No light at end of tunnel...or.

Nik has decided to discontinue the services of providing articles, and reading materials for Criminology subject. I felt that, currently hectic with my core element knowledge, that is Accounting & finance+ to juggle with work..therefore, as there were very indeed, limited time for me to focus simultaneously to both discipline...However, if there is a need arise..who knows, i might make a comeback :p
till then~
Nik sign-off

~TEMPORARY BREAK~

Relaks,its not really Suspended,but Due to excessive of topics in Criminology,and limited time that I have to update in this Criminology blog..i decided to take time off this blog temporary. My aim and major are in Accountancy and Criminology are my so-called off or free time education. In addition, currently Im carrying a challenge and tough subject for my final core paper in ACCA. thus,my focus and attention should heavely be put into this area.
However,after I comfortly pass my exam papers,Im delightly to update this blog.For the time being its officially closed.
Thank you for your support!

House Arrest

What is exactly House Arrest??is it by staying house all day until the period of the punishment ends? well, House arrest means just that, they ARE NOT to leave the house without prior consent of the judge. If the mother allows the "arrestees" to leave then yes she can be picked up as well. When some one is on house arrest they are still considered to be in the custody of what ever correctional facility ordered the house arrest. At the same time, such individual have these trackers around their anckles and they can only go so far until it will beep, so basicly they cannot leave their home, if they do, they beep noise, will contact the police.
You may seen the the latest movie 'disturbia' where Shia LaBeouf as a depressed teen placed under house arrest who thinks he witnesses a murder while spying on his suspicious neighbor, believing he is a murderer.
While house arrest can be applied to common criminal cases when prison does not seem an appropriate measure, the term is often applied to the use of house confinement as a measure of repression of authoritarian governments against political dissidents. In that case, typically, the person under house arrest does not have access to means of communication.
The terms of house arrest can differ. Some terms can require the convict to be inside his or her private residence no matter what. Others allow for certain exceptions, such as being allowed movement in as much as functions for the court or the prisoner's essentials. Examples of such movement can include visits to the probabation officer or police station, or being allowed to go to the office of a doctor or dentist. Some house arrests also permit the convict to frequent gymnasiums to keep their health up, as most prisons do have gyms and recreational areas included within their walls. Another house arrest option is to allow the prisoner to frequent shops and supermarkets on the basis that it is necessary to resupply the house periodically.
Some notable cases surrounding House Arrest, is the famous hilton heirness Paris.
I am outraged that Paris Hilton got released out of prison early. Why is it when Celebrities Sin, they get away with their wrongdoing and does not affect their reputation but when Everyday People Sin, the society around us has a field trip and Everyday People reputation gets hurt
After just three days of hard time in the clink, Paris Hilton was released and placed under house arrest ... or, palace arrest, as is more likely the case. While it's possible she'll be back in the orange jumpsuit before too long, we thought we'd take this opportunity to see just how house arrest anklets actually work..As i learned, Paris's newest fashion accessory is a clunky anklet rigged with a radio transmitter that communicates with a receiver installed in her house. The receiver is programmed with a distance range that Paris must stay within, and it uses phone lines to report her status (home or not home) back to a central monitoring hub. If Paris thought she could fool everyone by strapping the anklet around the neck of her pet monkey, she's out of luck: These babies are tamper-proof..
Others high profile cases regarding house arrest includes

• Galileo Galilei was put under house arrest for his belief in Copernicus's theory of the sun in the middle of the universe and all the planets and stars revolving around it. He stayed under house arrest until 1642 when he died.
• Former Premier Nikita Khrushchev was placed under house arrest for the seven years before his death after being deposed in 1964.
• Martha Stewart was sentenced to five months of house arrest following her release from prison on March 4, 2005.

Victimology

Victimology is the study of people who hurt others, and people who are hurt by others. Its subjects are bullies, rapists, molesters, batterers, gang leaders, terrorists, hate crime perpetrators, armed robbers, and their victims.

These are hardly the people that we like to think of populating schools or businesses. So why study them in developing business or educational products?

Both schools and businesses include some of these people. Both include many others who are their victims. And both are places where less dramatic, minor aggression causes big problems, and where good social relationships make a major difference between success and failure.
The experience of victimisation results in increasing fear and the spread of this fear and suspicion in the community.

Closely related to victimology are the concepts of method of approach, method of attack and risk assessment. If we know details of the victims' personalities (i.e. they may be naturally cautious), then we may be able to determine, in conjunction with an analysis of the crime scene, how they were initially approached by the offender. The same will apply for the way they were attacked and overpowered. If this information is not distinguishable through the crime scene, then an analysis of the victims' overall risk, that is, the chances of them becoming a victim, may be of some help. If we examine this along with the risks the offender was willing to take to acquire a certain victim, then we will have an overall picture of who the victim was and what drove the offender to choose this particular person as a victim.
While im reading some articles, Brent Turvey once quoted "In the rush to examine a criminal's behavior, it is not difficult to become distracted by the dangling carrot of that criminal's potential characteristics and forget about the value of understanding his victims"
There are three main issues that can be provided through victimology and these are

• context,

• connections, and

• investigative direction (Turvey).

Using the above case, it would have been possible to provide investigative direction in that the police should look for a male who had prior access to the properties, may have been employed by the Housing Commission, and was probably employed in a profession such as a painter, builder, lawn-mower or general maintenance man.The other kinds of links that may be provided between the offender and victim include work colleagues, geographic links (such as a neighbor), hobby related links (sports clubs), or social links (victim met the offender in a bar). The number of possible links is endless, so a good victimology is essential to narrow this down.

