Academic literature on the topic 'Crime Victoria Public opinion'

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Florida State University, 2009.
Advisor: Thomas G. Blomberg, Florida State University, College of Criminology and Criminal Justice. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed on Mar. 11, 2010). Document formatted into pages; contains xi, 133 pages. Includes bibliographical references.

Introduction: Renewed efforts for controlling criminality in Sweden are demanded by the Swedish Government. Restorative justice conferences (RJC), in Sweden known as mediation, can be described as a meeting mediated by a trained facilitator in which the offender and the victim of a crime meets, sometimes together with their friends and family. RJC aims to promote the offender to take responsibility for his or her actions and repair the damage the victim has suffered. Research on RJC shows promising results in regard of reduced recidivism and increased victim benefits. No Swedish publication studying public opinion on RJC has been found. The theoretical framework of reintegrative shaming stated that a community that offer reintegration is essential for successful crime prevention. Aim: To measure the level of RJC support held by a Swedish community sample in regard of different offender and offence characteristics. Method: Participants were recruited at a Swedish authority located in nine different cities (n = 192) and surveyed using an online questionnaire. The questionnaire was based on two scales measuring benefits of restorative justice and support for participation in restorative justice derived from a previous study. Results: The respondents had an overall positive attitude toward RJC. No respondent demographic was associated with the total level of restorative justice support although differences were found when using age and gender as independent variables. Respondents were more positive of RJC for juvenile offenders and non-violent crime. Discussion: A discussion regarding the public support for RJC in relation to offender recidivism is provided established on reintegrative shaming and previous empirical evidence. Concluding arguments for RJC to be extended in a wider context in the Swedish penalty system are presented.

2016-06-01

This study deals with the analysis of public opinion about crime and attitudes regarding criminal justice issues along two major dimensions. The first part concerns how respondents rank crime among a list of nine social problems (unemployment, high interest rates, inflation, crime, the high cost of living, moral decline, taxes, dissatisfaction with the government, and Reagan). The second dimension examines some research questions. These are whether there was any association between the respondents' perception of crime trends and each of the following: demographic background, neighborhood safety, the death penalty, gun ownership, frequency of locking doors, avoidance of teenagers, and the evaluation of police job performance; and also whether there was any association between the respondents' victimization experience and seriousness of crime and police job performance. The data were obtained from the archives of the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research in Michigan.

This thesis explores the relationship between crime, media, and public opinion of crime and criminal justice. It sets out current levels of knowledge and contemporary debates in each of the three academic disciplines devoted to these aspects of social life, and discusses how they relate to each other. It focuses on the capacity of information and public education to influence levels of public knowledge of and, as a secondary concern, attitudes towards, crime and criminal justice. The empirical research at the heart of the thesis employed a mixed methods research study drawing on quantitative – experimental research using a public opinion survey – as well as qualitative research methods – in-depth interviews and contextual data. The experimental research, the Oxford Public Opinion Survey and the publication of the Crime Scene column, was designed to measure the impact of providing factual information about crime and criminal justice to the public in a naturalistic way, i.e. by using a local newspaper column as the conveyor of such information. The key finding from the research was that readership of the column was low and that the column had no measurable impact on readers. Overall, the research findings suggest that interest in, take-up, and retention of factual information on crime and criminal justice is not as high as previous empirical research has suggested. The Crime Scene study has implications for sociological theories of crime and punishment which rely on simplistic orthodoxies concerning the media’s importance in influencing public opinion on crime and criminal justice and the related assumption that ‘the public’ is straightforwardly punitive.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--George Mason University, 2009.
Vita: p. 219. Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Justice, Law and Crime Policy. Title from PDF t.p. (viewed June 10, 2009). Thesis director: Stephen D. Mastrofski. Includes bibliographical references (p. 208-218). Also issued in print.

The Australian justice system is based in a conventional model of justice with the aim of uniformity in sentencing. It is important to ascertain public opinion on the relevance of different factors to be taken into account at sentencing as accurately as possible, in order to provide informed public opinion which may assist policy makers in making legislation or educating the public on these matters. The current study examined the impact of varying levels of victim harm (high or low) and offender remorse (high or low) for both person and property crimes on sentencing decisions made by both male (n = 99) and female (n = 94) members of the Western Australian public. The design was a 2 x 2 x 2 x 2 between subjects factorial, with dependent variables of length of sentence assigned (0-10 years jail), rated influence of four sentencing goals (retribution, rehabilitation, incapacitation and deterrence) on sentence choice, and responses to an open-ended question about the reasons for the sentence chosen. The main findings were that demonstrations of offender remorse and the level of harm caused to the victim appeared to be factors in public participants' sentencing. There was no difference in sentences assigned by male and female participants. Although the majority of participants believed they sentenced for rehabilitative reasons. Retribution appeared to be the major factor in the sentences assigned an outcome which reflects the focus of the Western Australian sentencing legislation. Implications arising from the results include the need for more public education in the areas of the functions or the courts, legal principles and theories, and options for victims of crime. Overall, the current study added to the body of research examining public opinions about the potential relevance of various victim and offender factors at the sentencing phase in the search for uniformity in sentencing.

