Legal Studies Commons^™

Illicit And Counterfeit Drug Analysis By Morphologically Directed Raman Spectroscopy, Andrew Koutrakos, Pauline E. Leary, Brooke Weinger Kammrath

Forensic Science Publications

Morphologically directed Raman spectroscopy (MDRS) is a novel tool for the forensic analysis of illicit and counterfeit drug samples. MDRS combines Raman microspectroscopy with automated particle imaging so that physical and chemical information about the components of a mixture sample can be obtained. Results of automated particle imaging are used to determine samples for Raman analysis. The use of MDRS for these types of samples can be employed for both forensic investigations and adjudications of cases. The method provides insight about the physical and chemical composition of the sample, as well as about manufacturing and sample history. Here, MDRS was …

Is Forensic Science In Danger Of Extinction?, David San Pietro, Brooke Weinger Kammrath, Peter R. De Forest

Forensic Science Publications

Observations of modern day forensic science has prompted asking the question of whether this field is in danger of extinction. Although there have undoubtedly been meaningful advancements in analytical capabilities, we have overlooked several unintended practical and philosophical consequences. This article addresses three main areas of concern: the declining role of the generalist in an era of increased specialization, the role of education in preparing the next generation of forensic scientists, and the implementation of advanced instrumentation with a focus on statistical significance and field deployable instrumentation.

Government And Nongovernmental Collaboration To Build Community Resiliency Against Terrorism In Oklahoma City, Kimberly K. Heltz

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The way communities build resiliency and prepare for acts of terrorism is ambiguous in the United States; best practices remain unclear. Due to mobility and advancements in communication technologies, individuals and organizations share information, incite anger, recruit, and act on ideological grievances with ease. Such grievances are bolstered by the political and social exclusion of disparate groups through poorly designed policies and ineffective government structures. Using a combination of social constructivism and systems thinking theories, this case study explored collaboration efforts between government agencies and nongovernment experts in Oklahoma City, OK, identifying best practices as a result of lessons learned …

An Examination Of Inattentional Blindness In Law Enforcement, Gregory Lee

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Inattentional blindness, or the inability to visually detect an unexpected stimulus while attending to a task or situation, can have detrimental effects on those who are subject to the phenomenon. This may be particularly true for law enforcement officers, who are often engaged in cognitively demanding tasks that draw their attention away from potentially deadly hazards. This study aimed to look at the effects of inattentional blindness within a group of officers of varying degrees of experience and expertise. The officers were presented with a video-based scenario in which an unexpected stimulus was placed. The control group was asked to …

An Evaluation Of Juvenile Lifers In Pennsylvania Pre And Post Act 33 Of 1995, Kieshia Martin

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Act 33 of 1995 is an amendment to Pennsylvania's Juvenile Act (2008). This amendment changed jurisdictional boundaries for juvenile offenders who committed violent crimes with weapons. As a result, youth who committed violent crimes with weapons were automatically transferred to the adult criminal justice system. Using punctuated equilibrium as the theoretical foundation, the purpose of this study was to determine if Act 33, as a punctuating event, resulted in an increase in the number of youth transferred to the adult criminal justice system and sentenced to life without the possibility of parole in an urban county in Pennsylvania. Secondary data …

Length Of Pretrial Detainment For Inmates With Mental Illness, Maria Pereira-Sosa

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

There has been an increase in the number of individuals with mental illness being housed in correctional facilities over the last 50 years. In this study, the length of pretrial detention was compared for inmates who have a mental illness and are compliant with psychiatric medications, inmates who have a mental illness and are noncompliant or not prescribed psychiatric medication, and inmates with no mental illness. I also examined if inmates who have a mental illness have less severe charges and if there was a difference in the classification of mental health diagnoses for inmates who are and are not …

Blacks In Policing And Organizational Change: A Comparison Of Departments’ Participation In Community Oriented Policing Activities, David Pernell Taylor

School of Criminal Justice Theses and Dissertations

Civil unrest in the1960s pitted Black citizens and police officers against each other (Kerner Commission, 1968). The Kerner Commission examined race relations and recommended the hiring of more Black officers to patrol Black neighborhoods. Recent shooting deaths of unarmed Black males primarily by White officers has led to renewed calls for police reform (Scholsser, Cha-Jua, Valgoi & Neville, 2015). This quantitative secondary analysis study utilizes data from the 2013 LEMAS survey to compare local police departments from three states (N=184) to examine whether police departments with a Black chief and/or a higher rate of Black officers reported more participation in …

