Safety, courts and crime: occupational safety and health prosecutions in the Magistrates' courts

This paper reports on an empirically based study of occupational safety and health prosecutions in the Magistrates' courts in the State of Victoria, Australia. It examines the way in which the courts construct occupational safety and health issues during prosecutions against alleged offenders, and then theorises the role of the criminal law in health and safety regulation. The paper argues that courts, inspectors, prosecutors and defence counsel are involved in filtering or reshaping occupational safety and health issues during the prosecution process, both pre-trial and in court. An analysis of the pattern of investigation of health and safety offences shows that they are constructed by focusing on 'events', in most cases incidents resulting in injury or death. This 'event focus' ensures that the attention of the parties is drawn to the details of the incident and away from the broader context of the event. This broader context includes the way in which work is organised at the workplace and the quality of occupational safety and health management (the micro context), and the pressures within capitalist production systems for occupational safety and health to be subordinated to production imperatives (the macro context). In particular, during the court-based sentencing process, defence counsel is able to adopt a range of 'isolation' techniques that isolate the incident from its micro and macro contexts, thereby individualising and decontextualising the incident. The paper concludes that the legal system plays a key role in decontextualising and individualising health and safety issues, and that this process is part of the 'architecture' of the legal system, and a direct consequence of the 'form of law'.

Young People and Crime in Rural Communities

Because childhood and adolescence are crucial phases in psycho-social development and the formation of responsible citizens, an unusual degree of attention and supervision is directed at the young (Bittner, 1976; Rose, 1989). Such is the moral frailty of youth that mere presence or 11 doing nothing" (Corrigan, 1979) can, under certain circumstances, excite adult anxieties as a harbinger of immediate or later danger. Delinquency and adolescent antisocial behaviour are not, therefore, a matter of objective, positivistic measurement and control, but are bound up with larger patterns of intergenerational relationships. These relationships are also conditioned by social and spatial environments.

Strange and stranger ruralities: Social constructions of rural crime in Australia

Rural crime has largely been understood through social disorganization theory. The dominance of this perspective has meant that most research into rural crime has tried to resolve perceived strains in communities, rather than analyze how social problems are constituted in rural places. Using Elias and Scotson's (1994) account of established-outsider relations, the paper examines how the organizational capacity of specific social groups is significant in determining the quality of crime-talk and responses to crime in isolated and rural settings. In particular social 'oldness' and notions of what constitutes 'community' are significant in determining what activities and individuals or groups are marked as features of crime-talk in these settings.

Gone Girl and the mediatization of crime

Gone Girl (David Fincher, 2014) will not be remembered for its representation of journalists, although both lead characters are, as the narrative opens in 2012, magazine writers made redundant in the wake of the 2008 global financial crisis. To this extent they personify the “death of journalism” narrative of recent years in the United States, but we never see them in a newsroom or doing journalistic work. The marriage of Nick and Amy Dunne (Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike) is cast as a victim of, among other things, the downturn in the US economy which accompanied the credit crunch. But this is not the subject of Gone Girl, so much as a context for the marital dysfunctionality at the heart of its plot...

When death is not a crime : challenges for police and policing

The over-representation of vulnerable populations within the criminal justice system, and the role of police in perpetuating this, has long been a topic of discussion in criminology. What is less discussed is the way in which non -criminal investigations by police, in areas like a death investigation, may perpetuate similar types of engagement with vulnerable populations. In Australia, as elsewhere, it is the police who are responsible for investigating both suspicious and violent deaths like homicide as well as non - suspicious, violent deaths like accidents and suicides. Police are also the agents tasked with investigating deaths which are neither violent nor suspicious but occur outside hospitals and other care facilities. This paper reports on how the police describe - or are described by others - their role in a non - suspicious death investigation, and the challenges that such investigations raise for police and policing.

Staged crime scenes : literature and types

Many things can hamper an investigation. For example, the crime may be a truly random occurrence without links between the victim and the offender, evidence may not be acknowledged or properly collected, and the crime type itself may influence solvability. In other cases still, offenders actively seek to hamper the police investigation in an effort to avoid being caught and going to prison. In fact, the literature on homicide notes that it is not uncommon in many cases of this type for the offender to engage in precautionary acts (Turvey, 2007)...

Environmental crime, human rights and green criminology

This chapter is concerned with the prospects for a safe and sustainable environment in a fair and just world. At present, these prospects look bleak. However there are a number of legal developments and ethical principles on which to build, including the European Convention on the Protection of the Environment through Criminal Law, notions of environmental, ecological and species justice, and conceptions of human rights. The chapter considers these in five sections: first providing an overview and exploring the links between human rights and environmental issues; then examining examples of environmental crimes / harms and attempts to regulate or criminalise these; before outlining the development of a Green Criminology and proposals for an international law against ecocide as a framework for addressing this range of challenges. Finally, concluding comments draw attention to debates and directions for discussion and research.

