Criminology Commons^™

Improving Law Enforcement’S Victim-Centric Responses To Sexual Assault: Global Best Practice Catalog, Ayesha Ashraf, Sebastián Galleguillos Agurto, Frederick Geyer, Kamela Gjoka, Jasmine Hwang, Stanley Montinat, Jessica Moor, Pierre Reyes, Tara Ventimiglia, Hongda Xu

Publications and Research

This catalog was compiled as part of a U.S. State Department Diplomacy Lab Project entitled “Improving Law Enforcement’s Victim-Centric Responses to Sexual Assault,” in fall semester of 2019, for American Citizens Services, US Embassy Bangkok. It is intended to cover best practices in law enforcement response to sexual assault across the globe, including laws, policies and programs.Ten multilingual graduate students in the capstone seminar of the Master of Arts Degree Program in International Crime and Justice at John Jay College of Criminal Justice (CUNY) established criteria for inclusion and standardized elements for each entry in this catalog. The ultimate aim …

Human Rights? What A Good Idea! From Universal Jurisdiction To Crime Prevention, Daniel Feierstein

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

Over the last decades, Genocide Studies has entered in a “comfort zone.” With fellowships and support from governments or NGOs, we have developed a very comfortable environment in which the knowledge we produce about genocide prevention is neither critical nor useful. We have become trapped by assumptions we have never checked against reality and many of us have chosen to work inside the circle of those assumptions: genocide and mass violence are horrible acts committed by horrible people; we cannot stand by and do nothing; we have the responsibility to protect civilian populations and that responsibility takes the form, as …

Brief Literature Review On Conscientiousness And Responsivity To Cbi Programming, Ernest M. Oleksy

The Downtown Review

This article reviews the literature of how individual differences (specifically trait conscientiousness) may contribute to ex-offender responsivity to reentry programming. By studying if individual differences (e.g. personality traits) contribute to specific responsivity, programming can be determined to be ineffective for the general population and redesigned in a manner that is beneficial for the largest number of clients. To that end, this literature review provides a conceptual foundation for potential future studies, based on what previous researchers have found in their own studies. With this knowledge, future researchers will be better equipped to make sense of findings once they analyze their …

Getting Out: Bruce Bryant’S Climb To Redemption Inside Prison, Rachel M. Rippetoe, Sean Sanders-Mills

Capstones

Bruce Bryant, 50, was convicted of the murder of 11-year-old Travis Lilley in June 1996. Bryant maintains he never fired a weapon that day in 1993. But he recognizes that his lifestyle as a young person — he started dealing drugs when he was 14 — contributed to an environment in which a stray bullet could take a young life. And for that reason, he’s spent most of his 25 years in prison working to help young people.

With at least 12 more years on his sentence, Bryant is now asking the governor for early release, with the hope that …

The Criminogenic Effect Of Marijuana Dispensaries In Denver, Colorado: A Microsynthetic Control Quasi-Experiment And Cost-Benefit Analysis, Nathan Connealy, Eric L. Piza, Dave Hatten

Publications and Research

The study analyzed the criminogenic effect of legalizing recreational marijuana dispensaries in Denver. Street segments with recreational dispensaries experienced no changes in violent, disorder and drug crime but did experience an 18% increase in property crime, and street segments adjacent to recreational dispensaries experienced some notable (but non-significant) drug and disorder crime increases. Medical dispensaries demonstrated no significant crime changes. A cost-benefit analysis found the associated crime costs were largely offset by sales revenue. Monetary benefits were much less pronounced, and barely cost effective, when only considering tax revenue.

Mentor Program Evaluation Report, Caitlin J. Taylor

Sociology and Criminal Justice Faculty work

This report details a three year evaluation of the MENTOR (Mentors Empowering to Overcome Recidivism) Program in the Philadelphia court system. MENTOR program participants who are serving county probation sentences are matched with a volunteer mentor from the community, receive case management from MENTOR staff, and attend a monthly status hearing with one of the MENTOR judges. The program evaluation relied on several data sources to assess program effectiveness, including surveys and focus groups with mentees, online monthly reports from mentors, internally collected program data on service referrals, interviews with stakeholders, and official records from Adult Probation and Parole Department …

An Exploratory Study Of Duty-Related Stress Among Conservation Officers, Logan Ledford

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Research relating to police stress has typically focused on officers working in urban areas, neglecting their rural counterparts. This is especially true of conservation officers, who are tasked with enforcing laws in state parks and other recreational areas. To date, only a handful of studies have sought to better understand their experiences and perceptions. The current study seeks to further our understanding of conservation officer stress in three unique ways: (1) via applying McCreary and Thompson’s (2006) operational police stress scale (PSQ-Op) to the population, (2) determining whether officer characteristics (e.g., age, education, length of service) affect perceived stress, and …

Money Laundering In The Commercial Sex Market In The United States, Youngbee Dale

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

This paper describes money laundering techniques used by different criminal organizations operating in the U.S. sex market. Prior to this study, scholars have not investigated money laundering techniques used in the U.S. sex market in a comprehensive manner. This paper describes and categorizes methods used for money laundering. It discusses the similarities and differences in money laundering techniques in the U.S. sex markets. Current challenges to combating money laundering are reviewed and recommendations are made to strengthen the ongoing fight against money laundering in the U.S. sex markets.

