SOC Midterm 1 PDF

- Criminologists explain crime by looking at its etiology - Criminal justice scholars describe/analyze the work of the police, courts, and corrections and how to better design effective methods of crime control - Punishment systems must be graduated so that the punishment closely...

- Criminologists explain crime by looking at its etiology - Criminal justice scholars describe/analyze the work of the police, courts, and corrections and how to better design effective methods of crime control - Punishment systems must be graduated so that the punishment closely matches the crime - Punishments must be swift, certain, and severe - Positivism: human behavior results from external forces beyond individual control - Positivism relies on the scientific method to solve problems - The earliest method to understand criminality was biological - Physiognomy: facial feature - Phrenology: skull and bumps - Cesare Lombroso : inspired criminal anthropology - Atavistic anomalies: physical characteristics of born criminals=enormous jaws, strong canine teeth, small wandering eyes, asymmetrical face, long arms, etc - Claimed that criminogenic traits could be acquired through indirect heredity - Chicago school: extension of sociological positivism - Research on the social ecology of the city - Social institutions are unable to control behavior - Ecological study of crime: crime in the context of where a person lives - Socialization view of crime: crime occurs when there’s an absence of pro-social influence Which of the following theorists or theoretical schools would be most likely to hold a structural perspective of criminology?  a. Cesare Lombroso b. Jeremy Bentham c. The Chicago School d. Cesare Beccaria - Criminal statistics: measure the amount and trends of criminal activity through valid crime data - Sociology of law: the history and origin of law, and what factors influence law in society - Theory construction: understanding the cause of crime rates and trends - Criminal behavior systems: the nature and cause of specific crime patterns - Penology: the correction and control of criminal behavior - Victimology: the nature and cause of victimization - Ethics: funding can influence the direction of research - Power imbalances between researches and official institutions can potentially put subjects at risk - Focus on minorities may influence public perception, lead to aggressive policing “Doing criminology” end of page 19 beginning of page 23- there may be one or two MC questions from this section - Deviance: departs from social norms and on their own, are not the subject of formal/criminal sanction, in easy words: unusual or unacceptable behavior, eg. being very loud - Crime: a violation of an explicit codified law that is enforced by government bodies, in easy words: illegal behavior that can be punished by law, eg. theft, assault - All crimes are deviant but not all deviant behaviors are crime - Society defines what is deviant and what isn’t - Deviance is not intrinsic (essential to something else), it is a product of social processes - Consensus view of crime: it is not a crime unless it is prohibited by the criminal law - Consensus implies what behaviors should be viewed as crimes - Consensus view is accepted by many criminologists but some dispute over whether the law is applied uniformly - Conflict view of crime: crime is controlled by wealth, power, and position, not moral consensus - Crime is a political concept: we should consider the following to be crimes Violation of human rights Unsafe working conditions Inadequate employment, childcare, housing, education Police brutality Environmental pollution Assassination and war making - Interactionist view of crime: based on symbolic interactionism - People act according to their own interpretations of reality - People learn meanings based on the reactions of others - People re-evaluate and interpret their own behavior according to meanings and symbols learned from others - Moral entrepreneurs: interest groups or individual who promote their own values onto others - Crime has no meaning unless people react to it - Why study crime rates: develop theories to explain crime - Create better policies to control/ eliminate crime - Knowledge brings prediction and control - Crime rates are affected by 5 factors:  1. Report sensitive: victims may be unwilling to report crimes 2. Policing sensitive: the level of police enforcement will affect crime rates 3. Definition sensitive: changes in how law is understood 4. Media sensitive: the media influences public concern, public concern influences police reporting 5. Real trends: we do see changes and trends in criminal behavior outside of these influences - Crime rates are uncovered through: The uniform crime report (UCR) - Revised in 1984 to gather information on accused, victim, and incident characteristics - Crime severity index weights the seriousness of offenses - Self report surveys: used by criminologists to combat the issues with official statistics - Victimization surveys: addresses crimes that victims may be less likely to report - UCR: only covers crimes not been found through police investigation - UCR collects accused and victims characteristics - UCR2 collects incident based data - unfounded/ false reports are excluded from the count - Crime rate: calculated by dividing the total number of crimes by the population and multiplying it by 100,000 - Property crime is far by the most common offense in Canada - 30% lower crime rate now than 10 years ago; except Winnipeg and Regina - Crime clearance: in order for a crime to be cleared: 1. At least one person must be arrested, charged, and turned over to the court for prosecution OR  2. Police cannot arrest the person involved due to an element beyond their control - Cases can be cleared without resulting in charges of convictions - Clearance rate varies depending on the type of crime - Limitations of the UCR Reporting practices: under reporting of crimes Law enforcement