Criminal Activities
First and foremost, Alison's actions were clearly criminal. She was trying to find a lighter in order to smoke illegal narcotics, which is why she broke into the vehicle in the first place. Yet, the charge of burglary may be hard to stick, as she technically did not steal anything, nor did she ever really intend to. If anything, she could be charged with the petty theft of the lighter, although she never actually got to steal it because she passed out in the front seat. Still, there are more appropriate charges that would stick better. For instance, she could be charged with possession, breaking and entering, and vandalism. These would be more appropriate in regards to her destructive behavior and her destruction of private property.

Part II

Although Bernice is in a dire situation, with little help available to her if she remained honest regarding the amount of money she….

Female Drug Offenders and the Subculture of Drugs and CrimeAbout the Reading, the Author and her ExpertiseMy reading is about female drug offenders and the drug and crime subculture, specifically gender, stigma, and social control. It has been obtained from the book Rethinking Gender, Crime, and Justice. The author of the book is Susan E. Martin, specializing in clinical social work and a therapist based in Los Angeles, CA. the authors specialties are mood disorders, relationship issues, and anxiety. She works with individuals in transition to help them unlock their potential and uncover the best path for them.The Main Issue in the ReadingThe main issue in the reading is gender, stigma, and social control. Female drug offenders face greater stigma compared to male drug users. They are mostly labeled as failures both as mothers and as women in general. Moreover, they face more social controls concerning their behavior than formal….

Big Data and the GovernmentIntroductionIn recent years, there has been an explosion of data generated by disparate sources, including social media, financial transactions, and sensor networks. This so-called Big Data has the potential to transform the way in which governmental agencies operate. For example, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has used Big Data to thwart terrorist attacks, by mining social media for suspicious activity. The Department of Health and Human Services has used Big Data to combat fraud in the Medicare system. And the Department of Education has used Big Data to improve student outcomes. With its ability to identify patterns and trends, Big Data has the potential to make government more efficient and effective. As the volume of data continues to grow, so too will the opportunities for government to harness its power. This paper will look at how Big Data can be used to improve DHS.Background on….

S. Senator Dianne Feinstein. The legislation makes the provision of over $ billion in funding "for gang prevention, intervention and law enforcement programs over five years and establishes new crimes and tougher penalties to deter and punish members of illegal street gangs." (Feinstein, 2007) the legislation proposed by Feinstein would make illegal participation in a criminal street gang a federal crime. The legislation criminalizes violent crimes in furtherance or in aid of criminal street gangs and creates a new criminal offense for murder and other violent crimes committed in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime. Under the present law, "a felon's criminal street gang involvement can be treated at most as a sentencing enhancement, adding no more than 10 years to a sentence. This bill establishes far higher penalties for violent gang crimes, including the possibility of life imprisonment without parole for murder, kidnapping, aggravated sexual abuse, or maiming. If….

If this is indeed the case, Leach is within his rights to appeal for an overturn of his conviction. The Fourth Amendment protects travellers from unwarranted police searches, which appears to be what happened in this case.
The Fourth Amendment then protects the rights of individuals to reasonable expectation of privacy. While Archibald Leach voluntarily yielded his luggage for investigation, the search itself was not conducted in a legal manner if there was neither warrant, reasonable suspicion or probable cause. The case does not mention any of these, based upon which the conclusion can be that Leach has sound grounds for appeal.

ources

Criminal Law Lawyer ource. (2009). earch Warrant. http://www.criminal-law-lawyer-source.com/terms/search-warrant.html

Farlex, Inc. (2009). Probable Cause. The Free Dictionary. http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Probable+cause 'Lectric Law Library's Lexicon. (2009). "Confession." http://www.lectlaw.com/def/c274.htm

Rice, Beverly. (2009). When can the police stop and frisk you on the street? upreme Court Articles. http://www.legalzoom.com/legal-articles/when-police-frisk-you.html

Walker, Jayme . (1998, Dec 1). Moving and touching stowed….

Richard Allen, the state's prisons commissioner, said ednesday the change is meant to reduce overtime, and should save the state $3 million to $4 million a year. 'e don't have any choice about it,' Allen said. 'e've got to save money. e've got to do some things that are out of the box, and this is one of them'" (Diel 2008). Corrections officers have naturally protested this measure, citing the dangers of the job and the impact upon the quality of their health and financial lives.
Alabama is not alone. In Florida budget cutbacks were blamed recently when "A Florida correctional officer was killed on the job last week" (Ray 2008). Even though corrections officer positions have not been eliminated in the state of Florida, an expanding prison population coupled with a refusal to add more positions have lead to understaffed prisons and overworked, tired officers. In other states, cutbacks….

Whereas judicial decisions are more likely to concern substantive matters of law and definitions of legal concepts, legislative adjustments generally reflect social consensus, particularly over large spans of time. Admittedly, political access and the relative ability of specific individuals, communities, and entities to generate legislative changes beneficial to them are not, in any sense, equal when viewed from the microcosmic perspective. Nevertheless, over time, changes in the American criminal justice are largely functions of widely-shared societal concerns and social values in the United States.
In recent years, the American criminal justice system has changed in several significant respects: it has become increasingly federalized; it seen a dramatic increase in the privatization of criminal justice facilities; and it has become ever-more effective by virtue of its technological evolution. Likewise, concepts and principles of criminal reform have continually undergone cyclical changes, due in part to unanticipated flaws in prior approaches or simply….

A plea-bargain is frequently attained at this time in order to circumvent a trial. In the event that a plea-bargain is reached, the case does not move forward to a trial but failure to offer enough evidence to establish a plea bargain will mean that the case goes on to trial (Criminal Justice System Handbook, 2009).
The trail

Trials consist of a sequence of proceedings where the prosecutor presents evidence which will be used to prove the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. In felony cases, the defendant is given chances to admit their innocence but there are also times where they are presented that they may dispute the validity of evidence that has been presented by the prosecutor. Felony cases normally entail the services of a jury who listen to the case proceedings together with the judge and then after careful assessment of the evidence that is presented; they make….

