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Violence Against Women in the US: Theory, Research and Policy
By Maddy Coy. 2024
Analyzing what is known about violence against women, this book centers on the contrast between the U.S.’s historic focus on…
a criminal legal framework and the human rights lens used globally by feminist activists.Distilling the existing evidence base and literature on violence against women in the United States, this book includes an overview of forms of violence, the prevalence of violence, contexts in which violence occurs, and debates about intervention and prevention. It engages with how human rights frameworks define violence against women as a cause and consequence of women’s inequality, and explores how race, ethnicity, class, citizenship status, and sexual orientation shape experiences of victimization, perpetration, and institutional responses. Chapters synthesize prevalence methods and data, key feminist concepts, impacts and aftermath of violence, what is known about perpetrators, the history of anti-violence activism, violence against women on college campuses and in the media, and how the criminal legal systems respond. Contested issues, such as prostitution and pornography, and the extent to which commercial sex can be understood as a form of, and/or context for, violence against women, are also explored. The book closes with a final chapter offering directions for adopting a human rights approach to ending violence against women in the United States.By offering an analysis of how violence against women has come to be named in activist, policy, and academic arenas, Violence Against Women in the US is an essential resource for students, scholars, and practitioners.Excessive Punishment: How the Justice System Creates Mass Incarceration
By Lauren-Brooke Eisen. 2024
The United States has by far the world’s largest population of incarcerated people. More than a million Americans are imprisoned;…
hundreds of thousands more are held in jails. This vast system has doled out punishment—particularly to people from marginalized groups—on an unfathomable scale. At the same time, it has manifestly failed to secure public safety, instead perpetuating inequalities and recidivism. Why does the United States see punishment as the main response to social harm, and what are the alternatives?This book brings together essays by scholars, practitioners, activists, and writers, including incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people, to explore the harms of this punitive approach. The chapters address a range of issues, from policing to prosecution, and from how people are treated in prison to the consequences of a criminal conviction. Together, they consider a common theme: We cannot reduce our dependence on mass incarceration until we confront our impulse to punish in ways that are excessive, often wildly disproportionate to the harm caused. Essays trace how a maze of local, state, and federal agencies have contributed to mass incarceration and deterred attempts at reform. They shed light on how the excesses of America’s criminal legal system are entwined with poverty, racism, and the legacy of slavery. A wide-ranging and powerful look at the failures of the status quo, Excessive Punishment also considers how to reimagine the justice system to support restoration instead of retribution.Bluecoated Terror: Jim Crow New Orleans and the Roots of Modern Police Brutality
By Jeffrey S. Adler. 2024
A searing chronicle of how racist violence became an ingrained facet of law enforcement in the United States. Too often,…
scholars and pundits argue either that police violence against African Americans has remained unchanged since the era of slavery or that it is a recent phenomenon and disconnected from the past. Neither view is accurate. In Bluecoated Terror, Jeffrey S. Adler draws on rich archival accounts to show, in narrative detail, how racialized police brutality is part of a larger system of state oppression with roots in the early twentieth-century South, particularly New Orleans. Wide racial differentials in the use of lethal force and beatings during arrest and interrogation emerged in the 1930s and 1940s. Adler explains how race control and crime control blended and blurred during this era, when police officers and criminal justice officials began to justify systemic violence against Black people as a crucial—and legal—tool for maintaining law and order. Bluecoated Terror explores both the rise of these law-enforcement trends and their chilling resilience, providing critical context for recent horrific police abuses as the ghost of Jim Crow law enforcement continues to haunt the nation.Shackled: A Tale of Wronged Kids, Rogue Judges, and a Town that Looked Away
By Candy J. Cooper. 2024
Here is the explosive story of the Kids for Cash scandal in Pennsylvania, a judicial justice miscarriage that sent more…