The Myth Of The "Gray Area" In Rape: Fabricating Ambiguity And Deniability, Maddie Brockbank

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

Sexual violence is a pervasive issue identified on post-secondary campuses. Existing research focuses almost exclusively on an American context and quantitatively explores the frequency with which sexual assault occurs on campuses. As men are overrepresented as perpetrators, it is necessary to investigate their perspectives on the issue. The present study qualitatively examines the perspectives of white, heterosexual, male students to facilitate dialogue about sexual violence on university campuses in Ontario. Several themes emerged, specifically pertaining to negotiations of consent, a perceived “grey area,” peer influence, and how the social construction of masculinity fosters specific beliefs that excuse sexually violent beliefs, …

A Venue To Grow: Researching Professional Growth In The Collaborative Courts Of The Northern District Of California, Wyatt Lim-Tepper

Master's Projects and Capstones

This study examines the professional growth of collaborative court staff in the Northern District of California (NDCA). First, it sets forth a background that reviews the history of collaborative courts and details the development, purpose and structure, and current processes at the federal level. Second, the researcher describes the framework of the NDCA as an institution and further identifies the stakeholders who participate in the NDCA’s two collaborative courts: the Reentry Court and the Conviction Alternatives Program (CAP). Third, the study reviews the literature on professional growth in the legal field, education and academia, and public-health fields. Fourth, this paper …

Communications And Methodologies In Crime Geography: Contemporary Approaches To Disseminating Criminal Incidence And Research, Mitchell Ogden

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Many tools exist to assist law enforcement agencies in mitigating criminal activity. For centuries, academics used statistics in the study of crime and criminals, and more recently, police departments make use of spatial statistics and geographic information systems in that pursuit. Clustering and hot spot methods of analysis are popular in this application for their relative simplicity of interpretation and ease of process. With recent advancements in geospatial technology, it is easier than ever to publicly share data through visual communication tools like web applications and dashboards. Sharing data and results of analyses boosts transparency and the public image of …

Private Security And Cctv Surveillance: A Systematic Review Of Function And Performance, Brandon C. Welsh, Eric L. Piza, Amanda L. Thomas, David P. Farrington

Publications and Research

Private security personnel play an important but largely overlooked role in the operation of CCTV surveillance to prevent crime in public and private areas. This role can take a number of forms, including active monitoring of cameras. Drawing upon a global database of CCTV evaluations (N=165), this article examines the function and performance of private security personnel as related to the effectiveness of CCTV. Findings indicate that CCTV schemes operated by private security personnel generated larger crime prevention effects than those operated by police or those using a mix of police and security personnel. Policy and research implications are discussed.

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 …

Awareness Of Sex Offender Registration Policies And Self-Reported Sexual Offending In A Community Sample Of Adolescents, Cynthia J. Najdowski, Hayley M. D. Cleary

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Sex offender registration laws are widely implemented, increasingly restrictive, and intended to serve both specific and general deterrent functions. Most states have some form of policy mechanism to place adolescents on sex offender registries, yet it remains unclear whether adolescents possess the requisite policy awareness to be deterred from sexual offending. This study examined awareness of sex offender registration as a potential sanction and its cross-sectional association with engagement in several registrable sexual behaviors (sexting, indecent exposure, sexual solicitation, and forcible touching) in a community sample of 144 adolescents. Results revealed that many adolescents were unaware that these behaviors could …

County Probation: A Service-Learning And Community Engagement Project For Criminology, Abby Byrnes, Chelsea Scuderi, Lindsay Smalec, Vince Filippini, Sarah Mooney

The International Undergraduate Journal For Service-Learning, Leadership, and Social Change

Our group focused on understanding the role of the probation office in the criminal justice system and in society. We were fortunate enough to work with the Union County Probation Office where we focused on adult probation, juvenile probation, and treatment court. We focused specifically on how it works, the effects of probation on society, and the differences between juvenile and adult probation. Much of what we learned through our participation at the Union County Probation Office relates to topics we covered in class discussions, debates, and in the textbook readings, making this a very worthwhile experience for our learning. …