Criminal Justice
The Criminal Type

What do you think of when someone talks to you about the 'criminal type'? Is there a specific 'type' of person that can be construed 'criminal?' According to Jessica Mitford, "Americans are preoccupied with crimes of the poor and as such the 'criminal type' has surfaced in American consciousness as a social creation." This paper is going to examine the concept of 'criminal types' and argues that anybody has the potential to be a criminal under certain definitions. We will also examine the concept of 'American ias' towards certain racial and socio-economic groups within the American justice system.

The word 'criminal' according to the Oxford Modern English Dictionary (1996) is "a person who has committed a crime." A crime, in the same dictionary is defined as, "a serious offence punishable by law" (Oxford, 1996). So it would be safe to assume from these definitions that a criminal is….

Under the stewardship of Police Commissioner Howard Safir, the NYPD began analyzing daily crime statistics collected from its 40,000 officers throughout the five boroughs of New York City and generating computer modeling of crime trends in a system dubbed CompStat that allowed the accurate identification of crime trends with pinpoint accuracy, often permitting nearly as precise predictive modeling via extrapolation (Safir, 2003).
The other main benefit and purpose of CompStat was that is enabled police administrators to grade the performance of every precinct according to any criteria defined by policy considerations. That aspect of CompStat is relied upon heavily by NYPD administration to the extent that Commissioner Safir reassigned, removed, or demoted fifty-four precinct commanders during his tenure as commissioner between 1996 and 2000 (Safir, 2003). Naturally, the technical means of data collection and analysis techniques differ quite profoundly from those available to previous generations of police administrators, but the….

To the extent that crime is a function of larger social issues, it is unrealistic to expect those underlying social problems to be rectified by law enforcement efforts. Even with respect to specific incidence of criminal behavior, law enforcement authorities must address two competing interests that fall within the purview and responsibility of law enforcement.
Specifically, poverty, unwanted pregnancy, lack of educational and vocational opportunities, and perceived social "disenfranchisement" within communities contribute heavily to crime in those areas but none of those social factors are capable of being redressed directly by law enforcement authorities. Likewise, even within the realm of law enforcement responsibilities, emphasis on quality-of-life-oriented policing and crime prevention-oriented policing conflict with the goal of preventing crime in light of empirical evidence and anecdotal experience demonstrating that efforts directed at the former do not necessarily achieve the goals of the latter appreciably.

In that regard, directed police patrols and crackdowns….

However, as criminals become more aware of undercover tactics, the covert officer is required to provide more and more proof that he is indeed a criminal- which leads to the officer committing acts that compromise his or her integrity for the sake of maintaining cover. y understanding the often conflicting nature of these goals, deception and integrity, we can see how an undercover officer can become confused, lost, and susceptible to temptation (i.e. criminal behavior).
y examining both aspects- environmental factors and personality factors- we take into account both sides of a complex relationship. These two groups of factors, when combined together, shed some light on the exact nature of criminal tendencies amongst police officers.

Definition of Terms

Covert: another term for undercover, meaning the use of deception for the purpose of gathering information or intelligence.

Non-covert: police officers that, even in plain clothes, maintain their own true identity instead of a false….

Criminal Decision Making: The Elements of the Culture of the Street and Party Life and Their elation to Criminal Decision-Making
Understanding offenders' lifestyles and the process by which they choose to commit criminal acts is critical particularly because it has important implications for crime control. Very often, certain elements of the street and party life influence the offender's assessment of the risks and rewards of crime. According to Shover and Honaker (1992), commitment to drugs and partying, as well as street culture, leads to alienation of offenders from mainstream society and pushes them away from a conventional life. Over time, they adopt a socially bounded rationality and become accustomed to a criminal lifestyle to a point where they break the law as a result of addiction, rather that free will. It is, therefore, imperative to understand the role played by these lifestyles in shaping the motivation for crime because it will….

e. height, weight, age, race, etc.), in connection with the investigation of specific criminal activity, that information allows authorities to narrow the search for individuals who match those identifying characteristics. The process is perfectly logical and obviously makes infinitely more sense than continuing to search for individuals who bear no resemblance to the descriptions provided by reliable sources.
However, the same legitimate techniques with respect to specific evidence of crimes also has a history of impermissible application in ways that deprive subjects of police investigation of their fundamental constitutional rights. For example, in the late 20th century, the U.S. Customs Service and the Drug Enforcement Administration both made extensive use of what they called "criminal indicators" in connection with their efforts to apprehend criminal drug traffickers as they attempted to enter the U.S. At the borders (Schmalleger, 2007).

Among other criteria, those sets of indicators including Hispanic origin and language, age range,….

Patterns Juvenile Delinquency Throughout the World/How Determine Who Juvenile?

Patterns in juvenile delinquency also vary throughout the world, as do the way countries define "delinquency" among juveniles. The Japanese according to Platt (2005) have taken on a much more philosophical approach to juvenile delinquency, supporting a Confucian style structure of education and support, one that works toward educating children to become part of the larger social collective (p. 965). In this environment, children are encouraged to become more socially aware and to self-regulate, often given the opportunity to reform before they are punished for wrongdoings.

This conflicts sharply with juvenile delinquency programs and structures elsewhere in the world. In Australia, juvenile delinquency is often associated with being a member of a juvenile gang, which is defined as "youth hanging out on the streets with gang activity" or street activity that has the potential to lead to mischievous behaviors (Duffy & Gillig, 2004,….