than 2,500 children and teens to a for-profit detention center while two judges lined their pockets with cash, as told by Candy J. Cooper, an award-winning journalist and Pulitzer Prize finalist.In the early 2000s, Judge Mark Ciavarella and Judge Michael Conahan of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania were known as no-nonsense judges. Juveniles who showed up in their courtrooms faced harsh words and even harsher sentencing. In the post-Columbine era, many people believed that was just what the county needed to ensure its children and teens stayed on the straight and narrow path. But as more and more children faced shocking sentences for seemingly benign crimes, and a newly built for-profit detention center filled up further and further, a sinister pattern of abuses and bribery emerged. Through extensive research and original reporting leading into contemporary times, award-winning journalist Candy J. Cooper tells the story of a scandal that the Juvenile Law Center calls &“one of the largest and most serious violations of children&’s rights in the history of the American legal system.&”Star-Crossed Killers
By Robert Scott. 2014
"An excellent writer." —True Crime Book ReviewsAnything For Love When nineteen-year-old Steven "Boston" Colver set eyes on beautiful young Tylar…
Witt, the sparks between them could not be denied. It didn't matter that she was only fourteen. The two saw their love written in the stars. All they wanted was to spend every moment in each other's arms. When Tylar's concerned mother, Joanne Witt, tried to come between them, her efforts only fueled the wild passions of two California teens who saw themselves as a modern-day Romeo and Juliet, trapped in a heartless world. Boston and Tylar would prove their love by any means necessary. They would allow no one to stand in their way. And they made a promise to stay together—until death and beyond. . .Praise for Robert Scott and His Real-Life Thrillers"Compelling and shocking. . .a fascinating account of a young girl's abduction by a monster." —Robert K. Tanenbaum on Shattered Innocence"Vividly described, unsettling. . .Scott spells out how rage and obsession can become fatally warped." —Publishers Weekly on Kill the Ones You Love58,000 WordsKill the Ones You Love
By Robert Scott. 2013
Experience the true crime story of a married father and ex-cop with a dark side in this &“fast-paced, unforgettable real-life…
thriller&” (Sue Russell).Family On The RunA handsome, married young father and former deputy sheriff, Gabriel Morris looked like the picture of respectability. When his mother and her boyfriend were found brutally murdered in their pleasant Oregon seaside home, authorities were shocked to find a trail leading to him. Soon, police in several states were caught up in a riveting chase as Gabriel, with family in tow, went on a cross-country crime spree. No one knew if his wife, Jessica, was a victim or accomplice; or if his four-year-old daughter was in jeopardy. In a gracious Virginia suburb, a SWAT team swooped down on the renegade family and ended their wild, dangerous ride. What followed was even more shocking, as the story of how Gabriel Morris ended up on the wrong side of the law took investigators on a dark journey into the heart of a killer . . .Includes sixteen pages of dramatic photos.&“Unsettling. . . . While Scott paints a horrifying murder scene, he also efficiently shows how such monsters are made. . . . Unexpected shocks and disturbing surprises.&” —Publishers WeeklyTransformation During Incarceration: Breaking the System (Innovations in Corrections)
By Deanna Evans. 2024
This book moves beyond rehabilitative strategies in corrections to engage a more holistic understanding of the communal experiences behind prison…
walls. Behavioral deficit models dominate the field of corrections theory: rehabilitation, retribution, deterrence, incapacitation, and restoration. Even humanist conceptions of evolution are described as change, transformation, correction, improvement, a lexicon fixed on a distorted view of humanity. What has not been explored is the resilience and human flourishing despite the systemic injustice and dehumanization of prison.What innovations are possible with a change of perspective and focus on self-identified stories of transformation where transformation is redefined from the lens of self-efficacy and power to change one’s world? Where we rebuild the lexicon from a humanizing philosophy, and our starting point shifts to the inherent goodness of humanity and the potential to evolve beyond limiting narratives and social constructs? Where we empower those with the most to lose through our feeble attempts as outsiders to reform prison paradigms? Where religious narratives of human depravity give way to trauma-informed praxis and neuroscience? Where community and relational equity replace solitary confinement and isolation? Using an indigenous research methodology analyzing memoirs of formerly incarcerated people, the book contextualizes and identifies the role of community and shared emotional connection among incarcerated people.This book is essential for scholars, practitioners, and students concerned with the transformative journey among the incarcerated population and for anyone engaged in higher education in prison or interested in constructive change of the prison system.The Marvelous Ones: Drugs, Gang Violence, and Resistance in East Los Angeles
By Prof. Randol Contreras. 2024
An intimate portrait of LA gang members turning to drugs, nostalgia, and religion as they age and fight to stay…