practices: how police respond to crime Legal definitions: what behaviors that law considers criminal Media practices: sensationalized coverage that impacts policy or enforcements Methodological problems: UCR is not perfect What is a known limitation of the UCR/UCR2? a. The numbers don’t account for changes to law and policy b. False accusations are included in the crime count c. The population will vary in urban vs. rural areas d. It does not collect incident based information - Self-report surveys: asks people to reveal law violations - Are distincts from UCR/government data - Methods: interviewing, surveys, and questionnaires - Most often done in high schools- focused on youth crime - Issues with self report surveys: accuracy - People can lie, exaggerate, omit - Students who skip/miss the questionnaire could skew results - Victim surveys: asks people to reveal victimization history - Many victims do not report crime - Canada’s first victimization surveys were conducted in 1988, now done every 5 years through the General Social Survey - Issues with victim surveys: accuracy issues - Misinterpreting events - Recency issues - Under reporting - Issues with some kinds of crimes - Crime trends: age: proportion of young males - Race: relationship is unclear - Indigeneity: much higher rate of victimization - Economy: reductions in inequality associated with decreasing crime rates - Social malaise: more social capital is associated with lower crime rates - Culture: cooperative vs. independent cultures - Drugs: increased drug use may crime rates - law/policy: “tough on crime” approach and selective incapacitation may lower crime rates - Ecology of crime: day, season, climate - Higher rates of crime during warm summer months - Temperature: IPV and homicide rates increase during long stretches of hot weather - Region: violent crime is more likely to occur in the West vs. Eastern provinces - Prairies have seen some increases in crime rates where other provinces have declined - Social class and crime: instrumental crimes: illegal activities by those unable to obtain needs/wants - Expressive crime: illegal activities with no instrumental purpose (often violent crimes) - Crime might be class related: there are crimes that poor people are more likely to commit, and crimes that rich people are more likely to commit - Age and crime: aging out: frequency of offending goes down as people age (also known as spontaneous remission or desistance)  - Early onset: people who are deviant or criminal at earlier ages are more likely to become persistent offenders - Some gendered difference (female homicide vs male homicide) - Desistance (giving up certain behaviors) are influenced by the type of crime - Most crimes are committed by offender 15-25 years of age - Development of law, crime and custom: developed out of common law traditions - Legal system had been decentralized into families and tithings - Ecclesiastical courts dealt with religion or morality - Crimes were handled through compensation to the victim or their family - Important people benefitted more when crimes were committed against them, but paid more when they were convicted - Stand by decided cases: judges on a circuit, deciding cases through stare decisis - Judges began sharing sentencing guidelines, discussing decisions, and developed an oral tradition of law - Common law and statutory law: continues to change and be modified - Murder needed more categorization to represent all nature of all offenses - Common law gave way to statutory law in Canada-enacted by the parliament - Inchoate crimes: incomplete offenses - Attempt: an intentional act for commiting a crime that is more than mere preparation - Conspiracy: a voluntary agreement to commit an act using means forbidden by law - Statutory laws introduced in England and have responded to drug use in order to criminalize certain groups Which of these statements are true about statutory laws? a. Statute law is unwritten legislation b. Statutes are replaced by common law c. Municipalities can enact statutes d. Parliament can enact statutes - Development of law in Canada: CJS (court and justice system) influenced by England's common law - Military was used to maintain law and order before 1867 - Hudson’s Bay company used employees to enforce its own penal code - NWMP formed in 1873: goals were repressing political dissent, controlling Indigenous populations - RCMP formed in 1920 - British North America Act: centralized federal crime control, federal government could create statute law - European CJS reforms had impacts in Canada through prisons, police training, and declining use of capital punishment - Civil law: property law, contract law, tort law - Property law: governing the transfer and ownership of property - Contract law: governing personal agreements - Tort law: governing personal wrongs and damage - Criminal law: law against the state, protecting the public from offenses against social order - State brings the action forward - Victim has a small role in the process - Burden of proof is on the state, must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt - Categories of offending: indictable offenses: serious offenses (theft over $5000, breaking and entering, aggravated assault, murder) - Summary offenses: more minor/ petty offenses (disturbing the peace, loitering) - Hybrid offenses: offenses can be dealt with as summary or indictable (impaired driving, assault, possession of a controlled substance)- The Crown decides how the offense will be handled - Mala in se: These acts are wrong in themselves, regardless of laws. Ex; murder and theft - Mala prohibitum: These acts are wrong because they are prohibited by law. Ex; jaywalking or selling alcohol without a license - Crime and torts: both deal with harm to another person (personal wrongs and damage) - Crimes are against the state, torts are against the other person - Functions of the criminal law Providing social control Discouraging revenge Expressing public opinion Deterring