Digital Commons Network^™

Breaking Bonds: Effect Of The Loss Of Parental Rights On Prison Admission In The United States, 2000-2019, Audrey E. Erickson

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

This paper investigates the relationship between termination of parental rights (TPR) and prison admission rates in the United States over the period from 2000 to 2019. Grounded in social bond and labeling theories, the study explores how the loss of parental rights influences the likelihood of parents to offend or reoffend and whether such a relationship differs between men and women. Using state-level administrative data, fixed-effects regression models are employed to analyze the impact of TPR rates on prison admissions, while accounting for time-varying socioeconomic factors (poverty rate, unemployment, and TANF maximum benefit). Findings indicate a positive causal effect association …

Undergraduates' Perceptions Of Campus Response To Sexual Assault: A Butler University Case Study, Julia Elizabeth Fryrear

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

Sexual assault and misconduct on college campuses is a pervasive and long-standing problem. As such, students’ views of campus climate, safety, and their universities’ response and prevention policies and practices remain paramount. Using an anonymous survey, the current research examines how undergraduate students at Butler University perceive the campus climate regarding sexual assault and misconduct and how they interpret and assess the university’s response. The questionnaire posed a series of questions concerning students’ knowledge and access to resources, general feelings of safety, and interpretation of university responses. Findings suggest that most respondents believe their university handles sexual assault and misconduct …

2024 Commencement, University Of The Pacific

Commencement Programs

No abstract provided.

Ending Arkansas’ First Appearance Crisis, Malia N. Brink, Pamela R. Metzger, Claire Buetow, Terrence Cain

Deason Center Reports

Arkansas law is clear: every arrested person has the right to an attorney’s help the first time they see a judge. But across the state, people often face a judge at first appearance without a lawyer by their side. Even worse, a shortage of attorneys means people sometimes wait months for a lawyer’s help. The Constitution promises that every person in jail will have access to the courts and to counsel. Yet far too often, Arkansas allows people to languish in jail alone, afraid, and undefended.

This policy brief outlines research-based solutions for Arkansas to honor the Constitution’s promises by …

Computationally Assessing Suspicion, Wesley M. Oliver

Law Faculty Publications

Law enforcement officers performing drug interdiction on interstate highways have to decide nearly every day whether there is reasonable suspicion to detain motorists until a trained dog can sniff for the presence of drugs. The officers’ assessments are often wrong, however, and lead to unnecessary detentions of innocent persons and the suppression of drugs found on guilty ones. We propose a computational method of evaluating suspicion in these encounters and offer experimental results from early efforts demonstrating its feasibility. With the assistance of large language and predictive machine learning models, it appears that judges, advocates, and even police officers could …

Dazed & Confused... And... Psychotic?, Judy Ann Clausen, Joanmarie I. Davoli, Benjamin W. Lacy Md

UF Law Faculty Publications

This Article examines marijuana’s impact on developing brains. Secondly, this Article explores the Green Rush – the rise of the multibillion-dollar marijuana industry and the media and legal environment that unleashed massive marijuana commercialization. The Article compares decriminalization with commercialization, illustrating that it is possible to address social justice concerns of arrests, incarceration, and criminal records for marijuana use without unleashing a multibillion-dollar industry that markets to youth. The Article concludes by exploring approaches from Australia, the United Kingdom, and Sweden, all of which continue to criminalize marijuana, in part because they have observed the U.S. Green Rush and its …

Comparative Analysis Of Victim Services Across The U.S., Avalena Giampa

Senior Honors Projects

Crime is a major problem that impacts many people across the United States. The media and public commonly focus on the suspects and perpetrators, rather than the victims. This problem contributes to a lack of awareness of victim services. The database developed in this study serves as a resource for people to see what each individual state offers for victim services within their most populated county’s district attorney’s office. In forming this database, I looked at each state’s most populated county and reviewed their web pages for victim services offered by each DA’s office and applied a coding structure as …

School Resource Officers: History, Efficacy, And Unintended Consequences, Alysha Gagnon May

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

There have been police and school partnerships in the United States for as long as public schools have existed, dating to the early- to mid-1800s. These partnerships have formalized as educational philosophies have changed, particularly in the context of school safety and discipline practices. In this dissertation, I explore the impact of implementing a School Resource Officer (SRO) program on school safety and I contribute to the national conversation about disparities in exclusionary discipline practices related to the presence of SROs. There have been several key turning points in these police and school partnerships, notably the Flint, Michigan, school liaison …

