Law Commons^™

Combating Recidivism, Shaylin Daley

Senior Honors Projects

SHAYLIN DALEY (Psychology) Combating Recidivism Sponsor: Lisa Holley (Political Science) Many people believe that criminals cannot be helped. It is evident that at least some of society shuns people who break laws and have negative views about the amount of money spent on detaining inmates. Thousands of individuals are released from United States prisons a day. Many of these individuals have no plan in place for their return home and are sent into the streets with nothing except for a jail ID. Most of these people will end up returning to prison. A good sum of these people face problems …

Breaking The Cycle: An Exploratory Study Of Alternative Solutions For Mentally Ill Adults In The Criminal Justice System, Lindsey Whitley

Masters Theses

Mental illness is a prevalent issue and many times individuals diagnosed with a mental illness are repeat offenders within the criminal justice system; therefore, it is important to understand the problems at hand and find ways to handle the problems, or best yet take preventative measures to stop the problems from ever occurring. The literature review and interviews show that the criminal justice system seems to be handling mental illness in the best way possible with the current resources that are available to them. However, the literature review and interviews also show that an increase in resources and training on …

They’Re Planting Stories In The Press: The Impact Of Media Distortions On Sex Offender Law And Policy, Heather Ellis Cucolo, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

Individuals classified as sexual predators are the pariahs of the community. Sex offenders are arguably the most despised members of our society and therefore warrant our harshest condemnation. Twenty individual states and the federal government have enacted laws confining individuals who have been adjudicated as “sexually violent predators” to civil commitment facilities post incarceration and/or conviction. Additionally, in many jurisdictions, offenders who are returned to the community are restricted and monitored under community notification, registration and residency limitations. Targeting, punishing and ostracizing these individuals has become an obsession in society, clearly evidenced in the constant push to enact even more …

Preventing Sex-Offender Recidivism Through Therapeutic Jurisprudence Approaches And Specialized Community Integration, Heather Cucolo, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

The public’s panic about the fear of recidivism if adjudicated sex offenders are ever to be released to the community has not subsided, despite the growing amount of information and statistically-reliable data signifying a generally low risk of re-offense. The established case law upholding sex offender civil commitment and containment statutes has rejected challenges of unconstitutionality, and continues to be dominated by punitive undertones. We have come to learn that the tools used to assess offenders for risk and civil commitment are often inaccurate and that meaningful treatment for this population is often unavailable and ineffective. Yet, society continues to …

The Law And Economics Of Fluctuating Criminal Tendencies And Incapacitation, Murat C. Mungan

Faculty Scholarship

Economic analyses of criminal law are frequently and heavily criticized for being unable to explain many criminal law rules and doctrines that people find intuitively just. Existing economic models cannot properly explain, for instance, why criminal law distinguishes between (i) repeat offenders and first-time offenders, (ii) murder and voluntary manslaughter, and (iii) remorseful and non-remorseful offenders.

In this Article, I propose a new and richer economic theory of crime that captures the rationales behind these practices, and potentially behind many other important criminal law principles and doctrines. Unlike an overwhelming majority of previous economic analyses, my theory accounts not only …