Discussion 1:Topic: Miranda Rights
I feel that Miranda Rights should be read at point of arrest and again before interrogation. That way the detained person knows his rights. In today’s world, there are so many laws and so many confusing issues in the world, people are frightened and scared if they have a run-in with the law. There is no reason that law enforcement cannot go out of its way to make sure that people feel safe and secured even when they are under arrest and about to be interrogated. All people need to be treated with more compassion and empathy. The Supreme Court’s guidelines are inadequate on this issue because they do not take into consideration the trauma of the arrestee or the fact that he may not be aware of his right at the time of arrest and may talk before interrogation, unaware that what he is saying can be used against him in the court of law.
Discussion 2: Topic: Public Encounters
An officer can do his job and not escalate the situation by being respectful and courteous at all times and treating the person he is patting down or doing a quick search of with care even though he suspects the person of being dangerous. Suspicion does not mean fact, and so the officer should be kind and considerate rather than rude and blunt. At the same time, the officer has to be able to do his job so he must be insistent and if the person resists, he must be able to use social and emotional intelligence to read the situation and prevent it from escalating by keeping calm himself but staying...
It is when officers lose control of their own emotions that escalation happens.
Discussion 3: According to conflict theory, what is “criminal justice inequality”? Provide an example.
Conflict theory posits that there are finite resources and groups are in a struggle for power over those resources. As a result there is usually a group that has power and consolidates by controlling the levers of justice, politics, business, and so on; and there is a group that does not have power that struggles to obtain it. Karl Marx, who developed conflict theory, believed the workers were an example of the latter group and that they would rise up to seize power for themselves.
Criminal justice inequality refers to the lack of equality in the criminal justice system between groups, those groups with power and those without. An example of this would be the way blacks are disproportionately incarcerated in the US: there is a disproportionate percentage of the black population incarcerated in US prisons, indicating that blacks are not receiving equal fair treatment within the criminal justice system.
Discussion4: Social Control Theory
Hirschi’s social bond theory states that crime is committed because of lack of attachment, commitment, involvement, or belief by the individual who commits the crime. In other words, the criminal perpetrator has no connections to society that are of…