relevant in a new era. Once celebrated in the gang world as rebels who defied the established prison order, veterano Maravilla gang members now grapple with the consequences of leading violent and drug-ridden lives. At once thrilling and tender, The Marvelous Ones sheds light on how these aging gang members struggle to stay meaningful in the face of addiction, violent trauma, and a rapidly changing East Los Angeles. Randol Contreras spent close to a decade studying the legendary Maravilla gangs of East LA, who made waves in the 1990s for their rebellion against the most powerful prison gang in the United States: the Mexican Mafia, or La Eme. These men granted Contreras unique access to their experiences, revealing how family members shun them, how jail and prison worsen them, how the church and drug treatment redeem them, and how their brightest moments lie in their pasts as legends of the California gang world. The Marvelous Ones gives human faces to the suffering and resilience of some of the most marginalized members of our society.Marked Man: Frank Serpico’s Inside Battle Against Police Corruption
By John Florio, Ouisie Shapiro. 2001
1971. Brooklyn, New York. Undercover cop Frank Serpico is knocking on a drug dealer’s door. His partners are there to…
back him up, but when the door opens, he’s staring down the barrel of a gun—and his partners are nowhere to be found. For more than a century, the New York Police Department had been plagued by corruption, with cops openly taking bribes from gamblers and drug dealers. Not Serpico. He refused to take dirty money and fought to shed light on the dark underbelly of the NYPD. But instead of being hailed as a hero, he became a target for every crooked cop on the force. In Marked Man, John Florio and Ouisie Shapiro bring this true story of police corruption to life. Join Frank Serpico on his one-man crusade to clean up the largest police force in the United States. And discover the price he had to pay for being an honest cop.Indicting the 45th President is a sequel to Criminology on Trump in real time, continuing the criminological investigation into the…
former US president. Developing and expanding on the themes of family dynamics, deviance, deception, dishonesty, and the weaponization of the law, this book offers the next chapter on the world’s most successful outlaw.In this new book, Gregg Barak considers the campaigns and policies, the corruption, the state- organized abuses of power and obstructions of justice, the pardons, the failed insurrection, the prosecutions, the indictment of Trump and the politics of punishment as these revolve around the Trumpian character and social structures that encourage such crimes of the powerful. Barak also thoroughly addresses the threat to American Democracy, critiques the current state of the U.S. constitutional system, and proposes reforms to enhance justice for all in the United States.Another accessible and compelling read, this is essential reading for all those engaged with state and white- collar crime in the context of power and privilege, and those seeking a criminological understanding of Trump’s evasion of law and justice.Making a unique contribution to the scholarship on democratic policing, this book adapts the concept of epistocracy to explore the…
role of knowledge and expertise in police governance and accountability. Analysing the Scottish police governance arrangements following reform in 2013, the book provides a framework for knowledge-based working practices, showing how the principles of democratic policing may be achieved in practice.This book uncovers the influence of racial and prejudicial stereotyping during police investigation of suspects from stigmatised communities. The book…
examines the under-researched aspect of whether and how negative stereotypes appear to influence the police interviews, investigative decision-making, and outcomes of criminal investigations when officers investigate individuals from stigmatised communities as suspects of crime.In the United Kingdom, the United States, and Europe, the war on terror has been argued to impact adversely on existing race relations policies in the aftermath of terrorist activity in both the United States and Europe. Recent research has suggested that changes in legislation and counterterrorism measures have contributed to the construction and reinforcement of the Muslim community as a suspect, which, in turn, may result in police bias and prejudice towards members of Muslim communities. Based on novel and groundbreaking research studies, the author examines whether such police bias could influence the police investigation and interviewing processes concerning individuals from the suspect community as well as the outcome of a criminal investigation.The author introduces the Minhas Investigative Interviewing Prejudicial Stereotyping Scale (MIIPSS), an instrument developed and used to assess the level of police interviewers’ racial and prejudicial stereotyping towards suspects from stigmatised groups, and maintains that its use would serve to minimise the influence of racial and prejudicial stereotypes on investigation. It is further suggested that the training of police officers on the implications of such prejudicial (racial/ religious) stereotyping is essential to improving interviewing performance, case outcomes, and community cohesion.This book will benefit academics, researchers, police officers, lawyers, social policy officers, and probation officers across the globe.Women And The Criminal Justice System
By Katherine Van Wormer, Clemens Bartollas. 2014
An empowerment approach to women in the criminal justice system. Women and the Criminal Justice System, Fourth Edition, presents an…
