Criminology Today

1
Criminology Today

• Chapters 3 and 4

2
Chapter 3 Where Do Theories Come From?

• Overview
• Criminological research
• Criminological theory study of crime
• Role of research and experimentation
• Quantitative and qualitative methods
• Study ethical considerations in research
• Impact of research on social policy

3
Introduction

• Story of Mayor of Inglis, Florida
• Official proclamation banning Satan from Inglis
  used official stationery
• Police Chief says crime did not decrease
• ACLU threatened suit
• Town rescinded proclamation, Mayor reimbursed for
  use of stationery
• Mayor was reelected still Mayor today
• Concept that the devil made them do it

4
This Chapter

• Describes how criminologists make use of
  contemporary social scientific research methods
  in the development of criminological theories and
  evidence-based policies and practices.
• Evidence based that which is built on
  scientific findings and especially practices and
  policies founded upon the results of randomized
  controlled experiments
• Experimental criminology a form of contemporary
  criminology that makes use of rigorous social
  scientific techniques, especially randomized
  controlled experiments and the systematic review
  of research results.

5
For any of this to have meaning

• The realize its ultimate promise, criminology
  must become accepted as a policy-making tool,
  consulted by lawmakers and social planners alike,
  and respected for what it can tell us about both
  crime and its prevention.

6
Laubs history of criminological thought

• 1900 1930 Golden Age of Research
• 1930 1960 Golden Age of Theory
• 1960 2000 Characterized by extensive theory
  testing of the dominant theories, using largely
  empirical methods.
• Laub criminologists over the past century have
  undertaken the task of building a scientific or
  evidence based criminology vs. an armchair
  criminology of earlier times
• The emphasis on measurement and objectivity gives
  contemporary criminology its scientific flavor

7
Theory Building

• Hypothesis an explanation that accounts for a
  set of facts and that can be tested by further
  investigation
• Theory a series of interrelated propositions
  that attempt to describe, explain, predict, and
  ultimately control some class of events
• Lust murderers men who sexually abuse and kill
  women, often sadistically theory doesnt help
  us understand their motives

8
The Role of Research and Experimentation

• Theories, once proposed, need to be tested
  against the real world via a variety of research
  strategies, including experimentation and case
  studies.
• Knowledge is inevitable built on experience and
  observation. Hence the crux of scientific
  research is data collection.

9
Research

• Research the use of standardized, systematic
  procedures in the search for knowledge
• Applied research scientific inquiry that is
  designed and carried out with practical
  applications in mind.
• Pure research research undertaken simply for
  the sake of advancing scientific knowledge
• Primary research - research characterized by
  original and direct investigation
• Secondary research new evaluations of existing
  information that had been collected by other
  researchers

10
Scientific research proceeds in stages

• Problem identification
• The development of research design
• A choice of data-collection techniques
• A review of findings, which often includes
  statistical analysis

11
Problem Identification

• Choosing an issue to study
• Availability of government grant monies
  frequently determines the focus of much
  contemporary research in the area of crime
• The bulk of research in criminology is intended
  to explore issues of causality, especially the
  claims made by theories purporting to explain
  criminal behavior

12
Testing Hypothesis

• Two definitions
• An explanation that accounts for a set of facts
  and that can be tested by further investigation
• Something that is taken to be true for the
  purpose of argument or investigation
• Variable concept that can undergo measurable
  changes
• Operationalization the process by which
  concepts are made measurable
• Once the concepts within our hypothesis are
  measurable, we can test the hypothesis itself.
• Once a hypothesis has be operationalized, it is
  assumed to be true for purposes of testing. It
  is accepted for study purposes until proven
  untrue or rejected.