Crime By Policewomen In The United States, 2005-2014, Chloe Wentzlof, Philip M. Stinson

Criminal Justice Faculty Publications

This study is a replication and extension of Stinson, Todak, and Dodge’s (2015) study of crime by policewomen across the United States in years 2005-2007. The sample for the current study includes 597 arrest cases involving 555 female police officers, each of whom were arrested during the decade 2005-2014. The arrested female officers were employed by 353 state and local law enforcement agencies located in 273 counties and independent cities within 44 states and the District of Columbia. Findings indicate that crimes committed by policewomen are most often violence-related, alcohol-related, and/or profit-motivated offenses. Descriptive and bivariate statistics are reported on …

Police Crime Across The Life Course: An Exploratory Study Of Arrested Officers Who Reoffend, Chloe Wentzlof, Philip M. Stinson

Criminal Justice Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study is to improve policing and inform the public about police crime and patterns of repeat or habitual police crime offenders. The study identified 10,287 arrest cases involving 8,495 individual nonfederal sworn law enforcement officers, each of whom were arrested during the decade 2005-2014. Of these, 505 officers (5.94%) were arrested more than once in the study years and account for 1,343 (13.06%) of the arrest cases in our database. This poster presents data on the criminal arrest cases and the officers who have been arrested multiple times while employed by a state or local law …

The Cybercrime Triangle, Sinchul Back

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Information technology can increase the convergence of three dimensions of the crime triangle due to the spatial and temporal confluence in the virtual world. In other words, its advancement can lead to facilitating criminals with more chances to commit a crime against suitable targets living in different real-world time zones without temporal and spatial orders. However, within this mechanism, cybercrime can be discouraged “…if the cyber-adversary is handled, the target/victim is guarded, or the place is effectively managed” (Wilcox & Cullen, 2018, p. 134). In fact, Madensen and Eck (2013) assert that only one effective controller is enough to prevent …

Are Domestic Incidents Really More Dangerous To Police? Findings From The 2016 National Incident Based Reporting System, Justin Nix, Tara Richards, Gillian M. Pinchevsky, Emily M. Wright

Criminology and Criminal Justice Faculty Publications

It is widely believed among police officers that domestic incidents are among the most dangerous incidents to which they respond. However, most research in this area suffers from the “denominator problem,” where prior studies have focused on incidents resulting in harm to police officers and failed to account for incidents not resulting in harm. Such methodologies can produce drastically misleading results. This paper uses data from the 2016 National Incident Based Reporting System (NIBRS) to overcome the denominator problem. We examine the probability of (1) an officer being assaulted and (2) an officer being injured or killed when responding to …

Exploring The Relationship Between Drug And Alcohol Treatment Facilities And Violent And Property Crime: A Socioeconomic Contingent Relationship, Christopher Salvatore, Travis A. Taniguchi

Christopher Salvatore

Siting of drug and alcohol treatment facilities is often met with negative reactions because of the assumption that these facilities increase crime by attracting drug users (and possibly dealers) to an area. This assumption, however, rests on weak empirical footings that have not been subjected to strong empirical analyses. Using census block groups from Philadelphia, PA, it was found that the criminogenic impact of treatment facilities in and near a neighborhood on its violent and property crime rates may be contingent on the socioeconomic status (SES) of the neighborhood. Paying attention to both the density and proximity of facilities in …

The Emerging Adulthood Gap: Integrating Emerging Adulthood Into Life Course Criminology, Christopher Salvatore

Christopher Salvatore

The aim of this study is to provide a theoretical mechanism, the ‘emerging adulthood gap,’ to integrate emerging adulthood into the life course or developmental area of criminological theory. This paper will present the ‘what’ of the emerging adulthood gap by introducing the concept and integrating it into existing theoretical paradigms, the ‘how’ by examining how social circumstances have altered the life course leading to the evolution of emerging adulthood as a distinct stage of the life course and to the ‘emerging adulthood gap,’ and the ‘why’ of the ‘emerging adulthood gap’ by discussing the decreased level of informal social …

Is Emerging Adulthood Influencing Moffitt’S Developmental Taxonomy? Adding The “Prolonged” Adolescent Offender, Christopher Salvatore, Travis A. Taniguchi, Wayne Welsh

Christopher Salvatore

The study of offender trajectories has been a prolific area of criminological research. However, few studies have incorporated the influence of emerging adulthood, a recently identified stage of the life course, on offending trajectories. The present study addressed this shortcoming by introducing the "prolonged adolescent" offender, a low-level offender between the ages of 18 and 25 that has failed to successfully transition into adult social roles. A theoretical background based on prior research in life-course criminology and emerging adulthood is presented. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health analyses examined the relationship between indicators of traditional turning …