How society views the use of the death penalty as a means of punishment greatly affects the decisions of lawmakers, politicians who use it as a platform for election, and the criminals who commit the crime of murder. This study used 40 different vignettes involving real-life murder scenarios in order for participants to form a more precise opinion of what the correct punishment for the crime should be. Given a choice between the death penalty, life without the possibility of parole, a prison term of their choosing, or other, participants were asked to assign a sanction for each vignette. Respondents were asked to answer demographic questions about themselves in order for these variables to be regressed to examine how their status relates to their opinion of the death penalty as a punishment for murder. Statistical analysis showed income level, political affiliation, and religious affiliation to be significant variables. Analysis of the vignettes themselves revealed substantial variation in individual's willingness to apply the death penalty across various types of murder.

This study was conducted on-site in Istanbul, Turkey, to determine the effects that mass media has on citizens' perceptions about fear of crime, in particular, and fear, in general. Specifically, the study was designed to (1) determine the tendency of citizens' media consumption, (2) determine the level of fear of crime among Turkish citizens, (3) establish the effect of media on citizens' fear of crime, and (4) determine if gender, age, educational level, neighborhood, and monthly income have an independent effect on fear of crime. To achieve this purpose, after administering a survey in Istanbul, the researcher collected appropriate data and then utilized regression analysis to examine the relationship between media variables and fear of crime. A survey consisting of three parts was administered to 545 Turkish citizens over the age of 18 who currently reside in Istanbul, Turkey. In Part I of the survey, respondents were asked to identify their trends in relation to media consumption, and in Part II respondents were asked to report their feelings about fear of crime. Finally, Part III consisted of socio-demographic characteristics including gender, age, marital status, level of education, and income. The media variables used for this study were, general TV viewing, watching crime drama, watching TV news, listening to radio news, reading newspaper news, and reading Internet news. Regarding the independent effects of socio-demographic variables on fear of crime, only gender was found to be significantly related thereby supporting the research hypothesis. From six media variables, only watching crime drama show and reading Internet news found to be related with individuals' fear of crime; however, this relation disappeared after controlling with socio-demographic variables. In addition, no cultivation effect could be found among the sub-groups of sample.

"This study deals with how the Kurdish websites deal with issues related to the city of Halabja, as (media coverage) or (news treatment) occupies a wide area of media studies, and helps to understand the nature of media interaction by different media outlets with different events.. The tragedy of Halabja, which is the chemical attack by the Iraqi regime in the spring of 1988, received (relative) media coverage from various local and international media outlets, The media interest during the event in 1988 was modest and did not represent the scale of the tragedy that befell this city, and that was because the Arab and international countries were supporting the former Iraqi regime, as well as the absence of international satellite channels and websites at that time, but despite that, a group of journalists, as well as Iranian media and diplomatic agencies, were able to convey the echo of this crime to world public opinion. This study is an attempt to examine how is the media coverage by three Kurdish websites relating to various issues related to the city of Halabja, through three main investigations the study reached a set of results. The international media at that time did not respond to this crime in the required manner and did not cover the event in a way that reflects the extent of the crime. And that the Kurdish websites publish topics and news related to the (Halabja) issues through the journalistic form of the news in the first place, and that the political issue of the issues related to Halabja occupies the first place of the Kurdish websites’ concerns. In the first place, and the three websites published most of their topics related to Halabja accompanied by a picture."