13
Research Designs

• The logic and structure inherent in an approach
  to data gathering
• Confounding effects a rival explanation, or
  competing hypothesis, that is a threat to the
  internal or external validity of a research
  design (other reasons why things may have
  occurred Ex. Taking sugar out of diet) 2
  different types
• Internal validity the certainty that
  experimental interventions did indeed cause the
  changes observed in the study group
• External validity the ability to generalize
  research findings to other settings
• Examples of these on page 97 and 98

14
Experimental and Quasi- Experimental Research
Designs

• To have confidence that the changes intentionally
  introduced into a situation are the real cause of
  observed variations, it is necessary to achieve
  some degree of control over factors that threaten
  internal validity.
• Controlled experiment an experiment that
  attempts to hold conditions constant

15
Quasi-experimental

• An approach to research that, although less
  powerful than experimental designs, is deemed
  worthy of use when better designs are not
  feasible
• The crucial defining feature of
  quasi-experimental designs is that they give
  researchers control over the when and whom of
  measurement, even though others decide the when
  and to whom of exposure to the experimental
  intervention.

16
Definitions

• Control group a group of experimental subjects
  that, although the subject of measurement and
  observation, is not exposed to the experimental
  intervention
• Randomization the process whereby individuals
  are assigned to study groups without biases or
  differences resulting from selection

17
Techniques of Data Collection

• The most important question to consider when
  beginning to gather information is whether the
  data-gathering strategy selected will produce
  information in a usable form.
• Surveys a social science data-gathering
  technique that involves the use of questionnaires
• Case studies built around in-depth
  investigations into individual cases studying
  one offender or group like street gang find
  similarities for others

18
Collecting Data

• Participant observation a strategy in data
  gathering in which the researcher observes a
  group by participating, to varying degrees, in
  the activities of the group. Gang example how
  far do you go
• Self-reporting simply another form of survey
  research
• Secondary analysis purposefully culls
  preexisting information from data that have
  already been gathered and examines it in new
  ways. (saves time and expense)

19
Problems in Data Collection

• Intersubjectivity a scientific principle that
  requires that independent observers see the same
  thing under the same circumstances for
  observations to be regarded as valid.
• Replicability a scientific principle that holds
  that valid observations made at one time can be
  made again later if all other conditions are the
  same.
• Science rests its claim to authority upon its
  firm basis in observable evidence

20
Data Analysis

• Two types of statistical methods
• Descriptive statistics statistics that
  describe, summarize or highlight the
  relationships within data that have been gathered
• Inferential statistics statistics that specify
  how likely findings are to be true for other
  populations or in other locales

21
Test of Significance

• A statistical technique intended to provide
  researchers with confidence that their results
  are, in fact, true and not the result of sampling
  error.
• The larger the sample size, the greater the
  confidence we can have in our findings.

22
Quantitative vs. Qualitative

• Quantitative methods a research technique that
  produces measurable results that can be analyzed
  statistically
• Mystique of quantity is an exaggerated regard
  for the significance of measurement, just because
  it is quantitative, without regard either to what
  has been measured or to what can subsequently be
  done with the measure. The mystique of quantity
  treats numbers as having intrinsic scientific
  value.

23
Quantitative vs. Qualitative

• The qualitative method in contrast to those that
  are quantitative, produce subjective results, or
  results that are difficult to quantify.
• Qualitative methods are important for the insight
  they provide into the subjective workings of the
  criminal mind and the processes by which meaning
  is accorded to human experience.
• Introspection, life histories, case studies, and
  participant observation all contain the potential
  to yield highly qualitative data.

24
Verstehen

• The kind of subjective understanding that can be
  achieved by criminologists who immerse themselves
  in the everyday world of the criminals they
  study.
• A researchers subjective understandings of
  crimes situational meanings and emotions its
  moments of pleasure and pain, its emergent logic
  and excitement within the larger process of
  research.
• It further implies that a researcher, through
  attentiveness and participation, at least can
  begin to apprehend and appreciate the specific
  roles and experiences of criminals, crime
  victims, crime control agents, and others caught
  up in the day-to-day reality of crime.

25
P. 106 Crime in the News

• Idaho Town Arming Itself
• Town Council of Greenleaf, Idaho, is considering
  a recommendation that all households keep and
  maintain guns because of the crime that might
  come with the encroaching growth from nearby
  Boise.
• Does gun ownership help to reduce criminal
  opportunity?