Honesty Without Truth: Lies, Accuracy, And The Criminal Justice Process, Lisa Kern Griffin

Faculty Scholarship

Focusing on “lying” is a natural response to uncertainty but too narrow of a concern. Honesty and truth are not the same thing and conflating them can actually inhibit accuracy. In several settings across investigations and trials, the criminal justice system elevates compliant statements, misguided beliefs, and confident opinions while excluding more complex evidence. Error often results. Some interrogation techniques, for example, privilege cooperation over information. Those interactions can yield incomplete or false statements, confessions, and even guilty pleas. Because of the impeachment rules that purportedly prevent perjury, the most knowledgeable witnesses may be precluded from taking the stand. The …

Evidence-Informed Criminal Justice, Brandon L. Garrett

Faculty Scholarship

The American criminal justice system is at a turning point. For decades, as the rate of incarceration exploded, observers of the American criminal justice system criticized the enormous discretion wielded by key actors, particularly police and prosecutors, and the lack of empirical evidence that has informed that discretion. Since the 1967 President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice report, The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society, there has been broad awareness that the criminal system lacks empirically informed approaches. That report unsuccessfully called for a national research strategy, with an independent national criminal justice research institute, along …

Introduction: Symposium On “Forensics, Statistics, And Law”, Brandon L. Garrett

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Oil Dries: A New Absorbent Material For Collection Of Ignitable Liquids From Semi-Porous Material, Jessica Sosa

Online Theses and Dissertations

Extraction of an ignitable liquid sample from a semi-porous surface such as concrete is especially difficult. For this purpose, two different solid oil dry absorbent materials, Instazorb and MAXXAbsorb, were researched for use of collection of ignitable liquid samples at a fire scene. These oil dries were spiked with different ignitable liquids (Coleman fuel, gasoline, kerosene, and diesel). Isolation of the ignitable liquid from the oil dry absorbent was accomplished by passive headspace isolation. Data was obtained by gas chromatography coupled with flame ionization detection (GC-FID) and gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Chromatograms obtained from both oil dries …

Predicting Staff Assault In Juvenile Correctional Facilities, Howard Henderson

Center for Justice Research Reports

This study examines the predictive utility of the community-based Positive Achievement Change Tool–Prescreen (PACT-PS) for staff assault in a sample of 787 state-committed male youth. Bivariate and multivariate analyses indicated the PACT-PS failed to predict staff assault across racial/ethnic groups. Notably, this study also found youth with serious delinquent histories and prior commitments improved the PACT-PS’s ability to predict staff assault. Limitations of this study, suggestions for future research, and practical implications are discussed.

Ideology In Physics: Ontological Naturalism And Theism Confront The Big Bang, Cosmic Fine-Tuning, And The Multiverse Of M-Theory, Anthony Walsh

Criminal Justice Faculty Publications and Presentations

The most profound questions that philosophers and scientists have asked across the centuries have been metaphysical and existential, such as “What is the meaning and purpose of life, why are we here, and why is there something rather than nothing?” There can be no definitive answers to these questions, so those who pose and propose answers to them necessarily engage ideology. Some physicists have become philosophers in that they are attempting to answer these profound questions with highly speculative theories as, for instance, Hawking and Mlodonow’s book The Grand Design (2010) which they tout as providing new answers to age-old …

Emancipatory Learning, Open Educational Resources, Open Education, And Digital Critical Participatory Action Research, Jason Leggett, Jay Wen, Anthony Chatman

Publications and Research

Given that we must prepare students for the future workforce today how can we use the power of Open Educational Resources (OERs) and Digital Social Science research to improve student learning and help students develop technical skills needed for the high-tech workforce? In this article, we use transformative learning theory (Mezirow, 1978) and Digital + Critical Participatory Action Research (D+CPAR) to analyze the effectiveness of integrating OERs into a course and reflect on how we used OERs to support student learning and make civic engagement more equitable at an urban community college. In a criminal justice course analyzing the legal …

The Effects Of Rehabilitation On The Ability To Reintegrate Into Society, Benjamin J. Troxell

