Digital Commons Network^™

Young Adult Addition To Opioids And Synthetic Opioids In Atlanta, Georgia, Jennifer Gaul

Selected Social Change Portfolios in Prevention, Intervention, and Consultation

The drug epidemic in the United States has grown significantly with increased drug overdose deaths quadrupling from 1999 to 2018 (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (C.D.C.), 2019). Of those deaths by overdose in 2018, 70% were from an opioid. The trend in opioid misuse has shown the use of non-medical prescription opioids (P.O.s) is increasing with adolescence (mean age 16.8), in which 83% will transition to use heroin within four years (Guarino, Mateu-Gelabert, Teubl, & Goodbody, 2018). The rate of using heroin has doubled over the last decade for young adults, age 18-25-years-old. The county in Atlanta I live …

The Relationship Of Legal History To Mood And Substance Abuse Symptoms Among Homeless Men And Women In A Residential Recovery Program, Lily A. Mkhitarian

Theses and Dissertations

Homelessness is a devastating experience that impacts hundreds of thousands of individuals in the U.S. each day. It has been widely reported that homeless persons experience higher rates of mental disorder, substance abuse, and physical illness than domiciled individuals. Homelessness is also associated with increased risk of exposure to trauma. In addition, about a quarter of homeless individuals in the U.S. report a history of incarceration. Certainly there are multiple pathways to both homelessness and incarceration. More research is needed on the implications and consequences of having a legal history on homeless persons. The purpose of this archival study was …

#Livingwhileblack: A Mixed-Method Exploratory Analysis Of The Social Media Documentation Of Racism Via Twitter And Interviews, Judy A. Jackson

Theses and Dissertations

African Americans have endured marginalization related to racial and cultural disparities. #LivingWhileBlack has become a unique repository of all related experiences that Black people are encountering, while performing every day, seemingly mundane tasks and activities. The #LivingWhileBlack hashtag went viral on Twitter (https://twitter.com/), allowing users, including Black Twitter (https://twitter.com/), to use the international platform to share their own Black story and experience. The three research questions that were explored included the following. First: How are profiling events related to #LivingWhileBlack events documented, reported and expressed by Social Media Users? Second: How are others/people using Twitter (https://twitter.com/); affected by various incidences …

Can The Pursuit Of Truth Reconcile With The Principle Of Minimizing False Convictions?, Doron Menashe

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

No abstract provided.

Arguing The Algorithm: Pretrial Risk Assessment And The Zealous Defender, Julian Adler, Sarah Picard, Caitlin Flood

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

This article examines the growing use of algorithmic pretrial risk assessment tools in the United States as a response to the systemic inequities of cash bail and mass incarceration. While proponents argue that these tools offer objective, data-driven alternatives to judicial discretion, critics highlight their potential to reinforce racial and economic disparities. Amid this contentious debate, the authors call attention to the underexplored role of public defenders in mitigating the harms—and maximizing the decarcerative potential—of risk assessment algorithms. Drawing on examples from New York and New Jersey, the article outlines four key strategies for defenders: demanding transparency in algorithm design, …

The Cultural Constraints Of Legal Transplantation A Ten-Year Retrospective, James L. Nolan Jr.

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

No abstract provided.

Table Of Contents - Cardozo Journal Of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 22, Iss. 1

Cardozo Journal of Conflict Resolution

No abstract provided.

Washington’S Young Offenders: O’Dell Demands A Change To Sentencing Guidelines, Erika Vranizan

Seattle University Law Review

This Note argues that the O’Dell decision was a watershed moment for criminal justice reform. It argues that the reasoning in O’Dell should be seized upon by the legislature to take action to remediate instances in which defendants are legal adults but do not possess the cognitive characteristics of an adult sufficient to justify adult punishment. Given both the scientific impossibility of identifying a precise age at which characteristics of youthfulness end and adulthood begins and the Court’s repeated recognition that these very factors impact culpability, the current approach to sentencing young offenders aged eighteen to twenty-five as adults simply …

