Criminology Commons^™

Support From Inside Out: Exploring Whether Various Social Supports Assist In Reducing Prison Rule Violations, Sarah Renee Lazzari

Dissertations and Theses

Scholars argue that prison rule violations are a way to assess whether individuals are engaging in prosocial behaviors. Individuals who engage in prosocial behaviors, during periods of incarceration, are less likely to engage in behaviors that result in official rule violations. Decreasing rule violations is one way to work towards a safer prison environment, while also preparing individuals for release. The current study uses cross-sectional data form the 2004 Survey of Inmates in State and Federal Facilities, in order to examine whether multiple types of prisons programs, which will be framed as various types of social supports, influence the frequency …

The Influence Of Age At Migration On Criminal Offending Among Foreign-Born Immigrants, Omar Melchor-Ayala

Dissertations and Theses

Domestic and international events -- such as the recent migrant caravans from Central and South America, and the records number of migrant children detained at the border -- have brought renewed attention to the adaptation of immigrants in the United States. More specifically, questions regarding whether the population of immigrants is driving the "crime problem," have taken center stage. Immigrants vary significantly in terms of when they migrate into the country. According to the Current Population Survey (CPS), the population of approximately 12 million foreign-born immigrant children living in the United States is split in terms of their age and …

Interrogating The Construction And Representations Of Criminalized Women In The Academic Social Work Literature: A Critical Discourse Analysis, Sandra Marie Leotti

Dissertations and Theses

In the United States today, there are 2.3 million people behind bars in jails and prisons. Mass incarceration has swept up the United States to such a degree that we are known globally for holding more people in correctional facilities than any other country in the world. Although women have always, and still do, reflect a smaller proportion of the correctional population, over the last 40 years, their rates of criminalization and imprisonment have far outpaced that of men's. Drastic increases in the criminalization of women are intimately connected to the entrenchment of social disadvantage enabled under neoliberal globalization. Neoliberal …

Closure Or Censure? Examining The Determinants Of Disclosure Of Sexual Assault Among College Students, Whitney Head-Burgess

Dissertations and Theses

Sexual assault is an ongoing problem on college campuses, with some projections indicating that one in four college women has experienced some sexual coercion or assault during her time at university. Recent national policy has strove to address the problem through legislation like the 2013 Campus Sexual Violence Elimination Act. Nonetheless, the crime remains the most underreported in the nation despite policy and law which explicitly defines what constitutes sexual assault. However, most victims of sexual assault will disclose what happened to someone else, even if they choose not to report.

This research examines sexual assault disclosure practices on a …

Effects Of Regulation Intensity On Marijuana Black Market After Legalization, Sikang Song

Dissertations and Theses

Since 2012, many states and Canada have legalized the use and sale of recreational marijuana. One of the expected benefits of the legalization is that the establishment of a legal cannabis market would eliminate the black market which has been the main form of marijuana trade for decades. Even though legal options are available for marijuana producers and consumers, the black market is still thriving in states where recreational marijuana has been legalized. The reasons behind the persistence of the marijuana black market are complex. One of the main arguments is that the legalized states have failed to establish a …

An Evaluation Of Clackamas County's Transition Center Using Propensity Score Modeling, Alicia De Jong Mckay

Dissertations and Theses

Part of the purpose of Justice Reinvestment Initiatives (JRIs) involve a focus of funds and effort toward implementing practices that increase the chances of successful reintegration of people recently released from incarceration. Similar to other jurisdictions, Oregon's JRI has taken a number of forms of reintegrative efforts. In 2016, JRI funding opened a services hub and reintegration/reentry center in a rural county. The Center offers a central location for reentry services, such as employment and housing assistance, but is not a requirement of an offender's supervision. Relying on the risk-need-responsivity framework, this program aims to reduce recidivism by mitigating barriers …

Gender And The Voir Dire Process, Tasha Ann Lane

Dissertations and Theses

The jury selection process (also known as voir dire) has been examined previously in many ways, including racial impacts. Previous research suggests the need for more examination of how and if gender impacts the voir dire process. The lack of knowledge about how gender impacts voir dire might also have implications for public respect and trust in the court system. For example, theories of procedural justice suggest that individual experiences with the legal system affect whether they view the entire legal system as being legitimate. This is important because this perception then impacts how the public interact with the system. …

