1. Chapter 3 Defining and Measuring Crime

2. Learning Objective 1
Discuss the primary goals of civil law and criminal law and explain how these goals are realized

3. Learning Objective 1 Civil Law Criminal Law
Civil court is concerned with responsibility
The burden of proof is preponderance of the evidence
The remedy for violations of civil law is compensation
Criminal Law
Criminal court is concerned with guilt
The burden of proof is beyond a reasonable doubt
The remedy for violations is some form of punishment

4. Learning Objective 1 Felonies Misdemeanors
More serious or atrocious than misdemeanors
Punishable by death or imprisonment in a penitentiary for a period of a year or longer
Misdemeanors
Less serious crimes
Punishable by a fine and or incarceration in a local jail for up to one year

5. Learning Objective 2
Explain the differences between crimes mala in se and mala prohibita

6. Learning Objective 2 Mala in Se Mala Prohibita
Acts that are inherently wrong, regardless of whether they are prohibited by law
Examples include murder, rape, and theft
Mala Prohibita
Acts that are made illegal by criminal statute and are not necessarily wrong in and of themselves
Examples include speeding and loitering

7. Learning Objective 3
Identify the publication in which the FBI reports crime data and list the three ways in which the data are reported

8. Discussion Questions What is the UCR most commonly used for?
What types of crimes are the most prevalent?

9. Video: Violent Crime

10. Learning Objective 3 The Uniform Crime Report (UCR)
Produced by the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Includes data collected from 17,500 policing agencies each year, including:
Number of arrests.
Number of crimes reported.
Number of officers.

11. Learning Objective 4
Distinguish between Part I and Part II offenses as defined by the Uniform Crime Report

12. Learning Objective 4 Part I Offenses: Part II Offenses: Violent Crimes
Property Crimes
Part II Offenses:
Includes all crimes that do not fall into the category of Part I offenses.
Measured only by arrest data.
Occur five times more often than Part I offenses.

13. Learning Objective 5
Describe some of the shortcomings of UCR as a crime measuring tool

14. Learning Objective 5 Criticisms of the UCR include:
Discretionary Distortions
Crime unreported by citizens
Crime underreported by police
Clearance Distortions
Variations in the law
NIBRS

15. Learning Objective 6
Distinguish between the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) and self-reported surveys

16. Learning Objective 6
Victim Surveys are a method of gathering crime where citizens are surveyed directly regarding their criminal victimizations.
Victim surveys attempt to uncover the dark figure of crime.
Self-report surveys ask respondents to tell about their criminal activities.
Reliability is an issue.
Self-report surveys are also an attempt to measure the dark figure of crime.

17. Learning Objective 7
Identify the three factors most often used by criminologists to explain increases and declines in the nation’s crime rate

18. Learning Objective 7 The “usual suspects” of crime fluctuation:
Imprisonment
Youth populations
The economy

19. Learning Objective 8
Explain why issues of race and ethnicity tend to be overstated when it comes to trends

20. Discussion Questions
How has the diversification of prison guards effected the prison population?
What demographic were prison officers most typically from?

21. Video: Nightline: Corrections

22. Learning Objective 8 Crime, Race and Poverty:
In general, poor people and minorities commit more crimes and are more often the victims of crimes, than wealthier people and whites

23. Learning Objective 9
Discuss the prevailing explanation for the rising number of women incarcerated in the United States

24. Learning Objective 9 Women and Crime:
Crime is a predominantly male activity, however female offending rates are steadily increasing
Explanations include Adler’s “liberation hypothesis” and the “get-tough” on crime movement