Crime Prevention Criminal Justice

During this course you will submit three journal article reviews. You can use this research in your Final Project, due in Week Five. The reviews will address crime prevention strategies through one of the following criminal justice system components:

Policing Crime Prevention Programs – policing, schools, community oriented policing (covered in Chapter 7 of Crime Prevention)

For this week, select an article on a corrections crime prevention program. In this review, do the following:

Summarize the article. Which type of crime prevention strategy is being addressed?

Identify the key findings and recommendations.

Cite the article in APA format.

THIS ASSIGNMENT ABOVE HAS ALREADY BEEN DONE. THE NEXT ASSIGNMENT YOU NEED TO DO IS:

PROVIDE FEEDBACK ON TWO CLASSMATES POSTS. THE LENGTH MUST BE 200 WORDS EACH POST. THERE ARE TWO FEEDBACKS YOU MUST DO. MUST BE POSITIVE FEEDBACK, PROPER GRAMMAR/SENTENCE STRUCTURE, AND ANY OUTSIDE SOURCES YOU USE THAT RELATES TO THE FEEDBACK FROM THE STUDENT MUST BE PROPERLY CITED/SCHOLARY SOURCE.

Respond to at least two of your classmates’ posts. PLEASE ANSWER THESE QUESTIONS BELOW IN THE FEEDBACK YOU PROVIDE TO EACH STUDENT.

After reviewing your classmates’ journal article reviews, what assumptions need to be made to incorporate the corrections-initiated crime prevention strategy?

Does the corrections-initiated crime prevention program cause problems for either the courts or law enforcement as part of the overall criminal justice system?

FIRST DISCUSSION RESPONSE FROM EDWARD C.

First do no harm: A look at correctional policies and programs today.

This week I came across a gem in regards to the assigned journal review. For this week we are tasked with finding an article which explains how corrections programs can contribute to crime prevention. The correctional system in the U.S. and what we have learned about “What Works”, or, on the other hand, what does not, is the focus of this paper. (MacKenzie, 2013) Through skim reading, I have found that this article is mainly about the programs and policies of the correctional system and the benefits or drawbacks associated with each. There are multiple programs within this article which I am optimistic about due to the flexibility I will have when writing my paper. I believe that this will allow me to use the programs and policies that I feel to be most effective and that will go the best with my paper to make the point I am trying to make. Something I had learned from this article is in regards to a program I had a misconception about. For example, Scared Straight is one program that has consistently been found to increase recidivism.(MacKenzie, 2013) I had previously believed that the Scared Straight Program was actually more beneficial to preventing future crime and I am now intrigued to look more into this program to see if the author of this article was indeed right in her statements. I believe that there is a lot of quality information within this article and I am definitely going to utilize it in my final paper for this class.

References:

MacKenzie, Doris. (2013, Mar). First do no harm: a look at correctional policies and programs today. Journal of Experimental Criminology. 9(1) 1-17

SECOND DISCUSSION RESPONSE FROM PAMELA E.

This article is a review of the literature written on the effectiveness of juvenile boot camps as a form of correctional rehabilitation, the use of boot camps as an alternative for the cost to incarceration for juveniles. Most people who attend boot camps are young offenders who have committed nonviolent crimes. The study completed within this article on boot camps were done on all male boot camps for leverage of comparison. Juvenile boot camps are used for several purposes such as behavioral modification, physical conditioning, attitude change, and to provide treatment along with teaching self-discipline. The article offers recommendations to improve the effectiveness of boot camps by implementing the rehabilitation theory that includes flexibility for the length of time the camp is in operation as well as flexibility for the needs of the individuals that attend. Additional recommendations include considering stringent rules for selecting boot camp participants as well as considering the individuals needs in comparison to what the boot camp can provide (Riphagen, 2010).

The key findings in this article indicate that the literature review of the effectiveness of boot camps does not indicate that boot camps in general are effective. The article points that it is very difficult to study the effectiveness of boot camps because of many factors. Those factors impeding the studies include lack of control groups, the variation in boot camp attendee requirements across the states, as well as variation in programming and approach, and boot camps often lack a theoretical model (Riphagen, 2010). In addition, there is a not enough research that indicates the common factors of boot camps that are effective within the program, as well as information surrounding the recidivism rates. Although the literature does not depict the effectiveness of boot camps, the foundation for the camps is reduce recidivism and cost effectiveness; however research indicates a need for a therapeutic factor and a structured aftercare program (Riphagen, 2010).

References:

Riphagen, R. C. (2010). Effectiveness of male juvenile boot camps in the United States: A crtical review of the literature. Ann Arbor: UMI Dissertations Publishing.