Victims’ Rights From A Restorative Perspective, Lara Bazelon, Bruce A. Green

Faculty Scholarship

The criminal adjudicatory process is meant in part to help crime victims heal. But for some crime victims, the process is re-victimizing. For decades, efforts have been made to make the criminal process fairer and more humane for victims. For example, state and federal laws are now designed to keep victims informed, allow them to be heard at sentencing, and afford them monetary restitution. But these efforts, while important, have not persuaded crime victims to trust criminal process. For example, sexual assaults remain grossly under-reported and under-prosecuted. Less than 1 percent of sexual assault crimes result in a felony conviction. …

Afrodescendants, Law, And Race In Latin America, Tanya K. Hernandez

Faculty Scholarship

Law and Society research in and about Latin America has been particularly beneficial in elucidating the gap between the ideals of racial equality laws in the region and the actual subordinated status of its racialized subjects. Some of the recurrent themes in the race-related literature have been: the limits of the Latin American emphasis on criminal law to redress discriminatory actions; the limits of multicultural constitutional reform for full political participation; the insufficiency of land reform and recognition of ethnic communal property titles; and the challenges to implementing race conscious public policies such as affirmative action. Especially illuminating have been …

Why The Policy Failures Of Mass Incarceration Are Really Political Failures, John F. Pfaff

Faculty Scholarship

In his forthcoming book, The Insidious Momentum of Mass Incarceration, Franklin Zimring argues that the most effective way to end mass incarceration is to target the policy failures that drive it. He focuses in particular on the “prosecutorial free lunch”: prosecutors are county-funded officials who can send as many people as they like to state-funded prisons, which is a classic moral hazard problem. While Zimring is correct to focus on how relatively technocratic issues have posed outsized and underappreciated problems, his analysis suffers from some important shortcomings. In particular, he gives too little attention to the politics that have …

Janus-Faced Judging: How The Supreme Court Is Radically Weakening Stare Decisis, Michael Gentithes

Akron Law Faculty Publications

Drastic changes in Supreme Court doctrine require citizens to reorder their affairs rapidly, undermining their trust in the judiciary. Stare decisis has traditionally limited the pace of such change on the Court. It is a bulwark against wholesale jurisprudential reversals. But, in recent years, the stare decisis doctrine has come under threat. With little public or scholarly notice, the Supreme Court has radically weakened stare decisis in two ways. First, the Court has reversed its long-standing view that a precedent, regardless of the quality of its reasoning, should stand unless there is some special, practical justification to overrule it. Recent …

Here There Be Dragons: The Likely Interaction Of Judges With The Artificial Intelligence Ecosystem, Fredric I. Lederer

Popular Media

No abstract provided.

Should Criminal Justice Reformers Care About Prosecutorial Ethics Rules?, Bruce A. Green, Ellen C. Yaroshefsky

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Defiance, Concealed Carry, And Race, Nicholas J. Johnson

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Injustice And The Disappearance Of Discretionary Detention Under Trump: Detaining Low Risk Immigrants Without Bond, Robert Koulish, Kate Evans

Faculty Scholarship

This Report demonstrates that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) violates legal requirements to provide immigrants with an individualized custody determination. Trump’s enforcement policies brought a surge of low-risk immigrants into ICE custody. The detention risk tool was supposed to train officers and strongly discourage them from detaining low-risk immigrants who posed no harm to society and were not a flight risk. Data received pursuant to FOIA show the opposite result. ICE has failed to perform the individualized assessment and restrict its use of civil detention to only those whose high levels of dangerousness and risk of flight justify their …

Athletic Identity, Greg Camillone

Research Papers

Limited data exists in college athletics about mental health conditions, while physical health remains the higher priority. In order to contribute to the limited understanding of student-athletes’ cognitive behavior, a documentary on collegiate student-athletes is produced, utilizing athletic identity as its main theme. Furthermore, the documentary shares personal experiences of how athletes have handled the transition from athletic role to an alternate identity, and how that change effected them mentally.

