Category: Criminal Justice Essay Examples

Martin Heidegger was a 20th-century German philosopher known for his existential and phenomenological explorations of the question of being. His best-known work, Being and Time, is considered one of the most important philosophical works of the 20th century. In it and later works, Heidegger maintained that individuals’ ways …

High-profile cases became a staple of media interest and exploitation soon after the introduction of newspapers. In contemporary society, television and Internet reporting broadcast live coverage, expert analysis, and commentary on these cases on a daily basis, including live coverage of court proceedings in many jurisdictions. Media coverage …

The main contributions of Thomas Hobbes’s book Leviathan are his thoughts on the state of nature and social contract theory. Hobbes explains how social and political structures developed and why human beings submit to the authority of a government. Hobbes’s writings were greatly influenced by his experiences of …

On April 8, 2013, the New York Police Department (NYPD) commemorated the 40th anniversary of the creation of its Hostage Negotiation Team (HNT). The NYPD is recognized as the first law enforcement agency in the United States to formally adopt the practice of hostage/crisis negotiation by forming the …

The international system of human rights treaties and the associated language and politics of human rights provide an important normative framework for evaluating the conduct of criminal justice. The goal of achieving human rights compliance does not necessarily displace other ways of thinking ethically about criminal justice. Human …

Human trafficking is the exploitation of people for slavery in forced labor, for trade in the sex industry, and for organ harvesting. The occurrence of these forms of human trafficking involve all forms of transportation. Examples of victims forced to leave the safety of home, trafficked from one …

Hurricane Katrina was a catastrophic natural disaster in 2005 that raised many questions about appropriate responses to disaster situations in general. The storm caused extensive damage on the Gulf Coast of the United States, leading to inquiries about how response could be improved in future incidents. Underlying debates …

The admissibility of testimony based on recovered memories is an area of great debate. Whether retrieved through hypnosis or other means, the use of memories that were once unavailable to the witness as a basis for criminal prosecution is a sharply contested practice. Experts in the fields of …

The question of identity is linked to the model that governs a correctional institution and the overall system of justice. Despite changing and multiple identities associated with those subject to the administration of justice in society, some notions of identity prevail. It is these enduring versions of identity …

Ideology is a term coined by French philosopher Destutt de Tracy (1754–1836) to designate the science or study of ideas. In its current usage, ideology is a pattern of ideas, beliefs, values, and attitudes, a way of looking at the world, a general life-orienting cognitive and emotional picture …

Immigration law in the United States has grown more complex over the years. Anti-immigration legislation and sentiment is not new in the United States. Within the last century, however, and particularly since 2001, legislation aimed at preventing or penalizing immigration has increased at both federal and various local …

Criminological literature has long considered whether the relationship between race, class, and the severity of sentencing has resulted in disparities in imprisonment. The interest in this relationship has been fueled, in part, by real or perceived institutionalized racism in the United States and by the observed disparity between …

Incapacitation is a philosophy of punishment that seeks to restrict an individual’s ability to commit crimes through artificial means. Historically, capital punishment was commonly used to incapacitate dangerous offenders, but in the 21st century incapacitation is most often accomplished through incarceration in jail, prison, and/or solitary confinement. In …

It is better that one innocent escape than a guilty person be convicted. This twist on Sir William Blackstone’s 18th-century formulation perhaps better fits contemporary criminal justice models with so many innocent individuals serving sentences in local, state, and federal correctional facilities. The escape, of course, is not …

Outbursts of violence cast doubt on the psychiatric competence to assess insanity and to balance the need to protect society with the need to offer a competent response to the mentally ill, who committed criminal offenses. Criminal law assumes that individuals act with free will and that they …

The concept of institutional morality is applicable to current policy dilemmas in the U.S. criminal justice system, particularly in the area of criminal justice policy. Bernard Gert defined the concept of “morality” as having two facets. Descriptively, morality can be seen as codes of conduct put forward by …

Researchers from multiple disciplines, including criminology, carry out studies. These studies often necessitate the participation of persons, often referred to as “human subjects.” Ethical standards guide researchers so that whenever they involve human subjects in their research, they must take steps to ensure that their study minimizes harm …

The term institutionalization is typically used to describe an ongoing process by which individuals are intimately shaped by the institutional environment in which they live. Institutionalization within a prison/jail occurs when incarcerated individuals gradually become used to the many restrictions associated with institutional life. Understanding institutionalization is important, …

Intellectual property is a form of legally protected property. All the controversial issues surrounding intellectual property from the perspective of criminal justice ethics stem from its conceptualization as a form of property. The items in the world that are identified as intellectual property are the products of creativity …

Intensive parole and probation supervision (IPPS) is an intermediate sanction that falls between traditional probation and incarceration on the continuum of sanctions. In its ideal form, it provides significantly more monitoring, oversight, and access to treatment/rehabilitation than regular probation or parole. IPPS was developed in the late 1980s …