criminal behavior Maintaining social order - Social control: law is intended to shape people’s behavior - Law prevents behavior that cause harm to others like: theft, assault, destruction of property - Law prevents behaviors that challenge the government like: treason - Discouraging revenge (retribution): criminal law opts to handle an offense rather than leaving this to individuals - The burden of retribution is on the state and not the wronged party - Punishments by the state prevents the greater evil of private retribution - Public opinion and morality: law is drafted to reflect our moral values and opinions - Difficulties controlling public morality: hard to asses the will of the majority - Need to respect the rights of the minority - Laws are enforced that may feel trivial, politicized, or self serving - Deterrence: preventing crimes before they occur through the thread of punishment - Maintaining social order: the law promotes activities that are necessary to sustain modern society and protect the economic and political system - The protection of private capital allows capitalism to thrive- underlying goal of the law - law also manages relationships between people involved in the CJS who are anonymous to one another - Law provides rights to businesses and protection from the employees working unlawfully within them - Legal definition of crime: in order to be found guilty of a crime, several elements must be proved - Actus reus - Mens rea - strict/ absolute liability - No actus reus: falsely accused, often seen in wrongful conviction cases - No mens rea: no intention of doing the act, lacked capacity to be held responsible, ignorance, mental disorder, and intoxication - Justification: did it, intended to do it, but the act was justified, necessity, duress, self defense, entrapment - Ignorance of law: not an excuse, public is expected to be informed about laws - Ignorance or mistake of fact: can be used as an excuse, unaware of underlying facts - NCRMD (not guilty by reason of insanity): ended in 1992 - a person was found not guilty through insanity could be held indefinitely - An accused must be fit to stand trial - Self induced intoxication: cannot be used for violent crimes - Two exceptions: if someone becomes intoxicated through force mistake or under duress, if specific intent is needed for the mens rea of the offense - Duress: cases where an accused has been threatened by another party with death or serious bodily harm - Cannot be argued in cases where an accused does serious harm to another person, even to save themselves or another person - Threat must be immediate - The accused cannot be a member of the group planning to commit an offense - Necessity: the law must be broken to avoid a greater evil - Will never justify killing another person - Self defense: just enough force as necessary to protect oneself against unprovoked assault - Can be used to justify violent crimes, including murder, manslaughter and assault - Conditions of the defense: must have a reasonable belief that they are in danger, the amount of force used must be no greater than necessary - Entrapment: persuasion, trickery, or fraud of law enforcement by the police - Officers plan a crime, share the plan, and pressure a person to commit an act - Police cannot induce a person to break the law - No illegality: means that something is not against the law, ex; Indigenous rights to land - Victimology: study of the victim’s role in criminal transactions, first victim study started in the late 1960s - Offenderology: focus on criminal offenders and failure to consider victims - Active victim: provoking or insulting the eventual tracker - Indirect victim: choosing a career or lifestyle that brings them to high crime areas or situations - Theories of victimization: Victim precipitation theory: a victim’s behavior or characteristics (provocation, open displays of wealth) can precipitate or being about the initial offense Lifestyle theories: the lifestyle of the victim (how often they go out, who they spend time with) is a factor that influences their likelihood of victimization Routine activities theory: crimes motivation is constant, routine activities of modern living will help offenders identify a target, victim is responsible for crime prevention - Victim precipitation theory: victims may initiate the confrontation - Active precipitation: when victims use threats or attack first - Passive precipitation: a personal characteristic that unknowingly threatens or encourages the attacker - Lifestyle theories: crime is not random - Victimization is highest among groups with high risk lifestyles - Equivalent group hypothesis: criminals and victims are not separate groups - Proximity hypothesis: people become crime victims because they live/ work close to criminal populations - Deviant place hypothesis: crime has natural areas (poor, densely populated, highly transient, commercial and residential properties side by side) - Routine activities theory: motivation for crime is constant - The volume and distribution of predatory crime is closely related to the interaction of three variables 1. Lack of capable guardian 2. Motivated offenders 3. Suitable targets - Similar to the lifestyle theory approach - Some issues: people can have risk factors and not be crime victims - Overlooks offender motivation/too much focus on victim - Doesn’t consider violence in the home - resources/ support for crime: systemic factors at play- women are more likely to access victim services than men - Victim impact statements: used to give victims a voice in the justice process - Victim compensation: some resources exist thought vary by province - Pretrial safety: peace bonds, restraining orders, provision restricting communication, publication bans - Victim- offender reconciliation - Self protection: target hardening- using security devices to secure home or business and prevent crime - Displacement: the effect when law enforcement/private security in one area moves crime to another