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CRIME

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Carnival of Crime

By Mark Twain.

The Facts Concerning The Recent Carnival Of Crime In Connecticut. “Straightway the door opened, and a shriveled, shabby dwarf entered. He was not more than two feet high. He seemed to be about forty years old. Every feature and every inch of him was a trifle out of shape; and so, while one could not put his finger upon any particular part and say, “This is a conspicuous deformity,” the spectator perceived that this little person was a deformity as a whole—a vague, general, evenly blended, nicely adjusted deformity. There was a fox-like cunning in the face and the sharp little eyes, and also alertness and malice. And yet, this vile bit of human rubbish seemed to bear a sort of remote and ill-defined resemblance to me! “

Atlantic Monthly June (1876) 17 pages.

The Story of Crime

By Hargrave Lee Adam.

From the Cradle to the Grave. “Some years ago I set myself the task of studying crime and prison life in all its phases. Not merely to accept hearsay evidence, but to see and hear with my own eyes and ears all that was significant on the subject that I could. Therefore, whereever anything was to be learned concerning crime I there prosecuted and observed for my inquiries myself what transpired.”

London: T. Werner Laurie, 346p.

Towards an Efficient, Just and Humane Criminal Justice: Nordic Essays on Criminal Law, Criminology and Criminal Policy 1972-2020

By Raimo Lahti.

This collection of essays on criminal law, criminology and criminal policy includes a selection of my articles from the year of 1972 to the year of 2020, i.e., from a period of 49 years. The writings – in all 32 – chosen for the compilation are written in English and 30 of them have been published earlier. The main aim with this anthology is to crucially widen the access of my writings for comparative purposes. The articles are divided into seven chapters. Chapters I–VI cover a large spectrum of criminal sciences, and they are – in particular, in Chapters IV–VI – written rather from a Nordic (Scandinavian) than from a narrower Finnish perspective. The title of the anthology expresses its main message: towards an efficient, just and humane criminal justice. Chapter VII includes five articles related to bio-ethics and (criminal) law. The reason for that chapter’s attachment is to present some of my contributions to the new discipline entitled ‘Medical law and biolaw’.

The intensified internationalization and Europeanization of criminal law and justice have changed the role of comparative law and criminal sciences in general. There is much more need for comparison of legal orders due to the emergence of European criminal law and international criminal law and due to the increased interaction between European and global legal regulations and the national legal orders. We also need more evidence-based criminological research to be utilized in criminal-policy planning and as a foundation for rational policy decisions.

Helsinki: Suomalainen lakimiesyhdistys, 2021. 554p.

Unseen Victims

By Inka Lilja, Elina Kervinen, Anni Lietonen, Natalia Ollus, Minna Viuhko, Anniina Jokinen.

The HEUNI report "Unseen Victims" presents the manifestations and consequences of gender-based violence and the challenges in assisting victims of violence in the migration context. With this report we aim to increase the understanding of policymakers on the structural challenges asylum-seeking and refugee women who have experienced gender-based violence face.

Helsinki: European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control (HEUNI), 2020. 100p.

Victims in the criminal justice system: A study into the treatment of victims and its effects on their attitudes and behaviour

Edited by J.A. Wemmers.

In the last fifteen to twenty years, criminal justice policy-makers and government in the Netherlands have begun to realize that victims of crime are often seriously affected by their experience and that reactions by criminal justice authorities are not always supportive. This realization was in part stimulated by the women's movement which drew attention to violence against women and the position of these victims in the criminal justice system. Other developments which have contributed to the increased attention for victims of crime include the rise in the registered crime rate which was at its peak during the seventies and early eighties. Also in the early seventies, the victim survey was introduced. It revealed that the registered crime statistics are incomplete and that only a fraction of crimes are brought to the attention of authorities. At the same time, police were finding it increasingly difficult to solve the crimes which were brought to their attention and the clearance rate began to drop. Authorities realized that they can only do their work if victims are prepared to report crime to them and that their willingness to report crimes is in part dependent on the quality of the relationship between citizens and the justice system.

The Hague: WODC, Ministry of Justice ; Amsterdam : Kugler Publications. 1996. 252p.

Fair and Appropriate? Compensation of Victims of Sexual Violence in EU Member States: Part II

By N Elbers; A Akkermans; H Soleto Muñoz; Fiodorova; A Grané; J Maria Tamarit; L Arantegui; P Patrizi; GL Lepri; E Lodi; D Chirico; I Lāce; L Vaivode; J Dilba; A Brekasi; N Zoidou Saripapa; N Spetsidis.