up-to-date analysis of women as victims of crime, as offenders, and as professionals in the justice system. The text features an empowerment approach is unified by underlying themes of the intersection of gender, race, and class; and evidence-based research. Personal narratives highlight the information provided to help students connect the text material with real-life situations. An emphasis on critical thinking teaches students to look beyond media hype concerning female offenders to study the real stories behind women affected by and working in the justice system.Understanding Victimology: An Active-Learning Approach
By Shelly Clevenger, Jordana N. Navarro, Catherine D. Marcum, George E. Higgins. 2024
Understanding Victimology: An Active Learning Approach is the only textbook with extensive discussion of both online and offline victimization reinforced…
by group and individual learning activities. Our textbook offers instructors a variety of active learning exercises – in the book itself and in the authors’ ancillaries – that engage students in the material and shed light on the experiences of marginalized social groups. Through these activities, students become engaged with the material at a higher level of learning. They learn how victimization happens and the challenges people who experience crime face in acquiring assistance from the criminal-legal system at a more intimate level instead of simply reading about it. Students also build their abilities to work with others in a collaborative learning environment, encouraging professional socialization for the future. The chapters in this second edition address gaps in information typically presented in victimology that ignore prevention or intervention, even though these topics are currently at the forefront of the national conversation going on about sexual violence in higher education. New to this edition are added coverage of immigrants and minorities and new chapters on the media and victimization and on victimization across the gender spectrum, as well as an online instructor resource covering UK case studies, legal framework, and social context that broadens the book’s global appeal. Suitable for undergraduate courses in victimology, this book also serves the needs of sociology and women’s studies courses and can be taught university-wide as part of diversity and inclusion initiatives.Walk the Walk: How Three Police Chiefs Defied the Odds and Changed Cop Culture
By Neil Gross. 2023
From “one of the most interesting sociologists of his generation” and a former cop, the story of three departments and…
their struggle to change aggressive police culture and achieve what Americans want: fair, humane, and effective policing.What should we do about the police? After the murder of George Floyd, there’s no institution more controversial: only 14 percent of Americans believe that “policing works pretty well as it is” (CNN, April 27, 2021). We’re swimming in proposals for reform, but most do not tackle the aggressive culture of the profession, which prioritizes locking up bad guys at any cost, loyalty to other cops, and not taking flak from anyone on the street. Far from improving public safety, this culture, in fact, poses a danger to citizens and cops alike.Walk the Walk brings readers deep inside three unusual departments—in Stockton, California; Longmont, Colorado; and LaGrange, Georgia—whose chiefs signed on to replace that aggressive culture with something better: with models focused on equity before the law, social responsibility, racial reconciliation, and the preservation of life. Informed by research, unflinching and by turns gripping, tragic, and inspirational, this book follows the chiefs—and their officers and detectives—as they conjured a new spirit of policing. While every community faces unique challenges with police reform, Walk the Walk opens a window onto what the police could be, if we took seriously the charge of creating a more just America.Routledge Handbook of Homicide Studies (Routledge International Handbooks)
By Kyle A. Burgason, Matt DeLisi. 2024
The Routledge Handbook of Homicide Studies comprehensively examines the topic of homicide from a diverse collection of perspectives and backgrounds.…
It brings together original contributions on homicide, with a focus on the broad range of impacts of homicide from a multitude of disciplines that evaluate and examine homicide in actual practice and theory. The editors have assembled a comprehensive collection highlighting the multifaceted causes and ramifications of homicide both across the United States and globally, with chapters exploring the current state of homicide, typologies of homicides offenders, causes and correlates of homicide, homicides and the criminal justice system, and a professional observations chapters authored by some of the leading practicing professionals in the world, many of whom have made pivotal contributions to the evaluation and investigation of homicide offenders and cases. Providing state-of-the-art scholarship on homicide in modern society, this handbook is a key collection and an invaluable resource for students, researchers, and practitioners engaged in the study of homicide across a diverse range of disciplines, including criminal justice and criminology, psychology, sociology, forensics, interdisciplinary departments, and sociolegal studies.The NYPD Tapes: A Shocking Story of Cops, Cover-Ups, and Courage