Determining The Time Since Deposition Of Bloodstains Based On Vibrational Spectroscopy For Forensic Purposes, Alexis Renee Weber

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

At the scene of violent crimes, bloodstain evidence is one of the most frequently found and valuable types of evidence. Blood traces discovered at crime scenes can provide crucial information to an investigation. By obtaining a DNA profile from the bloodstain, the profile can be used to link someone to a crime scene, which can corroborate or dispute a witness's statement. However, the current analysis of bloodstains is still not able to answer a key question for investigators: how much time has passed since the criminal event occurred? In addition, an equally important aspect of crime reconstruction is the ability …

Advancing Equity: An Examination Of Education Policy Impacts On Students With Disabilities, Arzana Myderrizi

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Students with disabilities (SWDs) in U.S. public schools face unique challenges that profoundly shape their educational experiences and transition into adulthood, such as lower academic achievement and higher rates of exclusionary discipline and juvenile justice involvement. These disparities have far-reaching implications, impacting high school graduation rates, college enrollment, and future employment prospects, thus perpetuating broader social and economic inequalities. Understanding what aspects of special education are conducive to learning and development for SWDs is important for identifying evidence-based strategies that can help improve educational experiences and outcomes for SWDs. This dissertation contributes to our understanding of effective educational practices for …

State Policies On Maternal And Infant Health In The United States, Heeun Kim

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

In the United States (US), state-level policies are critical structural determinants of maternal and infant health outcomes. State policies profoundly affect prenatal care utilization and pregnancy outcomes, particularly among marginalized pregnant persons with stigmatized health conditions. In this three-paper dissertation, I focus on two closely interrelated policies that aim to address significant public health concerns in the US: prenatal syphilis screenings and the criminalization of prenatal substance use. My research revolves around two central questions: First, do these policies effectively improve the pregnancy outcomes of high-risk populations, or do they cause unintended consequences? Second, if challenges in policy design and …

Indecent Exposure And The Court As Custos Morum, Bruce Davis

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Indecent exposure has been a crime in America since colonial times. Laws governing this crime are a cornerstone of government regulation of morals in America, sharing a common history with the jurisprudence of religion, obscenity, marriage, and sexual relations. The first reported case of indecent exposure in English common law is a widely acknowledged source of American moral jurisprudence that justifies the courts’ role as custos morum, or custodian of the morals.

Understanding Attitudes Among Professionals Who Interact With Youth Who Exhibit Problematic Sexual Behavior, Erin Gardner

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Problematic sexual behaviors (PSB) among youth have been a prominent public health and social concern. Although these behaviors have previously been considered to comprise a “curiosity” or an “experimentation”, PSB is now recognized as causing harm and suffering for victims and family members while also having a considerable economic influence in medical, behavioral health, social services, and criminal justice systems. Much research has examined how perceptions and attitudes impact our behaviors towards PSB among adults, but none examines how perceptions and attitudes impact our behaviors towards youth. Knowing there are several gaps in literature, the current study was conducted to …

Confessions In The Salem Witch Trials, Caylie Mcaree

ALL - Honors Theses

As defined as one of the darkest moments in American history, the Salem Witch Trials serves as a haunting reminder of the human capacity of fear and manipulation over a community of people that led to mass hysteria and injustice. Through the mist of mass hysteria and chaos, the Court of Oyer and Terminer was established to maintain social control of the community and prosecute the accused through coerced confessions. Over a hundred and fifty people were accused of witchery and over one-third of the accused confessed to the crime. This paper dives into a deep analysis of primary and …

Substance Use & Systems Impact: A Mixed-Methods Community-Based Participatory Action Study, Jordan Dyett

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Individuals, families, and communities who use drugs or have a history of substance use have been highly criminalized, stigmatized, and their perspectives marginalized in research and policy. Furthermore, trajectories of research on this community tend to focus on pathologizing individuals and focus on prevention or abstinence-based outcomes, failing to embrace a broader critique of societal forces that marginalize communities and contribute to substance use. Despite the increase in deaths due to drug toxicity, policy and practice at large have failed to embrace the expertise of those with lived experience using substances, and instead continued to rely on carceral logics to …

303 Creative Llc, Public Accommodations Law, And The Many Possible Futures Of Rights, Jacob Eisler

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

The unifying theme of the contributions to this Collection of Essays on 303 Creative LLC, which emerged from a panel held at the 2024 American Association of Law Schools meeting, is that while 303 Creative LLC may have brought these themes forward, their full expositions lie in the hands of Supreme Court jurisprudence that is yet to come...