26
Values and Ethics in Research

• Research, especially research conducted within
  the social sciences, does not occur in a vacuum.
  Values enter into all stages of the research
  process, from the selection of the problem to be
  studied to the choice of strategies to address
  it. In short, research is never entirely free
  from preconceptions and biases, although much can
  be done to limit the impact such biases have on
  the results of research.
• The most effective way of controlling the effects
  of biases is to be aware of them at the outset of
  the research.

27
Data Confidentiality

• The ethical requirement of social scientific
  research to protect the confidentiality of
  individual research participants, while
  simultaneously preserving justified research
  access to the information participants provide.
• Informed consent the ethical requirement of
  social scientific research that research subjects
  be informed as to the nature of the research
  about to be conducted, their anticipated role in
  it, and the uses to which the data they provide
  will be put.
• NIJ not publishing the findings of the DARE
  program
• 12 step method of AA
• Pressure of expenditure of pubic funds on research

28
Social Policy and Criminological Research

• The results of scientific studies in the field of
  criminology should have practical implications
  that can guide practice in relevant areas.
• Ex. Arrests instead of warnings in DV cases -
  departments adopted policy of arrests some
  states made it law
• However, publicly elected officials are often
  either ignorant of current criminological
  research or do not heed the advice of
  professional criminologists, seeking instead to
  create politically expedient policies.
• One such study and laws enacted dealt with 3
  strike laws

29
Three Strike Laws

• Became popular with legislatures across the
  country near the end of the last century, provide
  an example of the kind of dilemma facing
  criminologists who would influence social policy
  on the basis of statistical evidence.
• Three strike laws require that felons receive
  lengthy prison sentences following their third
  felony conviction.
• Such laws are built on the commonsense notion
  that getting tough on repeat offenders by
  putting them in prison for long periods should
  reduce the crime rate. Logic seems to say that
  lengthy prison sentences for recidivists will
  reduce crime by removing the most dangerous
  offenders from society.
• A study in 22 states, however, concluded that
  such legislation typically results in clogged
  court systems and crowded correctional facilities
  and encourages three-time felons to take dramatic
  risks to avoid capture.

30
Alabamas Habitual Felony Offenders

• 13A-5-9. Habitual felony offenders --
  Additional penalties.
• (a) In all cases when it is shown that a
  criminal defendant has been previously convicted
  of a felony and after the conviction has
  committed another felony, he or she must be
  punished as follows
• (1) On conviction of a Class C felony, he or she
  must be punished for a Class B felony.
• (2) On conviction of a Class B felony, he or she
  must be punished for a Class A felony.
• (3) On conviction of a Class A felony, he or she
  must be punished by imprisonment for life or for
  any term of not more than 99 years but not less
  than 15 years.
• (b) In all cases when it is shown that a
  criminal defendant has been previously convicted
  of any two felonies and after such convictions
  has committed another felony, he or she must be
  punished as follows
• (1) On conviction of a Class C felony, he or she
  must be punished for a Class A felony.
• (2) On conviction of a Class B felony, he or she
  must be punished by imprisonment for life or for
  any term of not more than 99 years but not less
  than 15 years.
• (3) On conviction of a Class A felony, he or she
  must be punished by imprisonment for life or for
  any term of not less than 99 years.
• (c) In all cases when it is shown that a
  criminal defendant has been previously convicted
  of any three felonies and after such convictions
  has committed another felony, he or she must be
  punished as follows
• (1) On conviction of a Class C felony, he or she
  must be punished by imprisonment for life or for
  any term of not more than 99 years but not less
  than 15 years.
• (2) On conviction of a Class B felony, he or she
  must be punished by imprisonment for life or any
  term of not less than 20 years.
• (3) On conviction of a Class A felony, where the
  defendant has no prior convictions for any Class
  A felony, he or she must be punished by
  imprisonment for life or life without the
  possibility of parole, in the discretion of the
  trial court.