Juvenile justice: Youth and crime in Australia [Fifth Edition]

Juvenile Justice 5th edition explores youth and crime in Australia, and the institutions and agencies associated with the administration of juvenile justice. It provides an accessible introduction to the main concepts and issues of juvenile justice and critically analyses the principles, policies and practices associated with it. The book provides clear information across a broad range of areas, and raises a number of questions about the institutions of juvenile justice and how we think about issues of juvenile justice.

Crime stories from the country of huopatossu and juhannusruusut : Translation strategies for Finnish cultural realia in the English translations of two of Matti Yrjänä Joensuu’s crime novels

Pro gradu –tutkielman aiheena on kulttuurin ominaispiirteiden kääntäminen. Teksteissä kulttuurin jälki voi näkyä monin eri tavoin. Tutkielman kohteena ovat erityisesti käännösstrategiat, joita kääntäjät käyttävät kohdatessaan kulttuurisidonnaisia viittauksia. Tutkielma nostaa esiin myös niitä tekijöitä, jotka vaikuttavat siihen, minkälaisia käännösstrategioita kääntäjät valitsevat. Näistä tekijöistä tutkielma keskittyy kääntämisen normeihin. Tutkielma pureutuu kulttuurisidonnaisten viitteiden kääntämiseen tarkastelemalla kahta suomalaista kaunokirjallista teosta ja niiden käännöksiä. Tutkielman aineistona ovat Matti Yrjänä Joensuun kaksi rikosromaania ja näiden käännökset. Teoksista toinen on vuonna 1983 suomeksi julkaistu Harjunpää ja poliisin poika, jonka englanninkielinen käännös Harjunpaa the stone murders julkaistiin vuonna 1986. Toinen teos on vuonna 2003 julkaistu Harjunpää ja pahan pappi ja sen käännös The Priest of Evil vuodelta 2006. Tutkielman tavoitteena on selvittää, minkälaisia kulttuurisidonnaisia viittauksia romaanit sisälsivät, minkälaisia käännösstrategioita kääntäjät käyttivät kääntäessään näitä viittauksia ja mikä voisi selittää heidän strategisia valintojaan. Tutkielma pyrkii vastaamaan kysymykseen siitä, voisiko jonkin kääntämistä koskevan normin olemassa olo selittää kääntäjien strategisia valintoja. Tutkielman tavoitteena on myös selvittää, suositaanko kääntämisessä englannin kieleen niin kutsuttuja kotouttavia käännösstrategioita ja ovatko käännösstrategiat ja kääntämistä koskevat normit muuttuneet kahdenkymmenen vuoden aikana. Näihin kysymyksiin vastaamiseksi suomenkielisistä teksteistä on etsitty kaikki kulttuurisidonnaisia viittauksia sisältävät tekstinkohdat. Näitä vastaavat kohdat on sitten etsitty käännöksistä ja suomen- ja englanninkielisiä kohtia on vertailtu keskenään. Molemmat suomenkieliset romaanit sisältävät runsaasti kulttuurisidonnaisia viittauksia. Suurimman kulttuurisidonnaisten viittausten ryhmän muodostivat molemissa romaaneissa henkilöiden nimet. Romaanin sisälsivät myös runsaasti viittauksia maantieteeseen, erityisesti kulttuurimaantieteeseen, ja yhteiskuntaan. Sitä vastoin viittaukset suomalaiseen kulttuuriin ja historiaan olivat vähäisempiä. Tutkielma osoittaa, että kääntäessään suomesta englannin kielelle suomalaisen rikoskirjallisuuden kääntäjät saattavat käyttää enemmän vieraannuttavia strategioita kuin kotouttavia strategioita ja että he suosivat vieraannuttavia strategioita kasvavassa määrin. Harjunpään ja pahan papin kääntäjä käytti enemmän vieraannuttavia strategioita kuin Harjunpään ja poliisin pojan kääntäjä kaksikymmentä vuotta aikaisemmin. Tutkielman tulokset eivät tue väitettä siitä, että käännettäessä englannin kielelle suosittaisiin kotouttavia strategioita. Näyttää siltä, että vieraannuttavia strategioita on käytetty enemmän ja käytetään yhä enenevässä määrin. Lisääntyvän vieraannuttamisen taustalla voi olla useita syitä, kuten suomalaisen kulttuurin lisääntynyt tunnettuus maailmalla, rikosromaanin genren vaatimukset tai muutokset kääntäjäyhteisön arvoissa. Tutkielman tulosten perusteella näyttää siltä, että ainakin muutoksia normeissa ja arvoissa on tapahtunut. Lisätutkimuksen avulla voitaisiin selvittää, pätevätkö tutkielman tulokset muihin romaaneihin ja niiden käännöksiin tai muihin genreihin käännettäessä suomesta englantiin. Lisätutkimus voisi nojautua laajempaan ja erilaisia tekstejä kattavaan aineistoon. Jatkotutkimus voisi myös sisältää kääntäjien haastatteluita tai kyselyitä kääntäjille. Näiden avulla voitaisiin saada lisäselvyyttä syistä heidän strategisille valinnoilleen. Asiasanat: Käännöskirjallisuus – kaunokirjallisuus Kääntäminen – suomen kieli – englannin kieli Kääntäminen – strategia Kääntäminen - normi