In exploring these possibilities, this Collection seeks to anticipate what might come next for both the First Amendment and public accommodations law.

This abstract has been taken from the author's introduction.

No Need To Wait: Congress Has The Power Under Section Five Of The Fourteenth Amendment To Abolish The Death Penalty In The States, Eric M. Freedman

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

Reformers currently proposing the abolition of capital punishment by federal legislation have only targeted the federal death penalty. They are aiming too low. Concerns about the roughly 50 prisoners facing execution by the federal government should not cause advocates to ignore the approximately 2,400 on the combined Death Rows of the states. Congress has the authority to abolish the death penalty in the states, and good reason to exercise it.

This Article takes as a given the Supreme Court’s view that the death penalty is not itself unconstitutional.

But under existing law Congress would have no difficulty in compiling a …

Effects Of Attractiveness And Relationship Type Of Perceptions Of Adolescent Sexual Grooming, Alexandra Shappley

Honors Theses

Child sexual grooming is a prevalent issue within the United States, especially with the rise of the internet and social media (Shakeshaft, 2004; Finkelhor et al., 2000; Winters et al., 2017). There has been less research done on adolescent sexual grooming; however, researchers have found that perceptions of adolescent sexual grooming vary depending on the gender and age of the offender and victim (Russel & Gyrus, 2022; Sahl & Keene, 2012). Researchers have found that people perceive a sexual grooming relationship as inflicting more harm if the perpetrator is a man (Hernandez et al., 2019), particularly an older man (Russel …

Online Deception: The Impact Of Language In Text-Based Deception Detection, Stephanie Dayle Avila

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

In today’s digital age, spreading false information online can have serious consequences, from affecting elections to undermining public health efforts. Despite the issue's importance, there’s been relatively little research into better understanding how people make decisions about lies and misinformation online. My project dives into this challenge by exploring how specific language cues, like grammar errors or unusual word choices, influence people’s perception of statements in terms of deceit online. I examined how people react to these cues through three separate but related studies when reading truthful and deceptive statements. The first two studies showed that true statements with grammatical …

Final Master's Portfolio, Savannah Packman

Master of Arts in English Plan II Graduate Projects

This portfolio uses Marxist and feminist film theory to analyze various forms of visual media. It analyzes Mark Mylod's film The Menu (2022), Julie Taymor's film Across the Universe (2007), the historic V-J Day Kiss photograph, and popular TikTok videos. This portfolio focuses on the impact of capitalism in the political and economic sphere. It also analyzes images of women throughout history and critiques how these images have been used to formulate the American body politic.

The Failed Promise Of Gun Legislation: The Assault Weapons Ban And Sandy Hook, Matigan Williams '24

Honor Scholar Theses

This paper has three chapters. The first details the Assault Weapons Ban and what led to its passage in 1994. It goes through the different provisions and exemptions in the ban. This chapter analyzes the impact that the ban had on crime, gun violence, government spending, and electoral politics. The chapter then details why the ban failed to pass again in 2004 and the resulting impact. The second chapter analyzes the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School and the shooting’s role in the gun control debate. This chapter looks at why the Assault Weapons Ban failed to pass in 2013 …

Emergence: Social Movements, Law Enforcement, And Defending The Sanctity Of Life, Diana Elizabeth Aroche

Doctoral Dissertations

This study examines the aftermath of national social movements advocating for police reforms and accountability, with San Francisco emerging as a pivotal city at the forefront of criminal justice and policing transformations. Rebuilding community trust and implementing substantive police reforms aimed at preserving lives has proven to be a formidable challenge. The convergence of interests among all stakeholders, driven by a shared commitment to dismantling institutional racism and implementing reforms that fostered trust with communities of color and law enforcement, played a pivotal role.