31
Part 2 Crime CausationChapter 4 Classical
and Neoclassical Thought

• The belief that at least some illegal activity is
  the result of rational choices made by
  individuals seeking various kinds of illicit
  rewards forms the basis for the perspectives on
  crime causation that are discussed in this
  chapter.
• Example planning that goes in Sex-tourism
  page 124

32
Major Principles of the Classical School

• Most classical theories of crime causation make
  the following basic assumptions
• Human beings are fundamentally rational, and most
  human behavior is the result of free will coupled
  with rational choice
• Pain and pleasure are the two central
  determinants of human behavior
• Punishment, a necessary evil, is sometimes
  required to deter law violators and to serve as
  an example to others who would also violate the
  law
• Root principles of right and wrong are inherent
  in the nature of things and cannot be denied
• Society exists to provide benefits to individuals
  that they would not receive in isolation
• When men and women band together for the
  protection offered by society, they forfeit some
  of the benefits that accrue from living in
  isolation
• Certain key rights of individuals are inherent in
  the nature of things, and governments that
  contravene those rights should be disbanded
• Crime disparages the quality of the bond that
  exists between individuals and society and is
  therefore an immoral for of behavior

33
Forerunners of Classical Thought

• Mores behavioral proscriptions covering
  potentially serious violations of a groups
  values. Examples murder, rape and robbery
• Folkways time honored customs. Although
  folkways carry the force of tradition, their
  violation is unlikely to threaten the survival of
  the group Ex. Body piercing jewelry on men

34
Definitions

• Mala in se acts that are thought to be wrong in
  and of themselves example forcing someone to
  have sex against his or her will and the
  intentional killing of children
• Mala prohibita acts that are wrong only because
  they are prohibited examples prostitution,
  gambling, drug use may not be illegal in
  different jurisdictions

35
The Demonic Era

• Since time began, humankind has been preoccupied
  with what appears to be an ongoing war between
  good and evil.
• Cosmically based plague, holocaust
• Individual behavior victimization
• Trephinaiton a form of surgery typically
  involving bone, especially the skull. Evil
  spirits residing in the heads of offenders.

36
Early Sources of the Criminal Law

• Code of Hammurabi an early set of laws
  established by the Babylonian king Hammurabi, who
  ruled the ancient city from 1792 to 1750 B.C.
  first body of law to survive and be available for
  study.
• Intended to establish property and other rights
  crucial to the continued growth of Babylon as a
  significant commercial center.
• Emphasis on retribution penal philosophy
  attempt to keep cruelty within bounds before
  code revenge seeking victims punished

37
Early Roman Law

• Early Roman Law derived from the Twelve Tables
  written circa 450 B.C. which regulated family,
  religious, and economic life
• Emperor Justinian I (A.D. 527-565) The
  Justinian Code contained elements of our modern
  civil and criminal law and influenced Western
  legal thought through the Middle Ages

38
Common Law

• Common law forms the basis for much of our modern
  statutory and case law. It has often been called
  the major source of modern criminal law.
• Common law refers to a traditional body of
  unwritten legal precedents created through
  everyday practice of English society and
  supported by court decisions during the Middle
  Ages.
• Common law is so-called because it was based on
  shared traditions and standards rather than on
  those that varied from one locale to another.
• Today, common law forms the basis of many of the
  laws on the books in English-speaking countries
  around the world.

39
The Magna Carta

• Great Charter important source of modern laws
• The Magna Carta was signed on June 15, 1215 by
  King John of England at Runnymede under pressure
  from British barons who took advantage of Johns
  military defeats at the hands of Pope Innocent
  III and King Philip Augustus of France.
• Forced the King to be bound by law.

40
The Magna Carta, cont

• Original purpose was to ensure feudal rights and
  to guarantee that the king could not encroach on
  the privileges claimed by landowning barons.
• Later, it guaranteed basic liberties for all
  British citizens and ruled that any acts of
  Parliament that contravened common law would be
  void.
• This formed the basis for Supreme Courts power to
  nullify laws of Congress
• Provision concerning not prosecuting barons
  without just cause served as basis of our concept
  of due process of law
• It has been called, The foundation stone of our
  present liberties.