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

With crime and recidivism rates so high in the United States, a focus on reintegration and rehabilitation are key in order to allow these individuals to be productive, successful members of society upon release. The following research will investigate the struggles of post-incarceration life for several individuals in a particular rehabilitation program and try to understand how the program they are a part of is aiding them with these struggles. Factors detrimental to reintegration, protective factors against recidivism, environmental factors that aid reintegration, and employment post-incarceration will be examined to gain a better understanding of the life ex-offenders face and …

Evolutionary Theory And Criminology, Anthony Walsh, Cody Jorgensen

Criminal Justice Faculty Publications and Presentations

In this chapter, we (a) demonstrate the relevance of evolutionary theory to criminology, (b) discuss the evolutionary origins of both prosocial and antisocial traits, and (c) show that evolutionary theory is invaluable to understanding two key issues that have been impervious to solution using the standard social science model—the sex ratio in criminal offending and the age-crime curve.

Media Exposure And Social Response As Predictors Of Citizen's Attitudes Toward Police, Tara A. Garrison

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Police-involved deaths of African Americans have increased over the past two decades, with continued high-profile media exposure. The problem is that extant research provided only a partial understanding and disparate focus about how media exposure, social responses, social media use, and attitudes towards police were possibly related to citizens witnessing acts of police-initiated actions against African Americans in the United States. The purpose of this quantitative study was to assess the predictive nature of media exposure, social response, and social media use concerning citizens' attitudes towards police. The two theories supporting this study and shaped this hypothetical system are media …

Causes Of Recidivism Among Mentally Ill Prerelease Offenders From The Perspective Of Former Correctional Mental Health Professionals, Rina Desiree Deneice Bradley Brown

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The move toward reducing the prison population was driven by an increase in the number of reentry programs that focused on the needs of the offender, such as the provision of stable housing, employment, education, and sustaining strong familial bonds. While the literature supported these areas as being effective in reducing recidivism, there was no consensus that they were effective for offenders with mental illness (OMI). The purpose of this qualitative study was to analyze the impact of prerelease services for the OMI population from the perspective of former correctional mental health professionals who provided these services. The research questions …

Advocating Ideal Type Policy For Police Officer Wellness Based On Body Mass Index As A Predictor Of Self-Reported Occupational Stress, Louis Chiappetta

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Scholars have validated both the damaging presence of police officer stress and separately, their increasing obese condition in the United States. Previous studies of police officers focus on stress or body weight, but not these variables conjointly. The purpose of this study was to inform policy creation by examining the problem of officer stress in relation to the calculated body mass index (BMI) values and to gain insight into stress outcomes. Lazarus and Folkman's stress-coping theory served as the research lens to examine if BMI would significantly contribute to the percent change of R2 variance accounted for in the predictive …

Reentry Practitioners' Perceptions Of Constraints During Ex-Offenders' Job Search Process, Crystal Raquel Francis

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Unemployment among formerly incarcerated citizens is a complex problem that continues to grow. Previous reentry studies describe the collateral effects of incarceration on employment from the perspective of formerly incarcerated individuals, yet little academic research exists regarding reentry practitioners' perceptions of constraints during the job search process. Using Goldratt's theory of constraints as the foundation, the purpose of this case study of reentry and employment in a mid-Atlantic state was to explore from the perspective of practitioners, the types of constraints individuals with criminal records face during the job search process, the most difficult phase of the job search process, …

The Need For De-Escalation Techniques In Civil Disturbances, George Raymond Mccord Jr

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The response to civil disturbances has historically been the aggressive use of force or escalation with tactics such as the use of police dogs, armed federal troops during war protests, and police field forces. These types of tactics can escalate tensions between protestors and police and only add to the violence and destruction of the incident. To reduce the violence between protestors and the police and the destruction often associated with civil disturbances, it is necessary to examine the need to include de-escalation techniques in the responses. This study utilized 3 theoretical frameworks, the chaos theory, the behavioral decision theory …

Legal Deserts: A Multi-State Perspective On Rural Access To Justice, Lisa R. Pruitt, Amanda L. Kool, Lauren Sudeall, Michele Statz, Danielle M. Conway, Hannah Haksgaard

Faculty Publications By Year

Rural America faces an increasingly dire access-to-justice crisis, which serves to exacerbate the already disproportionate share of social problems afflicting rural areas. One critical aspect of the crisis is the dearth of information and research regarding the extent of the problem and its impacts. This Article begins to fill that gap by providing surveys of rural access to justice in six geographically, demographically, and economically varied states: California, Georgia, Maine, Minnesota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. In addition to providing insights about the distinct rural challenges confronting each of these states, the legal resources available, and existing policy responses, the Article …

The Origins And Development Of Judicial Tenure 'During Good Behavior' To 1485, Ryan Rowberry

Faculty Publications By Year

No abstract provided.

