ignores the extent to which civil justice proceedings shape the lives of young people through divorce, custody, adoption, family preservation policies, and other actions (and vice versa).

There is nothing uglier than a catfish. With its scaleless, eel-like body, flat, semicircular head, and cartilaginous whiskers, it looks almost entirely unlike a cat. The toothless, sluggish beasts can be found on the bottom of warm streams and lakes, living on scum and detritus. Such a diet is healthier than it sounds: divers in the Ohio River regularly report sighting catfish the size of small whales, and cats in the Mekong River in Southeast Asia often weigh nearly 700 pounds. Ugly or not, the catfish is good to eat. Deep-fried catfish is a Southern staple; more ambitious recipes add Parmesan cheese, bacon drippings and papri­ ka, or Amontillado. Catfish is also good for you. One pound of channel catfish provides nearly all the protein but only half the calories and fat of 1 pound of solid white albacore tuna. Catfish is a particularly good source of alpha­ tocopherol and B vitamins. Because they are both nutritious and tasty, cats are America's biggest aquaculture product.

When approached by Plenum to put together a volume of social science research on the topic of "youth and justice," I found the interdisciplinary challenge of such a project intriguing. Having spent 2 years as Director of the Law and Social Science Program at the National Science Foundation, I was well aware of the rich diversity of research that could fit within that topic. I also knew that excellent research on youth and justice was coming from different communities of researchers who often were isolated from each other in their respective disciplines as psychologists, sociologists, criminologists, or policy analysts. I saw this project as an opportunity to break down some of this isolation by introducing these researchers-and their work-to each other and to the broader community of social scientists interested in law and justice. There was another gap, or set of gaps, to be bridged as well. The juvenile justice system and the criminal justice system differ in significant ways, and the civil justice system, which is a major venue for issues of youth and justice, is yet another separate world. Few researchers are likely to know the whole picture. For example, a focus on juvenile justice often ignores the extent to which civil justice proceedings shape the lives of young people through divorce, custody, adoption, family preservation policies, and other actions (and vice versa).

In this enlightening study, the authors implement a unique research approach to offer a greater understanding of policy reform of pretrial release and detention practices in the criminal courts in Boston, Miami, and Phoenix.

The past quarter-century has witnessed a dramatic upsurge of violent crime in the United States and abroad. In this country, the rise in violent criminal activity has been consistently documented in such published accounts as the Uniform Crime Reports and the Statistical Handbook on Violence in America, published by the FBI and the Vio­ lence Research Group, respectively. Further, social scientists-particularly those working in the fields of sociology and psychology-have provided a convergence of findings attesting to the magnitude of one of today's most significant social problems: domestic violence (e. g. , spouse, child, and elder abuse). Such efforts have served as the impetus for heightened clinical and investigative activity in the area of violent be­ havior. Indeed, a wide range of mental health experts (such as psychologists, psychi­ atrists, social workers, counselors, and rehabilitation specialists) have endeavored to focus on strategies and issues in research and treatment for violent individuals and their victims. The purpose of this book is to provide a comprehensive and timely examination of current psychological approaches with violent criminal offenders. Despite the fact that we continue to have much to learn about perpetrators of violent acts, in recent an increasingly large body of empirical data have been adduced about this years issue. However, these data generally have appeared in disparate journals and books. That being the case, it is our belief that such a handbook now is warranted.

Delinquency in a Birth Cohort, published in 1972, was the first criminologi­ cal birth cohort study in the United States. Nils Christie, in Unge norske lovorertredere, had done the first such study as his dissertation at the University of Oslo in 1960. Professor Thorsten Sellin was the inspiration for the U.S. study. He could read Norwegian, and I could a little because I studied at the University of Oslo in my graduate years. Our interest in pursuing a birth cohort study in the United States was fostered by the encouragement of Saleem Shah who awarded us a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health to begin our birth cohort studies at the University of Pennsylvania by investigating the delinquency of the 1945 cohort. We studied this group of 9,945 boys extensively through official criminal history and school records of their juvenile years. Subsequently, we followed up the cohort as adults using both adult arrest histories and an interview of a sample of the cohort. Our follow-up study was published as From Boy to Man, From Delinquen­ cy to Crime in 1987.

Reflecting a diversity of thought and intellectual power, this unique volume provides undergraduate students with an important historical context and demonstrates the continuity of many issues in the fields of criminology and criminal justice. Commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the American Society of Criminology, this volume contains previously published articles by the society's president-many of whom are the leading thinkers in the field. Articles examine the philosophy of punishment, policing, the politics of crime and crime control, criminological theory, drug use, white-collar crime, female crime, the study of deviance, parole, prediction studies, and criminal justice policy.

It takes courage to do research on crime and delinquency. Such research is typically conducted in an atmosphere of concern about the problem it addresses and is typically justified as an attempt to discover new facts or to evaluate innovative programs or policies. When, as must often be the case, no new facts are forthcoming or innovative programs turn out not to work, hopes are dashed and time and money are felt to have been wasted. Because they take more time, longitudinal studies require even greater amounts of courage. If the potential for discovery is enhanced, so is the risk of wasted effort. Long-term longitudinal studies are thought to be especially risky for other reasons as well. Theories, issues, and sta­ tistical methods in vogue at the time they were planned may not be in vogue when they are finally executed. Perhaps worse, according to some perspectives, the structure of causal factors may shift during the execu­ tion of a longitudinal project such that in the end its findings apply to a reality that no longer exists. These fears and expectations assume an ever-changing world and a corresponding conception of research as a more or less disciplined search for news. Such ideas belittle the contributions of past research and leave us vulnerable to theories, programs, policies, and research agendas that may have only tenuous connections to research of any kind.

This book evolved from our interest in rape as feminists and as sodal sdentists. As feminists, we were concemed about the treatment of rape victims and the attrition in rape cases under traditional rape law, and we welcomed legal reforms designed to improve the situation. As sodal sdentists, we wondered about the efficacy of legal changes aimed at an inherently resistant court system. We also were curious about the lack of studies examining the impact of these changes; we were particularly surprised to find that no one had attempted to ana­ lyze the impact of the reforms in more than one jurisdiction. Con­ vinced that untangling the effects of the reforms from the effects of contextual factors required a multijurisdictional study, we deeided to undertake the project. We quickly discovered that evaluating rape law reform in several jurisdictions would be no easy task. We had deeided that such an evaluation would require monthly data on the outcome of rape cases before and after the reforms were implemented, as weIl as qualitative data on the attitudes of criminal justice officials toward the reforms. Because states do not generate monthly data on case outcomes, we would have to collect the data ourse1ves from court records main­ tained by individual jurisdictions. To obtain an adequate number of cases for the time-series analysis, we would have to select our sites from large urban jurisdictions scattered throughout the United States.