1. The method of approach is a term that refers to the offender's way of getting close to his victims (Turvey). It is useful to examine as it may provide many clues about the offender, such as his social skills, physical build, and ability to manipulate and charm. There are generally three methods of approach, described as con, surprise and blitz. These may occur singularly, or in conjunction with one of the other methods such as a con/blitz or surprise/blitz combination.
2. The method of attack refers to the offender's mechanisms for initially overpowering a victim once he has made his approach (Turvey). It is generally not appropriate to use the terms "con" and "surprise" here, as they are not really suited to describing attacks.The method of attack is probably best described in relation to the degree of force used and the presence of any weapons and their role in the attack. The attack may range from mild (such as verbal threats) to severe (overwhelming physical assault with the excessive use of a weapon).
3. Risk assessment involves determining the risk of a particular person becoming a victim of crime. Occasionally we will hear reports about violent crime stating that the perpetrator had gone to great lengths to acquire the victim. In other cases, we may hear that the perpetrator has acquired a victim of opportunity. Perhaps in this last instance, something that the victim had done, or was involved in, had elevated their risk of becoming a victim of that crime.
   

As a conclusion, the study of victimology also includes the "culture of victimhood," wherein the self-professed "victim," reveling in his status of victimhood, goes about proclaiming that self-created victimhood throughout a community in order to salve his low self-esteem by winning the sympathy of professionals and peers.
Regarding this articles,some references i made are from

• Turvey, B. E. (1999). Criminal Profiling: An Introduction to Behavioral Evidence Analysis.
• Holmes, R., & Holmes, S. (1996). Profiling Violent Crimes: An Investigative Tool (2nd ed.).
• Douglas, J. E., Burgess, A. W., Burgess, A. G., & Ressler, R. K. (1992). Crime Classification Manual: A Standard System for Investigating and Classifying Violent Crimes.
• Mr.Wayne Petherick which he lectures in Media and Crime, Crime and Deviance, Criminal Profiling, Advanced Behavioural Evidence Analysis, Theories of Crime and the Criminal Justice System.
• Jo Goodey, Victims and Victimology,Research, Policy and Practice(2004)
  

Criminal Law aims

For my first introduction,let us focus our attention on the main goals of the existence of criminal law.There are five main goals of criminal justice: retribution, deterrence, incapacitation, rehabilitation and restitution. Jurisdictions differ on the value to be placed on each, if any at all.
First,my understanding on

• Restitution - Restoration may well not be enough for the betrayed person and they may seek revenge of some sort, whereby they can feel the satisfaction of seeing the other person suffer in the way that they have suffered.
  Revenge can be many times more severe than reparation as the hurt party seeks to make the other person suffer in return.



• Rehabilitation - The first thing that the betrayed person may seek from the betrayer is some form of restitution, putting things back as they should be.
  The simplest form of restitution is a straightforward apology. Restoration or rehabilitation means putting things back as they were, so it may include some act of contrition to demonstrate one is truly sorry. This may include action and even extra payment to the offended party.
  Restorative justice is also known as corrective justice



• Incapacitation - Incapacitation aims simply to keep criminals away from society, so that society is protected from their criminal conduct. This is normally achieved through long prison sentences.



• Deterrence - Those who support the deterrence theory believe that if punishment is imposed upon a person who has committed a crime, the pain inflicted will dissuade the offender (and others) from repeating the crime. When the theory refers to the specific offender who committed the crime, it is known as special deterrence. General deterrence describes the effect that punishment has when it serves as a public example or threat that deters people other than the initial offender from committing similar crimes. Deterrence can be divided into two three categories :- Specific deterrence(to discourage the criminal from future criminal acts by instilling an understanding of the consequences), General deterrence (The individual actor is not the focus of the attempt at behavioural change, but rather receives punishment in public view in order to deter other individuals from deviance in the future). , Incapacitation ( criminals are put in jail not so that they will learn the consequence of their actions but rather so that while there they will be unable to engage in crime).

Here are a couple principles and facts for you to consider:

It is better for a hundred guilty men to go free, than one innocent man to go to prison.
All criminal offenses have a statute of limitations except homicide.
Burden of proof—in every criminal case the burden of proof is on the state and the state (meaning, the "prosecutor") must prove every element beyond a reasonable doubt.
4 Reasons for criminal punishment (prison):

1-deterrence (to stop)

2-incapacitation (to isolate)

3-retribution (to punish)

4-rehabilitation (to save).

-The various justifications for criminal punishment are not mutually exclusive. A particular punishment may advance several goals at the same time. A term of imprisonment, for example, may serve to incapacitate the offender, deter others in society from committing similar acts, and, at the same time, provide an opportunity for rehabilitative treatment for the offender. On the other hand, the goals of punishment may at times conflict. The retributive and deterrence theories call for the infliction of unpleasant experiences upon the criminal, including harsh prison treatment; but the prison environment may not be conducive to, or may even defeat, rehabilitation.

No one theory of punishment addresses all the goals of criminal law. A combination of theories and goals plays a part in the thinking of the legislators who establish the ranges of punishment for various crimes, the judges and jurors who sentence offenders within these ranges, and the parole authorities who have the power to release certain prisoners.

some of the discussion on the recent deterrent can be refer to this website http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?&did=2374 which i find it very useful, and also this book written by Clive Norman & Clive Norris which act as my resources.