The second eBook of the FAIRCOM Project, available as download on this page, presents the results of an investigative study on State Compensation and Offender Compensation in the current five partner countries: Greece, Italy, Latvia, the Netherlands and Spain. It identifies good practices and offers recommendations.

The last 20 years, victims of crime have received increased attention in the criminal trial process. Various EU legislation, in specific the Victims’ Rights Directive 2012/29/EU,1 has established important victims’ rights, such as the right to receive information, respectful treatment, legal support, victim support and compensation. Most EU member states have implemented the legislation and the position of victims has clearly been strengthened. Now that victims of crime are in the spotlight, it is a good opportunity to also focus on specific vulnerable groups of victims in criminal law: victims of sexual crimes. Victims of sexual crimes require special attention for several reasons. Firstly, the scale in which sexual violence occurs is significant: according to a report of the European Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA), it is estimated that 3.7 million women in the EU are subjected to sexual violence every year. 2 In total 11% of women have experienced some form of sexual violence since they were 15 years old. 5% of women have been raped since the age of 15. 3 The FRA did not include sexual violence to men. What is known about men is that 10% of victims of violent sexual crimes are men, the majority (90%) of the victims are women. 4 Of the perpetrators, 99% are men, 1% are women. 5 Secondly, victims of sexual crimes need support in their search for justice. Only 14% of victims of sexual violence report their offense to the police.6 Sexual crimes are often associated with shame and stigma and often mentioned in relation to secondary victimisation. About 25% of victims of sexual crimes do not dare to report the crime because of shame and 12% does not report because they think they will not be believed. Victims of physical violence also do not report because of shame or not being believed but the percentages are much lower, respectively 8% and 2%.7 Of the victims of sexual crimes who report to the police, about 46% are not satisfied with the treatment received by the police.

Amsterdam: Free University of Amsterdam, 2020. 94p.

Oath taking and the transnationalism of silence among Edo female sex workers in Italy

By Cynthia A. Olufade.

This book is based on Cynthia A. Olufade’s Master’s thesis ‘Oath taking and the transnationalism of silence among Edo female sex workers in Italy’, winner of the African Studies Centre, Leiden’s 2018 Africa Thesis Award. This annual award for Master’s students encourages student research and writing on Africa and promotes the study of African cultures and societies. This study aimed to interrogate the oath taking phenomena among Edo female sex workers in Italy. In a bid to understand how the oaths taken in Edo State, translates into an intangible aspect of the trafficking process. To achieve the aims of the study, the research utilised the qualitative method of data collection, it involved the use of in-depth interviews and observations. The study reveals that the transnational silence exhibited by different categories of actors in the Edo sex work network sustains the industry. The research also highlights that the oaths form only a part, albeit important of the construction of debt and bondage in the context of Edo transnational sex work. In light of its findings, the study concludes that the idea of transnationalism of silence is as effective as the oaths taken.

Leiden: Leiden University, 2020. 118p.

Justice for child victims and witnesses of crimes

Edited by The Centre for Child Law.

Child victims and witnesses of crime are amongst the most vulnerable people in the justice system. The United Nations issued guidelines for their protection in 2005. This publication sets out the guidelines in the South African context. Does South African law reflect these guidelines? What are the challenges to be faced in order to bring South African law and practice in line with these international standards? Answers to these questions are provided in this up-to-date analysis of the current state of the law. This publication is a useful guide for students of law, as well as for practitioners who work with children in the courts. Launched during the internationally recognised “16 days of activism to end violence against women and children”, the publication is designed to be of assistance in the everyday working life of presiding officers, prosecutors, defence lawyers, social workers, intermediaries and other professionals.

Pretoria: Pretoria University Law Press (PULP), 2008. 59p.

Three Criminal Law Reformers: Beccaria, Bentham, Romilly

By Coleman Phillipson.