Implementing A Public Health Perspective In Fda Drug Regulation, Patricia J. Zettler, Margaret Foster Riley, Aaron S. Kesselheim

Faculty Publications By Year

There is, without question, a public health crisis in the United States arising from both illicit and prescription opioid misuse, addiction, and overdose. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is one regulator with an important role to play in minimizing the harms associated with prescription opioids, while also ensuring that prescription opioids are available for the evidence-based management of pain. One question, however, is to what extent the agency can consider in its decisions to approve opioids and keep existing ones on the market the provider and patient behaviors contributing to the epidemic. This is, in part, because FDA’s approval …

Modeling Job Stress Among Police Officers: Interplay Of Work Environment, Counseling Support, And Family Discussion With Co-Workers, Lily Chi-Fang Tsai, Claire Nolasco, Michael S. Vaughn

Criminology and Criminal Justice Faculty Publications (Archived)

Existing literature indicates that various factors affect police stress. This article uses data from the ‘Work and Family Services for Law Enforcement Personnel in the United States, 1995’ downloaded from the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (‘ICPSR’) website. Respondents include 594 sworn police officers from 21 agencies in New York City. Using structural equation modeling, results indicate that sex, race, education, and tenure do not have a direct influence on total job stress, but have a direct impact on family discussion with co-workers, counseling support, and negative working environment. Rank has a direct impact on total job stress, …

The Downstream Effects Of Bail And Pretrial Detention On Racial Disparities In Incarceration, Ellen A. Donnelly, John M. Macdonald

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

Bail and pretrial detention decisions may have important consequences for racial disparities in incarceration rates. Poor minority defendants who are unable to post bail and get released from jail before trial may be more likely to plead guilty and accept longer sentences of incarceration. Racial disparities in incarceration sentences may then reflect a combination of differences in the seriousness of a defendant’s case, criminal history, and economic resources to pay bail. This study examines the extent to which bail decision-making and pretrial detention explain Black-White disparities in criminal adjudications and sentences in the Delaware courts from 2012 to 2014. Over …

Now You See Me: Problems And Strategies For Introducing Gender Self-Determination Into The Eighth Amendment For Gender Nonconforming Prisoners, Lizzie Bright

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology

As the fight for transgender rights becomes more visible in the United States, the plight of incarcerated transgender individuals seeking medical care behind bars is likewise gaining attention—and some trans prisoners are gaining access to gender-affirming care. However, progress for incarcerated members of the trans community has been slow, piecemeal, and not without problems. As federal court opinions in Eighth Amendment access-to-care cases brought by trans prisoners show, how a court interprets the subjective intent requirements of the Eighth Amendment and how the imprisoned plaintiff pleads his/her/their case can make or break the claim. Further, courts and plaintiffs rely on …

Vocational And Life Skills Monthly Data Update: January 2018, Uno Nebraska Center For Justice Research, Johanna Peterson

Reports

Grantees use an online data management system to submit data on participants served under their Vocational and Life Skills programming. This data is due monthly and reflects all services provided during the previous month to participants. Evaluators at the Nebraska Center for Justice Research work with grantees directly to correct any data errors on an ongoing basis during monthly update calls and regular site visits.

Data presented below is from the most recent monthly data extract. Because this data comes for an active database with live data being entered and updated daily, data, including previously submitted information, may fluctuate depending …

Adult Justice In Nebraska 2018, Sara Toto, Ryan E. Spohn, Emily M. Wright, Tara Grell, Nebraska Center For Justice Research, University Of Nebraska At Omaha

Reports

The Nebraska Center for Justice Research was established in 2014 with a mission to develop and sustain research capacity internal to the State of Nebraska, assist the Legislature in research, evaluation, and policymaking to reduce recidivism, promote the use of evidence-based practices in corrections, and improve public safety. The primary purpose of this report is to provide an overview of recent trends in Nebraska’s adult criminal justice system. Most of the data in this report is presented statewide as well as separated into Nebraska’s twelve judicial districts. Nebraska’s two most metropolitan counties are represented by District 4 (Douglas County) and …

Police Interrogation, Philip M. Stinson

Criminal Justice Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.