41
Enlightenment

• A social movement that arose during the
  eighteenth century and that built upon ideas like
  empiricism, rationally, free will, humanism, and
  natural law.

42
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)

• English philosopher Thomas Hobbes work
  Leviathan (1651)
• Social contract the Enlightenment-era concept
  that human beings abandon their natural state of
  individual freedom to join together and form
  society. In process of forming individuals
  surrender some freedoms to society as a whole and
  government, once formed is obligated to assume
  responsibilities toward its citizens and to
  provide for their protection and welfare.

43
John Locke (1632-1704)

• English philosopher published Essay Concerning
  Human Understanding put forth the idea that the
  natural human condition at birth is akin to that
  of a blank slate upon which interpersonal
  encounters and other experiences indelibly
  inscribe the traits of personality. He ascribed
  the bulk of human qualities to life experiences.
• Locke contended that human beings, through a
  social contract, abandon their natural state of
  individual freedom and lack of interpersonal
  responsibility to join together and for society.
  

44
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778)

• Swiss-French philosopher and political theorist
• Human beings are basically good and fair in their
  natural state but historically were corrupted by
  the introduction of shared concepts that joint
  activities like property, agriculture, science
  and commerce.
• Contributed to concept of natural law

45
Natural Law

• The philosophical perspective that certain
  immutable laws are fundamental to human nature
  and can be readily ascertained through reason.
  Human-made laws (positive law), in contrast, are
  said to derive from human experience and history
  both of which are subject to continual change.

46
Natural Law and Natural Rights

• Natural rights thoughts that individuals retain
  in the face of government action and interests
• Thomas Jefferson wrote of inalienable rights to
  life, liberty, property, such rights were
  naturally due all men and women because they were
  inherent in the social contract between citizens
  and their government

47
Natural Law today

• Many people today still hold that the basis for
  various existing criminal laws can be found in
  immutable moral principles or in some other
  identifiable aspect fo the natural order.
• The Ten Commandments, inborn tendencies, the
  idea of sin, and perceptions of various forms of
  order in the universe and in the social world
  have all provided a basis for the assertion that
  natural law exists.
• Example debate over abortion

48
The Classical School

• A criminological perspective of the late 1700s
  and early 1800s that had its roots in the
  Enlightenment and that held that humans are
  rational beings, that crime is the result of the
  exercise of free will, and that punishment can
  be effective in reducing the incidence of crime,
  as it negates the pleasure to be derived from
  crime commission.

49
Cesare Beccaria (1738-1794)

• Italian in 1764 published Essay on Crimes and
  Punishments
• Distilled the notion of the social contract into
  the idea that laws are the conditions under
  which independent and isolated men untied to form
  a society.
• Writings mainly consisted of a philosophy of
  punishment
• Purpose of punishment is deterrence rather than
  retribution punishment should be imposed to
  prevent offenders from committing additional
  crimes
• Adjudication and punishment should both be swift
  and certain

50
Beccaria continued

• Punishment should fit the crime, declaring that
  theft should be punished by fines, personal
  injury through corporal punishment, and serious
  crimes against the state (revolution) via
  application of the death penalty
• He wrote that oaths were useless in a court of
  law because accused individuals will naturally
  deny their guilt even if they know themselves to
  be fully culpable
• Is responsible for the contemporary belief that
  criminals have control over their behavior, that
  they choose to commit crimes, and that they can
  be deterred by the threat of punishment

51
Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)

• Benthams claim rested upon his belief, spawned
  by Enlightment thought, that human beings are
  fundamentally rational and that criminals will
  weigh in their minds the pain of punishment
  against any pleasures thought likely to be
  derived from crime commission.