By Graham A. Rayman. 2013
In May 2010, NYPD officer Adrian Schoolcraft made national headlines when he released a series of secretly recorded audio tapes…
exposing corruption and abuse at the highest levels of the police department. But, according to a lawsuit filed by Schoolcraft against the City of New York, instead of admitting mistakes and pledging reform Schoolcraft's superiors forced him into a mental hospital in an effort to discredit the evidence. In The NYPD Tapes, the reporter who first broke the Schoolcraft story brings his ongoing saga up to date, revealing the rampant abuses that continue in the NYPD today, including warrantless surveillance and systemic harassment. Through this lens, he tells the broader tale of how American law enforcement has for the past thirty years been distorted by a ruthless quest for numbers, in the form of CompStat, the vaunted data-driven accountability system first championed by New York police chief William Bratton and since implemented in police departments across the country. Forced to produce certain crime stats each quarter or face discipline, cops in New York and everywhere else fudged the numbers, robbing actual crime victims of justice and sweeping countless innocents into the police net. Rayman paints a terrifying picture of a system gone wild, and the pitiless fate of the whistleblower who tried to stop it.A Good Month for Murder: The Inside Story of a Homicide Squad
By Del Quentin Wilber. 2016
Bestselling author Del Quentin Wilber tells the inside story of how a homicide squad---a dedicated, colorful team of detectives—does its…
almost impossible jobTwelve homicides, three police-involved shootings and the furious hunt for an especially brutal killer--February 2013 was a good month for murder in suburban Washington, D.C.After gaining unparalleled access to the homicide unit in Prince George's County, which borders the nation's capital, Del Quentin Wilber begins shadowing the talented, often quirky detectives who get the call when a body falls. After a quiet couple of months, all hell breaks loose: suddenly every detective in the squad is scrambling to solve one shooting and stabbing after another. Meanwhile, the entire unit is obsessed with a stone-cold "red ball," a high-profile case involving a seventeen-year-old honor student attacked by a gunman who kicked down the door to her house and shot her in her bed.Murder is the police investigator's ultimate crucible: to solve a killing, a detective must speak for the dead. More than any recent book, A Good Month for Murder shows what it takes to succeed when the stakes couldn't possibly be higher.Brief Encounters: Conversations, Magic Moments, and Assorted Hijinks
By Dick Cavett. 2014
Dick Cavett is back, sharing his reflections and reminiscences about Hollywood legends, American cultural icons, and the absurdities of everyday…
lifeIn Brief Encounters, the legendary talk show host Dick Cavett introduces us to the fascinating characters who have crossed his path, from James Gandolfini and John Lennon to Mel Brooks and Nora Ephron, enhancing our appreciation of their talent, their personalities, and their place in the pantheon. We tag along as Cavett spends an afternoon with Stan Laurel at his modest apartment in Los Angeles, spars with Muhammad Ali at his training camp, and comes to know a young Steve Jobs—who woos him to be Apple's first celebrity pitchman. He also offers piquant commentary on contemporary politics, the indignities of travel, the nature of comedy writing, and the utter improbability of being alive at all.On his talk show, Cavett welcomed the leading figures from film, music, theater, literature, comedy, and politics, and engaged them in conversation that made viewers feel that the discussion was taking place in their own living rooms. Jimmy Fallon, the host of The Tonight Show, has called him "a legend and an inspiration" and has written a foreword that makes clear the debt that today's talk show hosts owe to Dick Cavett.To spend a few minutes, or an hour, or even a whole evening with Dick Cavett is an experience not to be missed, and now there's no reason to deny yourself. Enjoy the conversation!The Death Penalty as State Crime: Who Can Kill?
By Laura L. Finley. 2024
This book offers a new perspective on the death penalty in the US, examining capital punishment as state crime or…
state-produced harm. It addresses the death penalty, showing how the state not only authorizes a system and a practice that tortures human beings, but is also aware of its deep flaws and chooses not to address them.Building on the vast literature on state crime together with case examples and interviews with activists seeking to abolish the death penalty, this book offers a new and innovative critique of state punishment in the US. It draws on a range of issues and topics such as arbitrariness, inadequate counsel, racial bias, mental illness, innocence, conditions on death row, the protocols, and the equipment used for executions. It emphasizes the need for abolition of the death penalty and highlights efforts being made to do so, with a focus on successful elements of abolition campaigns.The Death Penalty as State Crime is essential reading for all those engaged with capital punishment, human rights, and state crime, and will be of interest to criminologists, sociologists, legal scholars and political scientists alike.