Remember Not to Forget Furman: A Response to Professor Smith

Professor Robert J. Smith encourages readers, lawyers, and courts to forget Furman v. Georgia and to focus instead on death penalty challenges grounded in the diminished culpability of nearly all capital defendants. We applaud Professor Smith’s call to focus on the mental and emotional characteristics that reduce the blameworthiness of so many of those charged with capital crimes; recognizing diminished culpability as the rule rather than the exception among capital defendants conveys a reality that rarely finds its way into reported cases. We are troubled, however, by Professor Smith’s call to “forget Furman.” We believe the title and the article’s efforts to undermine Furman-based challenges disserve Professor Smith’s principal goal — addressing the United States’ broken death penalty system.

Dead man walking : an empirical reassessment of the deterrent effect of capital punishment using the bounds testing approach to cointegration

This paper empirically estimates a murder supply equation for the United States from 1965 to 2001 within a cointegration and error correction framework. Our findings suggest that any support for the deterrence hypothesis is sensitive to the inclusion of variables for the effects of guns and other crimes. In the long run we find that real income and the conditional probability of receiving the death sentence are the main factors explaining variations in the homicide rate. In the short run the aggravated assault rate and robbery rate are the most important determinants of the homicide rate.

Love thy neighbour? Associations of social capital and crime with physical activity amongst women

Using a multilevel study design, this study examined the associations between social characteristics of individuals and neighbourhoods and physical activity among women. Women (n = 1405) recruited from 45 Melbourne (Australia) neighbourhoods of varying socioeconomic disadvantage provided data on social factors and leisure-time: physical activity; walking; and walking in one’s own neighbourhood. Individual level social factors were number of neighbours known and social participation. Neighbourhood-level social characteristics (interpersonal trust, norms of reciprocity, social cohesion) were derived by aggregating survey data on these constructs within neighbourhoods. Objective data on crimes within neighbourhoods were obtained from Victoria Police. In bivariable regression models, all social variables at both the individual and neighbourhood level were positively associated with odds of physical activity, walking, and walking in one’s own neighbourhood. Associations with individual social participation (associated with all three physical activity variables) and neighbourhood interpersonal trust (associated with overall physical activity only) remained significant in multivariable models. Neither neighbourhood crime against the person nor incivilities were associated with any form of physical activity. These results demonstrate that women who participated in local groups or events and, less consistently, women living in neighbourhoods where residents trusted one another, were more likely to participate in leisure-time physical activity. While redressing macro-level social and economic policies that contribute to neighbourhood inequalities remains a priority, public health initiatives aimed at promoting physical activity could consider focusing on fostering social interactions targeting both individuals and communities. Further investigation of causal mechanisms underlying these associations is required.

‘The Snowtown we know and love’ : small newspapers and heinous crimes

This paper examines the role of small newspapers in Australia when bizarre and shocking crimes are committed locally. These crimes often attract intense media attention that casts a net of shame across entire townships through their representation as places of fascination and fear in the public imagination. We take a practice approach in the tradition of Pierre Bourdieu to explore the complex editorial considerations, news judgements and community responsibilities small newspapers must negotiate when covering these stories for local audiences. This study focuses on three towns in regional Australia that have been represented in metropolitan and international news media as ‘dead zones' after shocking crimes: Bowral in NSW, Snowtown in South Australia and Moe in Victoria.

A eficácia, no ordenamento jurídico brasileiro, da responsabilização penal da pessoa jurídica pela prática de crimes ambientais

The environment, which fundamental importance has already been recognized in all the world, is an actual national and international discussion subject, whose interest grows for the society, and consequently to the Law, in order to prevent the natural resources to the present and future generations. The 1988 Brazilian Constitution, recognizing the importance of the environment, treated about it in many of its parts, even dedicating a specific chapter (Chapter V About Environment, inserted in Title VIII About Social Order). The brazilian constitutional text established to everyone the fundamental right of enjoying an equilibrated environment, obligating the State and all society to defend and preserve the environment to the present and future generations. The economic growing process, that predominated and still persist in the big majority of the countries, where is practiced the capitalist system, has in the enterprises (legal persons) one of its main actors. Many times, these enterprises, especially in the actual globalized world in where we live, where the gain of money is priorized, ends, at the moment they act, making damages to the environment. These damages are, many times, considered by the law. crimes against the environment. The 1988 Brazilian Constitution, according to the Modern Criminal Law, realizing that many crimes were being committed by the enterprises, established in article 225, §3rd, the criminal responsibility of the legal persons. Almost ten years after the 1988 Brazilian Constitution, was published the Law number 9.605/98, in which third article established the penal responsibility of the legal persons that practice crimes against the environment, without excluding the individual responsibility

Crimes lucratifs des jeunes de la rue : réanalyse de l'impact criminogène de la rue

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

Crimes lucratifs des jeunes de la rue : réanalyse de l'impact criminogène de la rue

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.