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We the People - Criminals and Victims

NCJ Number
75378
Journal
Journal of Current Social Issues Volume: 16 Issue: 2 Dated: special issue (Summer 1979) Pages: complete issue
Editor(s)
P H Sherry
Date Published
1979
Length
70 pages
Annotation
This is an examination of issues such as crime and punishment, fear of crime, victimization, and conflicting citizen expectations of how criminals should be dealt with by the criminal justice system.
Abstract
The first of the three major sections into which this study is divided deals with contemporary crime patterns, including violent crime, white-collar crime, and organized crime. Corollary issues such as fear of crime and its political implications; how race and class affect individual crime perceptions; inequities of the criminal justice system; the handgun controversy; sexism and criminal violence; and crime victims and their rights are also discussed. A section devoted entirely to capital punishment follows, with contributions by an anthropologist (who is against the death penalty), as well as with interviews with death row inmates, and with the wife of one of these inmates. The final section deals with the concept of justice itself and how ordinary citizens apply it, consciously and unconsciously, in everyday life. Alleged inequities of the criminal justice system against blacks, other minorities and women are discussed. Two perspectives on juvenile justice are presented, along with a proposed alternative to the present prison system. Different contributors show significant differences in ideology and perspective, as well as a lack of agreement on fundamental questions regarding the future of the American criminal justice system. (Author abstract modified).