Spatial Analysis Of Burglary And Robbery Crime Concentration Near Mass-Transit In Portland, Bryce Edward Barthuly

Dissertations and Theses

The relationship between mass-transit and the concentration of burglary and robbery crimes is inconsistent within the available literature in environmental criminology. A number of studies have provided evidence of crime concentration at and near mass transit locations where paths intersect, referred to as a node. These empirical studies bring in environmental criminology theory with the idea that crime is clustered, and the pattern of the concentrations is substantially influenced by how and why people travel and move in a city. It is suggested that public transit allows for a large proportion of the population to move around the community along …

Effect Of Pretrial Detention In Oregon: Testimony To The Senate And House Judiciary Committees, Christopher M. Campbell, Ryan M. Labrecque

Criminology and Criminal Justice Faculty Publications and Presentations

What is the relationship between pretrial detention and sentencing outcomes in Oregon? This presentation examines the effect of being detained through disposition, and the effect of days spent in detention. The data shows that, controlling for all other measures, fully detained defendants are over twice as likely to be incarcerated. This probability increases the longer a person is detained. The authors believe this means that counties should continue to explore ways to reduce pretrial detention, be more selective in holding defendants over 30 days, and should examine different pretrial risk assessments.

Untitled Screenplay, Lora A. Herman

University Honors Theses

The following document is a working copy of an untitled fictional screenplay in which the story and characters are the original work of Lora A. Herman.

In 2082 North America, the United States no longer exists as a governing entity. The vast majority of the landscape that once comprised the USA is unlivable due to irreparable advances in climate change -- flood, fire, freeze, and drought.

The remaining society has restructured itself to focus less on controlling its population and their free will, and to instead focus on maintaining the integrity of and resources for the man-made contained communities that …

Effect Of Prison Length Of Stay In Oregon, Mark Harmon, Christopher M. Campbell, Kris R. Henning, Brian Renauer

Criminology and Criminal Justice Faculty Publications and Presentations

Oregon’s Justice Reinvestment Initiative (JRI), “is an approach to spending resources more effectively with the goals of reducing recidivism, decreasing prison use, protecting the public and holding offenders accountable (Oregon Criminal Justice Commission, 2019).” To maximize the effectiveness of Justice Reinvestment programs, policy makers need to understand the relationship between imprisonment, particularly length of stay (LOS), and recidivism. Subsequently, the Oregon Criminal Justice Commission (CJC) sought to conduct a LOS study in Oregon similar to a study completed by Snodgrass et al (2011). The goal of Portland State University’s (PSU) analysis is to provide useful information for Oregon’s JRI effort …

Preventing Child Sexual Abuse And Juvenile Offending Through Parental Monitoring, Kelly E. Stewart

Dissertations and Theses

In this dissertation, I present three manuscripts to investigate the prevention of a range of crimes committed against, and by, youth, using parental monitoring or guardianship. In the first paper, I tested whether the routine activities of juvenile sexual offenders (JSOs) and their victims' caregivers was associated with the JSO being placed into a supervisory role, and whether subgroup differences existed in the use of modus operandi strategies between JSO supervisors and non-supervisors (Chapter II). Findings indicated that parents' need for childcare assistance predicted JSO supervisor status more strongly than perpetrators efforts to get the child alone or disruptions to …

Opportunity And Rationality As An Explanation For Suspicious Vehicle Fires: Demonstrating The Relevance Of Time, Place, And Economic Factors, Hannah Kelly, Joseph Clare, Kathryn Wuschke, Len Garis

Criminology and Criminal Justice Faculty Publications and Presentations

Opportunity theories of crime emphasize the non-random spatial and temporal patterning of criminal events. Such theoretical development has proven useful when extended beyond traditional applications to crime event data. This study continues to explore the wider utility of such criminological theories by examining the spatio-temporal patterns of vehicle fires through an opportunity lens. Specifically, we explore the patterns associated with different types of vehicle fires, and consider longitudinal socio-economic trends that may influence the perceived costs and benefits associated with crimes committed with the intention of escaping debt, such as vehicle arson. Data for this study were obtained from Surrey …