Where Concerned Citizens Perceive Police As More Responsive To Troublesome Teen Groups: Theoretical Implications For Political Economy, Incivilities And Policing, Christopher Salvatore, Ralph B. Taylor, Christopher Kelly

Christopher Salvatore

The current investigation extends previous work on citizens' perceptions of police performance. It examines the origins of between-community differences in concerned citizens' judgments that police are responding sufficiently to a local social problem. The problem is local unsupervised teen groups, a key indicator for both the revised systemic social disorganization perspective and the incivilities thesis. Four theoretical perspectives predict ecological determinants of these shared judgments. Less perceived police responsiveness is anticipated in lower socioeconomic status (SES) police districts by both a political economy and a stratified incivilities perspective; more predominantly minority police districts by a racialized justice perspective; and in …

Less Safe In The Ivory Tower: Campus Sexual Assault Policy In The Trump Administration, Leah C. Butler, Heejin Lee, Bonnie S. Fisher

Criminology and Criminal Justice Faculty Publications

Since the late 20th century, the federal government has regulated colleges’ and universities’ handling of campus sexual and gender-based violence (CSGBV). Although the arc of history has bent toward establishing greater protections for victims of such violence, new proposed regulation by the U.S. Department of Education under the Trump administration focuses more heavily on ensuring due process rights for students accused of CSGBV. Most recently, in November 2018, U.S. Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos submitted a proposed rule change to the regulation of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. This article provides the historical context for this …

Police Integrity Lost Podcast Episode 54: Former Police Chief On Trial For Federal Hate Crime, Philip M. Stinson

Philip M Stinson

This episode of the Police Integrity Lost Podcast features an interview of Professor Phil Stinson by Matt Katz that originally aired on the PRI show The Takeaway on September 26, 2019.

Employing An Intentional Mentoring Model For Delinquent Youth., Anne M. Hobbs

Criminology and Criminal Justice Faculty Proceedings & Presentations

Employing an Intentional Mentoring Model for Delinquent Youth Delinquent youth often do not receive the opportunity to be mentored. This is especially true for youth who have committed serious law violations and are detained. In Nebraska, the Youth Rehabilitation and Treatment Centers (YRTCs) are the highest level of care for delinquent youth within the state. Under Nebraska law, a youth is committed to the YRTC only after all community-based services and every level of probation supervision has been exhausted (Sec. 43-286). In 2011, the Juvenile Justice Institute (JJI) agreed to teach a course on mentoring delinquent youth and to match …

Racial Differences In Conceptualizing Legitimacy And Trust In Police, Erin M. Kearns, Emma Ashooh, Belen Lowrey-Kinberg

Criminology and Criminal Justice Faculty Publications

Scholarly debate on how best to conceptualize legitimacy and trust in police has generally assumed these conceptualizations are stable across demographics. Recent evidence, however, suggests that this may not be the case. We examine how the public conceptualizes legitimacy and trust in police, how public conceptualizations relate to academic debate on these terms, and how public views differ between and within racial groups. This work is exploratory, though it is rooted in differences found in theoretically driven empirical work on the subject. Data are from online, national samples of White (N = 650), Black (N = 624), and …

Women And Crime, Samantha M. Caimi

Undergraduate Research

This paper examines the role of gender in three high profile criminal cases involving women. Each case highlights different circumstances of women involved in crime and the consequences of a justice system that does not acknowledge and address the role of gender in women’s criminal involvement. First, Cyntoia Brown’s case demonstrates the challenges specific to poor girls of color. Second, the case of Yeardley Love delineates the danger women face in their relationships with male intimate partners. Finally, the highly controversial case of Casey Anthony illustrates the societal pressure on women as mothers and the need to address potential biases …

“Un Sistema Abandonado”: Una Investigación Sobre El Acceso A Servicios De Salud Sexual Integral Para Mujeres Privadas De La Libertad En Argentina. / “An Abandoned System”: An Investigation Into The Access Of Comprehensive Sexual Health Services For Incarcerated Women In Argentina., Erica Harp

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

En esta investigación, exploramos algunas percepciones del acceso a servicios de salud sexual integral para mujeres privadas de su libertad en Argentina. Las mujeres tienen necesidades de salud muy específicas, y aunque cada una tiene el derecho humano a una atención de salud adecuada, esto no se cumple en muchos casos. Con respecto a la salud en contextos de encierro, Argentina sigue las reglas de Bangkok, leyes federales y provinciales, que requieren atención médica adecuada para mujeres. Investigaciones anteriores han mostrado que hay una gran falta de atención médica en los sistemas penitenciarios del país, específicamente de servicios complementarios como …

Book Review Of A General Theory Of Crime, Paul Marcus

Paul Marcus

No abstract provided.