THE following three essays are not intended to be considered as separate, independent studies; they are meant to be taken together as supplementing each other, and as constituting one whole. With this intention in view, the author has been able to avoid a good deal of overlapping and repetition, which would otherwise have been inevitable. Though three men and their works are here discussed, we are concerned with but one epoch, one movement, one phase in legal evolution, which represents in many respects a turning-point in European history, and is of the utmost importance in the development of our modern civilisation. Beccaria, Bentham and Romilly are among the greatest law reformers of modern times. In their assault on the folly, injustice and cruelty of the then existing criminal jurisprudence, in their trenchant criticism of outworn codes, obscurantist traditions, blind superstitions, dogmatic technicalities, oppressive fictions, and useless relics of the past, in their proposal of rational substitutes, in their pointing the way to the light, they were intimately united. Their resemblances, like their differences, are as striking in their work as they are in their personal characteristics. In the case of Beccaria—a diffident Italian youth, shrinking from the struggles _ of men, whose small work was almost forcibly extracted from . him by his friends, and whose guarded oracular utterances soon arrested the attention of the world—we shall see vital conceptions and principles of penology in the process of germination and crystallisation; we shall see them in their triumphant conflict with the prevailing régime of sanguinary laws and barbarous methods of procedure. In the case of Bentham—that myriad-minded man, the dauntless explorer of institutions, the arch-legislator ever ready, in his jealously guarded “‘hermitage,”’ to make laws for all the nations of the earth—we shall see a prodigious multitude of ideas, schemes and systems, lavishly given to the world from a rich mine that could, surely, never be exhausted; we shall see this prolific progenitor scattering them broadcast, infusing new life into many barren places…

London: J.M. Dent, 1923. 344p.

Passion and Criminality in France

By Louis Proal.

A Legal and Literary Study. Translated by Alfred Richard Allinson. From the preface: “…How comes it that affection may turn to hate, and lovers become the bitterest of foes — that the transition is so easy from love to loathing, from the transports of the most exalted tenderness to frenzies of the most savage anger? How is it foun so fond a feeling may grow so cruel and lead to commission of so many barbarous murders…?”

Paris. Carrington (1901) 707 pages.

Brains of Criminals

By Moritz Benedikt and Edward P. Fowler.

Anatomical studies upon brains of criminals: a contribution to anthropology, medicine, jurisprudence, and psychology. “An inability to restrain themselves the repetition of crime, notwithstanding …the superior power of he lazy society, and a lack of sentiment of right and wrong…”

Harrow and Heston Classic Reprint. 1878. 204 pages.

A Book of Remarkable Criminals

By H. B. Irving.

“Do not let us, in all the pomp and circumstance of stately history, blind ourselves to the fact that the crimes of Frederick, or Napoleon, or their successors, are in essence no different from those of Sheppard or Peace. We must not imagine that the bad man who happens to offend against those particular laws which constitute the criminal code belongs to a peculiar or atavistic type, that he is a man set apart from the rest of his fellow-men by mental or physical peculiarities.”

Harrow and Heston Classic Reprint. (1918) 297 pages.

Challenge Of Crime In A Free Society

By the President’s Commission of Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice.

“This report is about crime in America — about those who commit it, about those who are its victims, and about what can be done to reduce it….The existence of crime, the talk about crime, the reports of crime, and the fear of crime have eroded the basic quality of life of many Americans.” From the Summary.

Harrow and Heston Classic reprint. (1967) 342 pages.

The Positive School of Criminology

By Enrico Ferri.

The positive school of criminology was b born of the three lectures Ferri gave at the University of Naples in 1901. In these essays he makes the case for the importance, possibly supremacy, of social and economics causes of crime, in contrast to the then dominant theories of biological determinism, the idea of the “born criminal.” In much of his professional life he was driven by one cause that strikes a bell today in the 21st century: the cause of social justice.

Harrow and Heston Classic Reprint. 1902.

Criminal Sociology

By Enrico Ferri.

In this great Italian classic in criminology, its famed author Enrico Ferri describes it as “a work of propaganda and an elementary guide for anyone who intends to dedicate himself to the scientific study of offenders and of the means of prevention and social defense against them.” Published in 1892 and in English in 1896. The book emphasizes the link between crime causation and social justice, setting him apart from his criminal anthropologist forebears.

Harrow and Heston Classic Reprint. 1896.

Unsoundness of Mind

By John Charles Bucknill.

In Relation to Criminal Acts. “Your Lordship, having held successively the Gkeat Seal in England and in Ireland, has been the legal guardian of all insane persons in this Kingdom. Your Lordship has also effected an extensive revision of the statutes, regulating the care and treatment of the insane and the protection of their property.”

London. Samuel Highly (1854) 156 pages.

The Jukes

By Robert L. Dugdale.

A study in crime, pauperism, disease and heredity. “‘The Jukes’ has long been known as one of those important books that exert an influence out of all proportion to their bulk. It is doubtful if any concrete study of moral forces is more widely known, or has provoked more discussion, or has incited a larger number of students to examine for themselves the immensely difficult problems presented by the interaction of ‘heredity’ with ‘environment.’“

London Putnam (1910) 137 pages.