A Story of Organized Crime: Constructing Criminality and Building Institutions

This is a narrative about the way in which a category of crime-to-be-combated is constructed through the discipline of criminology and the agents of discipline in criminal justice. The aim was to examine organized crime through the eyes of those whose job it is to fight it (and define it), and in doing so investigate the ways social problems surface as sites for state intervention. A genealogy of organized crime within criminological thought was completed, demonstrating that there are a range of different ways organized crime has been constructed within the social scientific discipline, and each of these were influenced by the social context, political winds and intellectual climate of the time. Following this first finding, in-depth qualitative interviews were conducted with individuals who had worked at the apex of the policing of organized crime in Australia, in order to trace their understandings of organized crime across recent history. It was found that organized crime can be understood as an object of the discourse of the politics of law and order, the discourse of international securitization, new public management in policing business, and involves the forging of outlaw identities. Therefore, there are multiple meanings of organized crime that have arisen from an interconnected set of social, political, moral and bureaucratic discourses. The institutional response to organized crime, including law and policing, was subsequently examined. An extensive legislative framework has been enacted at multiple jurisdictional levels, and the problem of organized crime was found to be deserving of unique institutional powers and configurations to deal with it. The social problem of organized crime, as constituted by the discourses mapped out in this research, has led to a new generation of increasingly preemptive and punitive laws, and the creation of new state agencies with amplified powers. That is, the response to organized crime, with a focus on criminalization and enforcement, has been driven and shaped by the four discourses and the way in which the phenomenon is constructed within them. An appreciation of the nexus between the emergence of the social problem, and the formation of institutions in response to it, is important in developing a more complete understanding of the various dimensions of organized crime.

O cérebro criminógeno na antropologia criminal do século XIX: um estudo sobre a etiologia do crime a partir da medicalização da sociedade

O presente trabalho se dedica a realizar uma incursão na história do pensamento criminológico a fim de contribuir para um mapeamento das justificativas do surgimento de certas normas penais, algumas ainda em vigor, e o mapeamento das razões da edificação de muitas instituições jurídicas e administrativas, algumas ainda em funcionamento. A análise tradicional da biografia da Criminologia costuma, todavia, omitir certas ideias que deveriam ser integradas ao percurso da sua vertente científica. Vários são os autores que apontam para a origem da trajetória cientificista criminológica na Europa do fim do século XIX. No entanto, quando se aprofunda na identificação das raízes das referências positivistas na implicação Medicina-Pessoa-Sociedade da era moderna e sua influência na seara criminológica, percebesse que uma tímida Criminologia já estava nascendo no início do século XIX com os estudos sobre a fisiologia cerebral. Em meio a um processo político amplo de fortalecimento do Estado e da burguesia, dá-se a formação de um aparato médico-jurídico, pelo qual se demonstra a tentativa de reconhecimento da autoridade médica para além dos limites legítimos da atividade. Preocupa-se, portanto, em chamar a atenção para o movimento de medicalização do criminoso por uma leitura histórica do impacto do cientificismo cerebral na esfera criminal. O material desenvolvido pela Frenologia e, depois, pela Antropologia Criminal, é emblemático dessa onda cientificista do século XIX, na qual as pesquisas cerebrais imprimem a visão sobre a etiologia do crime a partir de seus marcadores biológicos. Mais particularmente, atenta-se para a recepção das teorias de Franz Joseph Gall e de Cesare Lombroso sobre o cérebro (do) criminoso na criminologia do século XIX, através da discussão da noção de livre arbítrio, do debate sobre retribuição versus tratamento, bem como das propostas de medidas preventivas em caso de tendências à violência e das políticas públicas voltadas para o cerceamento de direitos em nome de uma suposta defesa social.

Compositional Bayesian modelling and its application to decision support in crime investigation

J. Keppens, Q. Shen and M. Lee. Compositional Bayesian modelling and its application to decision support in crime investigation. Proceedings of the 19th International Workshop on Qualitative Reasoning, pages 138-148.

A Want of Order and Good Discipline: Rules, Discretion and the Victorian Prison

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