52
Definitions

• Hedonistic calculus the belief, first proposed
  by Jeremy Bentham, that behavior hold value to
  any individual undertaking it according to the
  amount of pleasure or pain that it can be
  expected to produce for that person
• Utilitarianism another term fir Jeremy
  Benthams concept of hedonistic calculus

53
Bentham continued

• Distinguished between 11 different types of
  punishment pages 134 135
• Suggested tattooing name on wrists for police
  indentification
• Panopticon a prison designed by Jeremy Bentham
  that was to be circular building with cells along
  the circumference, each clearly visible from a
  central location staffed by guards
• Prisons should be managed by contractors

54
Heritage of the Classical School

• Five principles fundamental to modern day
  perspectives page 137
• Rationality
• Hedonism
• Punishment
• Human rights
• Due process

55
Neoclassical Criminology

• Positivism the application of scientific
  techniques to the study of crime and criminals
• Hard determinism the belief that crime results
  from forces beyond the control of the individual
• Acceptance of the notion of determinism implied
  that offenders were not entirely responsible for
  their crimes and suggested that crime could be
  prevented by changing the conditions that
  produced criminality

56
Neoclassical criminology

• A contemporary version of classical criminology
  that emphasizes deterrence and retribution, with
  reduced emphasis on rehabilitation
• Nothing works doctrine the belief popularized
  by Robert Martinson in the 1970s that
  correctional treatment programs have little
  success in rehabilitating offenders
• Justice model a contemporary model of
  imprisonment in which the principle of just
  deserts forms the underlying social philosophy

57
Rational Choice Theory

• A perspective that holds that criminality is the
  result of conscious choice and that predicts that
  individuals choose to commit crime when the
  benefits outweigh the costs of disobeying the
  law.
• Routine activities theory (RAT) a brand of
  rational choice theory that suggests that
  lifestyles contribute significantly to both the
  volume and the type of crime found in any society
• Situational choice theory a brand of rational
  choice theory that views behavior as a function
  of choices and decisions made within a context of
  situational constraints and opportunities
• Soft determinism the belief that human behavior
  is the result of choices and decisions made
  within a context of situational constraints and
  opportunities

58
Table 4-1

• Twenty-five techniques of situational crime
  control, p. 140
• 5 objectives are across the top of the table

59
Situational Crime Control Policy

• The new crime prevention effort called for a
  focus not on people who commit crime but on the
  context in which crime occurs
• Situational crime prevention a social policy
  approach that looks to develop a greater
  understanding of crime and more effective crime
  prevention strategies through concern with the
  physical, organizational, and social environments
  that make crime possible..
• Target hardening the reduction in criminal
  opportunity for a particular location, generally
  through the use of physical barriers,
  architectural design, and enhanced security
  measures - (sometimes causes criminals to find
  new targets - displacement)

60
Punishment and Neoclassical Thought

• If a person is attracted to crime and chooses to
  violate the law, modern neoclassical thinkers
  argue, then he or she deserves to be punished
  because the consequences of crime were known to
  the offender before the crime was committed.
• Example of caning of 18 year old Faye in
  Singapore, p. 146
• Notions of revenge and retribution are morally
  based. They build on a sense of indignation at
  criminal behavior and on the sense of
  righteousness inherent in Judeo-Christian notions
  of morality and propriety.

61
Just Deserts Model

• The notion that criminal offenders deserve the
  punishment they receive at the hands of the law
  and that punishments should be appropriate to the
  type and severity of crime committed.
• Deterrence the prevention of crime
• Specific deterrence a goal of criminal
  sentencing that seeks to prevent a particular
  offender from engaging in repeat criminality
• General deterrence a goal of criminal
  sentencing that seeks to prevent others from
  committing crimes similar to the one for which a
  particular offender is being sentenced
• Justice is not swift! Page 147 middle

62
Recidivism

• Recidivism the repetition of criminal behavior
• Recidivism rate the percentage of convicted
  offenders who have been released from prison and
  who are later rearrested for a new crime,
  generally within five years following release
• 80-90
• Figure 4-2 on page 148

63
The Death Penalty

• Capital punishment the legal imposition of a
  sentence of death upon a convicted offender
• Opponents of capital punishment make 10 claims
  page 148 bottom
• Advocates deserved, failure to is injustice to
  victim, just deserts, never commit another crime
• CP and race imposed disproportionately