The purpose of this study is to present evidence from a Division I athletic program to contribute towards answering the following questions:

1. Are collegiate student-athletes struggling mentally with life after …

Identifying Suicidality Correlates Among People Incarcerated In Jail, Frances Abderhalden

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

The rate of suicidality in jail is estimated to be eight times greater than that of the general population, yet the identification of risk factors for suicidality among people incarcerated in jail has not been explored by researchers (Fazel, Grann, Kling & Hawton, 2011; Hayes, 1999; Noonan & Ginder, 2013). To date, the breadth of the literature on suicidology almost exclusively deals with the prison population or general public, and official data of completed suicides. However, when analyzing suicidality in jail and prison populations, it is evident they are not interchangeable and suicidal behaviors include more than just completed suicides. …

(Main)Streaming Hate: Analyzing White Supremacist Content And Framing Devices On Youtube, Christopher Charles

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

The emboldening of white supremacist groups, as well as their increased mainstream presence in online circles, necessitates the creation of studies that dissect their tactics and rhetoric, while offering platform-specific insights. This study seeks to address these needs by analyzing white supremacist content and framing devices on the video hosting website, YouTube. Data were collected through a multi-stage sampling technique, designed to capture a 'snapshot' of white supremacist content on the platform during a 45-day period in 2019. After line-by-line coding and qualitative thematic analysis, results showed that sampled channels varied between different levels of color-blindness and overt racialization in …

Drug Availability And Disparities In Arrests, Robert Hellmuth

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Racial disparities in arrests in the United States are well-documented. Particularly, young black males are arrested at inordinately higher rates than other demographics. In this research, we investigated whether an unresearched variable—drug availability—could explain these discrepancies found in the US criminal justice system. Research suggests race is an extralegal (unrelated to the law) factor associated with arrest rates. Until this study, no research has investigated whether an individuals' access to illegal drugs might be related to likelihood of being arrested. If illicit substances might be more easily obtained by individuals of a specific race, could this explain inequalities in arrest …

Navigating The Manosphere: An Examination Of The Incel Movements’ Attitudes Of Sexual Aggression And Violence Against Women, Albina Laskovtsov

Online Theses and Dissertations

There is a considerable and established literature on the topic of violence against women. Yet, there remains understudied areas of foci with lesser attention paid to its occurrence within online and digital contexts. Of particular interest is the networked misogyny and sexism of the online group that self-identifies as “involuntary celibates”, or “incels”. Drawing on data collected from online forums and chat rooms, the language and discourse of this particular group are analyzed through an integrated conceptual framework encompassing hegemonic masculinity, aggrieved entitlement, and patriarchy to better understand the prevalence and types of violence promoted by “incels”. Emerging themes revealed …

Capital Punishment And Race Disparities In The Modern Era: An Empirical Analysis, Trevor Myers

Online Theses and Dissertations

Dissimilarities by race-of-defendant and race-of-victim have received ample attention in capital punishment literature, predominately in regard to death sentencing. Much less attention has been provided to the intersection of race and gender-of-victim with utilization of execution data, and research has failed to adequately address this topic in a historical context. In this exploratory study, I seek to identify multivariate correlates of executions involving characterizations of defendant race as well as victim race x gender characterizations since 1977. More specifically, I use multivariate analyses to examine possible predictors of executions elucidated defendant race x victim race and gender amalgamations. Among the …

Framing Crime And Social Problems: How Students Perceive The Legality Of Digital Piracy, Jordan Henson

Online Theses and Dissertations

The current information age has seen a shift from analog product manufacturing to the production of intellectual property (e.g., software and digital media); property that is stolen at alarming rates. Much of the research concerning the modern phenomenon of digital piracy, as defined by Al-Rafee and Cronan (2006, p. 237) as “the illegal copying/downloading of copyrighted software and media files,” has stemmed from various fields, including business, ethics, marketing, and information systems. What is lacking in the literature is a notably criminal justice lens in which to view a controversial topic that is growing in popularity among the media and …

Hiding In Plain Sight: Ghosted Police Vehicles And The Perception Of Police Presence On College Campuses, Mackenzie Kibler

Online Theses and Dissertations

Previous research has shown that police presence, which involves visibility of law enforcement personnel, is often related to perceptions of individual safety and individual behavior. The purpose of this study was to explore perceptions of college students and campus law enforcement regarding visibility of and citizen/police interaction on Eastern Kentucky University’s campus. The first phase of this project was designed to measure student awareness and visibility of “ghosted” police vehicles, which are black with matte black markings on the doors and have few easily visible indicators of law enforcement vehicles, versus other police types of police vehicles on campus. The …