"This work includes talking about the crime of Camp Speicher, in which 1,700 students of the Iraqi army of the Sheea creed were killed by the gangs of the terrorist organization ISIS, with the aim of eliminating the members of this sect because of the misleading ideology carried by those gangs. On 6-12-2014, Iraqi soldiers at Camp Speicher (Speicher Air Base) in Tikrit were subjected to murder and enforced disappearance by terrorist organizations because of their affiliation to the Sheea creed. This crime was among a series of brutal crimes for the genocide of Sheeas in Iraq. This is similar to what happened in the Badoush prison crime in the province of Mosul, which the Iraqi Parliament considered it as a crime of genocide, in which these gangs executed about (400) members of the prison inmates of the Sheea component. After ISIS took control of the city of Tikrit in Iraq, and one day after they took control of the city of Mosul, they captured (2000-2200) soldiers and led them to the presidential palaces in Tikrit, and they shot them there and in other areas and buried some of them alive. This disaster had a negative impact on the families of the victims of the Speicher where they went out in demonstrations demanded that the leaders who handed over the victims of Speicher to ISIS must be prosecuted, and in one of the demonstrations they managed to enter Parliament and demanded that the leaders who handed over Speicher to ISIS be held accountable. After that, many demonstrations took place by the families of the victims, some of which led to the closure of a bridge in Baghdad a few times Protesting the government's delay in clarifying the fate of their children or taking quick measures. The Iraqi parliament and government recently considered the Speicher incident “genocide” in reference to the premeditated murder of Badoush Prison inmates in Nineveh Governorate and the unarmed Speicher military base, the premeditated murder of members of the Albu Nimr, Jabour, al-Lahib, and al-Ubaid tribes, and the killing and displacement of civilians from Kurds, Christians, Yazidis and Shabaks in Sahel Nineveh, Sinjar, deliberate killing and displacement of Turkmens in Tal Afar and Bashir. This decision paves the way for obtaining international recognition from it as a ""genocide"" as stipulated in the Contract of the United Nations in 1948, and Iraq signed it in the fifties of the last century. This study attempts to explain the Al-Ikhnasas Court in looking into the crimes of genocide committed by ISIS against the bereaved students of the Air Force Base (Speicher) due to what this issue raised from the national and international public opinion, especially after the involvement of the Iraqi army leaders in this massacre, according to what witnesses reported in that area and what was reported by soldiers who survived the incident, in addition to the involvement of some members of the Sunni tribes in these crimes with the terrorist organization ISIS. The importance of this study lies in the following aspects: - That ISIS elements were tried according to Anti-Terrorism Law No. 13 of 2005, and from our point of view that the aforementioned law is vague and broader than it should be, and it applies to serious and simple crimes from murder to crimes of sabotage, and the list of crimes punishable by the death penalty according to the aforementioned law is a long list and spacious. - The Iraqi government has embarked on an attempt to develop a legal framework to prosecute ISIS elements, and its mission focused on understanding the procedures and results drawn from those judicial efforts, and its mission also focused on showing the efforts taken by the Iraqi government to address violations in the field of the right to life, including those committed by affiliated forces government as well as other international and domestic actors. The International Criminal Court is specialized in considering specific crimes under Article (5) of its Statute, which are war crimes, aggression and crimes against humanity, which necessitates the adaptation of Speicher's crime within any of the mentioned types of crimes. The assumption of the International Criminal Court in relation to the Speicher crime, includes several positive matters and results at the same time a set of negatives, which must be presented to those positives and negatives in order to give preference between them and the choice of authorizing the court to consider the crime or not. The terrorist organization ISIS has committed serious systematic violations, including war crimes and others, and perhaps those that are not under its control, and that none of these crimes can be addressed within the anti-terrorism law, which cannot address human rights violations. The international community has recognized the heinous violations committed by ISIS against the citizens of Iraq by adopting Resolution (2370) in September of 2017, issued by the Security Council, which authorizes the Security Council to appoint an investigation team to support local efforts to hold ISIS elements accountable by collecting and preserving evidence in Iraq, which can rise to a high level, and it was committed by the elements of the organization. It considers that the decision constitutes a burden and an obligation on Iraq to investigate all allegations of violations committed by government forces for the purpose of holding them accountable, as well as requiring the establishment of special courts and trained judges in relation to ISIS crimes to deal with them. Terrorism is a global curse that has recently spread horizontally to all countries of the world and its effects have been concentrated vertically in some countries, and no one denies that the parties to this phenomenon are increasing (perpetrators and victims) and the United Nations in particular and the international community in general has not succeeded in reducing it despite the fact that the resolutions of the UN Security Council It is increasing, but the proportionality is absent between these decisions and the practical reality. The phenomenon of terrorism is spreading rapidly, and the perpetrators of terrorist acts are on the rise, corresponding to an increase in the victims of terrorism. Also, the circumstances and events that Iraq is going through, especially after 2003, put it at the forefront of countries which suffers from terrorism that has killed the people, using methods and forms that were not previously known and brutal and bloody cruel. ) for the year 2005, and since terrorism was not limited to Iraq, but included many countries, and was not specific to a place or time, nor was it recent in terms of composition. In addition, the aforementioned law cannot be aware of all violations of international and humanitarian law, as we mentioned previously, which requires the necessity of referring the criminals to a competent court. The Court conducts its rule under Article (13) of its Statute when referred to it by a state party to the same system or by the Security Council or when the Public Prosecutor conducts the investigation on his own, and then how does the Court take its measures regarding the aforementioned crime if we take a look Considering that the State of Iraq is not a member of the Statute of the Court. The rule of the court is free from the death penalty, which makes the idea of authorizing the court to consider the crime rejected by most Iraqis, especially the families of the victims. What are the negative aspects of the Iraqi national judiciary’s view of the Speicher crime, and how can it be avoided if the International Criminal Court plays this role? What are the guarantees provided by the court in the event that it proceeds with its procedures regarding this crime? The research on this subject is according to the appropriate method, which is the analytical and comparative method, which works on studying and comparing topics by analyzing ideas and jurisprudential rulings, and the positions of the governments of countries and the United Nations, as well as the resolutions of the Security Council and the General Assembly, and comparing arbitration between Iraqi courts. And the international courts regarding the trial of the perpetrators of the Speicher base crime, and then come up with a set of conclusions and recommendations."