64
Alabama Death Penalty or Life Without

• (a) The following are capital offenses
• (1) Murder by the defendant during a kidnapping
  in the first degree or an attempt thereof
  committed by the defendant.
• (2) Murder by the defendant during a robbery in
  the first degree or an attempt thereof committed
  by the defendant.
• (3) Murder by the defendant during a rape in the
  first or second degree or an attempt thereof
  committed by the defendant or murder by the
  defendant during sodomy in the first or second
  degree or an attempt thereof committed by the
  defendant.
• (4) Murder by the defendant during a burglary in
  the first or second degree or an attempt thereof
  committed by the defendant.
• (5) Murder of any police officer, sheriff,
  deputy, state trooper, federal law enforcement
  officer, or any other state or federal peace
  officer of any kind, or prison or jail guard,
  while such officer or guard is on duty,
  regardless of whether the defendant knew or
  should have known the victim was an officer or
  guard on duty, or because of some official or
  job-related act or performance of such officer or
  guard.
• (6) Murder committed while the defendant is
  under sentence of life imprisonment.
• (7) Murder done for a pecuniary or other
  valuable consideration or pursuant to a contract
  or for hire.
• (8) Murder by the defendant during sexual abuse
  in the first or second degree or an attempt
  thereof committed by the defendant.
• (9) Murder by the defendant during arson in the
  first or second degree committed by the
  defendant or murder by the defendant by means
  of explosives or explosion.
• (10) Murder wherein two or more persons are
  murdered by the defendant by one act or pursuant
  to one scheme or course of conduct.
• (11) Murder by the defendant when the victim is
  a state or federal public official or former
  public official and the murder stems from or is
  caused by or is related to his official position,
  act, or capacity.
• (12) Murder by the defendant during the act of
  unlawfully assuming control of any aircraft by
  use of threats or force with intent to obtain any
  valuable consideration for the release of said
  aircraft or any passenger or crewmen thereon or
  to direct the route or movement of said aircraft,
  or otherwise exert control over said aircraft.
• (13) Murder by a defendant who has been
  convicted of any other murder in the 20 years
  preceding the crime provided that the murder
  which constitutes the capital crime shall be
  murder as defined in subsection (b) of this
  section and provided further that the prior
  murder conviction referred to shall include
  murder in any degree as defined at the time and
  place of the prior conviction.
• (14) Murder when the victim is subpoenaed, or
  has been subpoenaed, to testify, or the victim
  had testified, in any preliminary hearing, grand
  jury proceeding, criminal trial or criminal
  proceeding of whatever nature, or civil trial or
  civil proceeding of whatever nature, in any
  municipal, state, or federal court, when the
  murder stems from, is caused by, or is related to
  the capacity or role of the victim as a witness.
• (15) Murder when the victim is less than
  fourteen years of age.
• (16) Murder committed by or through the use of a
  deadly weapon fired or otherwise used from
  outside a dwelling while the victim is in a
  dwelling.
• (17) Murder committed by or through the use of a
  deadly weapon while the victim is in a vehicle.

65
Gallup poll

• A Gallup poll in May 2006 found that 2/3 of
  Americans 18 and older support the death penalty.
  But when asked which is the better penalty for
  murder, roughly half said life without parole and
  about half said the death penalty
• Massachusetts has long been one of the 12 states
  where capital punishment is not a sentencing
  option for the crime of murder.

66
Policy Implications Classical School

• Determinate sentencing a criminal punishment
  strategy that mandates a specified and fixed
  amount of time to be served for every offense
  category. Under the strategy, for example, all
  offenders convicted of the same degree of
  burglary would be sentenced to the same length of
  time behind bars.
• Truth in sentencing a close correspondence
  between the sentence imposed upon those sent to
  prison and the time actually served prior to
  prison release

67
Alabamas Sentencing Guidelines

• See Internet - http//filmore.net/faulknerclass/in
  dex.html

68
Next Class

• Chapter 5 Biological Roots of Criminal Behavior
• Chapter 6 Psychological Psychiatric
  Foundations of Criminal Behavior
• Review information for Midterm Exam
• Topics for term paper assignments