Development Of Novel Analytical Methods For Detection And Determination Of Tamoxifen In Oral Fluid And Discrimination Between Regioisomeric Aromatase Inhibitors For Doping Control Purposes, Brooke A. Sutton

Online Theses and Dissertations

The use of SERMs (Selective Estrogen Receptor Modulators) – most notably the drug Tamoxifen – has significantly increased among athletes over the past decade to enhance athletic performance and/or negate certain side effects of using anabolic steroids. This “doping” is always banned by WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency) for all athletes, but SERMs can naturally increase testosterone production so they are a tempting alternative to using steroids or androgenic supplements that can cause significant health problems (e.g. acne, breast development, frequent urge to urinate, low libido, etc.). Similarly, the use of AIs (Aromatase Inhibitors) has also increased among athletes for identical …

Firearm Bans And Gun Violence, Jake Burns

Research Papers

Tackling the problem of gun violence in the United States is a major challenge facing society. Many different policies have been created in order to address annual gun violence rates including bans on firearm importation, purchase, sale, and possession. Assault weapons, handgun, and Saturday night special bans are the most common firearm bans aimed at combatting gun violence. This systematic review of the literature examined these three different firearms bans and provided an overview of the effectiveness of these interventions. Firearm bans must be weighed against the constitutionality of such acts. Each one of these firearm bans are impacted by …

Trajectory Of Trauma: The Experiences Of Black Girls In The School-To-Prison Pipeline, Heather Nicholson-Bester

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

This critical ethnographic research utilizes participatory action research (PAR) and case studies to explore the impacts that zero-tolerance policies have had on the lives of Black girls and women. This work contributes to a small but growing body of work on the intersectional struggles faced by Black girls within the School-to-Prison Pipeline. An aim of this research was to work with the participants to amplify their voices and center them as experts on their own lives. Working with a small sample of three girls and women enabled the creation of detailed narratives of their experiences. These narratives point to the …

Postcolonial Public Administration: A Critical Discourse Analysis, Esteban Santis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Four years after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a group of Public Administration scholars met in New York's Adirondack Mountains to discuss the future of the field. At this gathering, the Minnowbrook I Conference, scholars acknowledged the need for social equity. Today, more than fifty years later, there is still a need for social equity. There is still a need to understand the history and role of oppression within Public Administration. Apropos, in this dissertation, I interrogate oppression, by way of postcolonialism and critical discourse analysis, to learn about the field's darkness and splendor. This project …

Breaking The Cycle Of Intergeneration Literacy Deficits: Describing Linguistic Interactions Between Adolescent Mothers And Their Young Children, Diana Abarca

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

The purpose of this pilot descriptive study was to begin the exploration of adolescent mothers' and their children's sociodemographic characteristics and language and literacy skills, the home literacy environment (HLE) provided by adolescent mothers, and the quality of linguistic interactions between adolescent mothers and their children. Eight adolescent mother-child dyads were recruited from local school counties. Data were collected through demographic and HLE questionnaires, various language standardized measures (i.e., Preschool Language Scales, Fifth Edition and Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals, Fifth Edition), and scored interactions between mother-child dyads using the Parenting Interactions with Children: Checklist of Observations Linked to Outcomes …

A Person-Centered Approach Of Dynamic Needs: Demographic Characteristics, Static Factors, And Justice-Related Outcomes Among Juvenile Offenders In Florida, Caitlin Brady

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Prior research examining criminogenic risk and need suggests that dynamic factors (i.e., criminogenic needs) are best suited for intervention and treatment as they are changeable over time. Thus, dynamic factors can be targeted to reduce the likelihood of recidivism among youth in the juvenile justice system. The assessment of needs is critical as it allows for the prediction of future delinquency and the ability to provide appropriate services/treatment for juvenile offenders. Several studies have shown that youth present with multiple needs and that these needs differ by gender. Therefore, the current study utilized a sample of adjudicated youth under community …