A significant aspect of this reform process has been the development of social movement convergence, where …

A Spatiotemporal Analysis Of Violent Crime In Little Rock, Arkansas From 1999-2022, Nicole Rogers

Data Science Undergraduate Honors Theses

Little Rock, Arkansas is not only the capital and largest city in Arkansas, but it has one of the highest crime rates amongst cities with over 100,000 people in the country. According to the US Census in 2020, Little Rock had a population of 202,591. In the same year, Little Rock Police Department recorded 3,567 cases of violent crime, leading to a violent crime rate of 1,805 violent crime occurrences per 100,000 people. For perspective, Chicago’s violent crime rate was approximately half of that of Little Rock during the same time period. Crime, like other social phenomena is unevenly distributed …

Functional Biases Toward Formidable Men In Legal Domains, Bridget O'Neil, Mitch Brown

Psychological Science Undergraduate Honors Theses

The recurring threat of physical aggression throughout human evolutionary history presented a selection pressure that favored perceptual acuity threatening people. One heuristic of threat is men's formidability, often indexed by upper body strength. Although functional, such responses could be mismatched with demands of the U.S. legal system. The demands of a fair legal system could be at odds with ancestrally informed motives that serve to mitigate harm, a bias that has previously been demonstrated to increase sentencing length based on features deemed aggressive. This study extends previous findings by focusing on men's upper body strength while assessing how specific motivations …

State V. Kelliher: Providing A Meaningful Opportunity For Juvenile Offenders In North Carolina, Amy R. Price

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Music Borrowing And Copyright Law: A Genre-By-Genre Analysis, Hannah Rosborough

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

Edited by Enrico Bonadio and Chen Wei Zhu, Music Borrowing and Copyright Law: A Genre-by-Genre Analysis confronts the valuable task of addressing the following points of significance: First, the relationship between copyright law and music borrowing is dynamic. Second, copyright and music borrowing have most often been considered and centred around a Western perspective. Third, there is a concern that copyright may stifle creativity in the music space. And fourth, the relationship between copyright law and music requires a fulsome review to better understand the borrowing norms and practices of musicians.

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Music Borrowing and Copyright Law: A Genre-by-Genre Analysis …

Emotional Labor Performed Among University Faculty Responding To Student Sexual Assault Disclosures, Cadi Imbody

All Theses

Given the barriers to formal help-seeking and the prevalence on college campuses, students who experience sexual assault may turn to faculty for assistance, as they are familiar faces they trust and can provide access to university resources. In these cases, faculty may become the frontline for providing official help within the university setting. Responding to these student sexual assault disclosures requires great emotional capacity and the ability to provide empathetic, supportive responses. In these interactions, faculty may need to perform what Arlie Russell Hochschild (1983/2003) theorized as “emotional labor” to handle such sensitive information appropriately. Initially focusing on the service …

Unmasking Justice: Racial Disparity Trends In Sentencing Before And After The Covid-19 Pandemic, Noah Samuel Reynolds

All Theses

The advent of the COVID-19 pandemic profoundly impacted every facet of the United States justice system, disrupting traditional systems and introducing a new era of virtual alternatives. This unprecedented crisis provides a unique opportunity to empirically study the interplay between health risks, shutdowns, and uncertainty and the foundational value of fair and impartial justice. Using North Carolina sentencing data from 2016-2022, this study delves into the consequences of the pandemic on sentencing outcomes after the virus was declared a national emergency in March 2020. Framed within the Focal Concerns (FC) theory, I expect judges to be more lenient in their …

Impact Of Socioeconomic Inequalities On Racial/Ethnic Disparities In Adrd Incidence Rate In South Carolina, Noor Nishan

All Theses

none

Bail At The Founding, Kellen R. Funk, Sandra G. Mayson

Faculty Scholarship

How did criminal bail work in the Founding era? This question has become pressing as bail, and bail reform, have attracted increasing attention, in part because history is thought to bear on the meaning of bail-related constitutional provisions. To date, however, there has been no thorough account of bail at the Founding. This Article begins to correct the deficit in our collective memory by describing bail law and practice in the Founding era, from approximately 1790 to 1810. In order to give a full account, we surveyed a wide range of materials, including Founding-era statutes, case law, legal treatises, and …