mens rea and public welfare

People v. Jensen ,Michigan Court of Appeals No 210655, (1998)

The defendant in this case was charged with three counts of knowing that she was HIV positive in the case of People v. Jensen, 222 Mich. App 575; 564 NW2d 192 (1997)

She was found guilty of engaging in sexual penetration with a partner without informing them of her HIV infection based on MCL 333.5210; MSA 14.15(5210) and was sentenced to concurrent terms of two years and eight months to four years imprisonment on each of the three counts.

The defendant in this case argues that MCL 333.5210; MSA 14.15(5210) is unconstitutional because it does not specify that an intent or mens rea is required. She also argues that because the statute does not specify and intent to harm, one who does not understand the consequences of their actions cannot be found criminally responsible.

The Michigan Court of Appeals upheld the conviction handed down to the defendant in her trial.

The court finds that knowingly engaging in sexual conduct without informing the partner of the risks they are taking is the culpable state of mind that can lead to the partner’s death. In the case of People v. Lardie,452 Mich 231,256;551 MW2d 656 (1996) the Supreme Court found that a person who operates a vehicle while intoxicated can be held criminally responsible for causing the death of another, based on the fact they knew they were intoxicated while driving, even without a specific intent to cause harm. The court has used the same rationale to uphold their decision here in this case of People v. Jensen.

I support the decision of the court in this case. If a person who is HIV infected is going to engage in sexual penetration with another, they should understand that there is a chance of causing that person to become infected with the deadly virus. In the interest of public welfare I believe that state statutes are constitutional in banning an infected person from engaging in sexual penetration without notifying the partner of the risks involved.

Police Ride Along 08/20/09

I went out for a partial shift ride with my buddy John in CO last night. I spent all day unloading a trailer of firewood so I wasn't able to make it for the whole shift, but I would not have been able to anyway because he went in early for some supervisor meeting stuff, so it would not have mattered anyway.




















After going back to our company terminal and showering up, he came by and picked me up at 1800 and we stayed on until midnight.

Since my last ride along John has got a brand new 2010 Crown Victoria police interceptor. It's all nice and shiny too because John's 10 year old daughter had been acting up, so he saw this as an opportunity to teach her a lesson and get the car waxed, so he made her wax the patrol car. (with his help of course) She did a wonderful job, it looks great! Now he is hoping she will act up again soon because his F-150 is getting a little dull... As we're cruising around we got off of I-25 and we noticed a tractor trailer parked in a very odd spot, just up in a grassy area next to the off ramp, so we drove up to investigate. The windows were cracked and the vents on the sleeper were open but nobody responded. The music was still playing also and the driver had new messages on the qualcomm. We peeked inside the tractor the best we could, but did not see anyone in the sleeper. We called the company and they said the driver was a very responsible driver and he was supposed to have picked up a load nearby at 1800 and they were unable to reach him also. The trailer had no seal and we opened it to verify it was empty. We drove to the restaurant across the street to see if he had walked over there but he had not, the waitress gave us a description of the driver and she said she had seen him get out of the truck and walk up into the a residential area, not a very good one at that. We went back on patrol and the company called John back awhile later and said they had made a mistake dispatching him on a load because he had requested time off here even though he didn't live here. John told them we thought there was a girl involved in this somewhere. lol We went back and checked and the truck was still there, John told them it was not a problem really, just odd that he left the windows and vents open and also the company had a yard only a few miles away. The truck remained there for the rest of the night though.


















After going back out on patrol we responded to a call for a family fight. We are thinking it's going to look like a Cledus Judd song. Grandpa punching the cousins, brothers bashing each other over the head with wooden chairs, you know...no such luck. A father kicked his son out of the house, and on the way out the son stole his puppy. So we didn't waste much time on this.

We then responded to assist some other officers in making an arrest on a warrant, but unfortunately the individual had already vacated the premise, for whatever reason, maybe he knew we'd be coming. LOL

Next we got a call of what sounded like it was going to be a good domestic! Neighbors called and said there was loud music playing and then when the male showed up they heard a loud scream from the woman and then the radio went silent. So we headed over there with a few other cops and we went around the back of the house in the alley and we met with the neighbor who told us what happened. John went around the back of the house with another officer to the door that the woman said belonged to that part of the duplex. Anyway the people they were looking for ended up being around the front side of the house. John came back and got the cruiser and we drove around the front, it was nothing more than a little party with some drunk chicks and a dude. John asked the woman if she would call him later and she said sure, whats your number, he said 1-800-BIG-HUNK! LOL

Also way back in the winter this year John sent me a picture from his phone of roll call, and I had made a joke about the one guy in the back left corner, I said "he looks like he could use a few foot chases." Nothing personal, I was just goofing around.


















Every time I've rode with John we always run into him, and the funny thing is every time I see him he says lets go get in a foot chase! He didn't even know what I had said, but John kept threatening he was going to tell him, I'm like oh no don't do that, he's going to kick my ass! LOL
Well we ran into him again and John just couldn't hold it in any longer, he had to tell him "hey my rider said you were fat..." So I was left explaining the whole story to him, luckily he is a pretty nice guy. He says the camera adds ten pounds. LOL Although he did say he knew what I drove, so I may want to stay out of that area now. He's not really a big guy, I think it was the camera, or maybe it was a cold day and he was padded up.

Overall it was a pretty dead night for this district, the next district south of us at one point had twenty calls on hold, and since John's guys weren't really doing much they started sending them down there to answer calls. We were cruising down the Ave. where all the whores hang out and we heard a guy parked in a driveway just off a side street honk his horn as a girl walked by and she looked at him and kept walking, so I guess she wasn't what he thought. So we flipped around and went back there and we turned on the lights just as the guy was attempting to back out of the drive. Now he gets out of his car and pops the hood open before John even gets up to him, and he asks him what he was doing and he claimed his car had been overheating and he was just working on it. So we cleared his name and John told him he knew exactly what he was doing and he needed to just get out of here. So John comes back to the cruiser and we are getting ready to leave, the man is still pretending to be looking under his hood. He just wouldn't give up on his story.

Next call we took was for a drunk man at a motel way up on the north end of the district causing problems. This is cool because with the new computer aided dispatch they are testing out in this district, we actually were able to see the call and head there before it was ever dispatched to an officer. We showed up with the other officer and as soon as we went in the motel the man tried to make a break for the door, but John and the other officer quickly grabbed him and cuffed him. There was a man in the bar who claimed he had punched him in the face three times, but he refused to press charges because he wasn't hurt and he said the guy just needed to sober up. The motel also refused to file a complaint because he was an employee of a contract they had, and they didn't want to hurt any relationships. The man was giving the other officer a hard time getting in the back of his cruiser, and he really wasn't happy the motel refused to file a complaint, he wanted to take him to jail. But he just went down to detox to sober up and be released, all this at his own expense though. That bill should be enough to make him think next time before he gets drunk and stupid in public.

I noticed later as were driving a car with a headlight out and I told John and we went to check it out, I also saw her make a left turn onto the main Ave. with no blinker, she got away from us a little bit but we chased her down and pulled up beside her. John is like "do you REALLY want to stop her? She looks like she just came from church." So he let her go, petty stuff I know but we were really running out of things to do. LOL John is a pretty nice guy, me I would have stopped her just to make contact and see if anything comes up, I wouldn't write any tickets for that stuff.

Awhile later John spots a van with out of state plates make an illegal turn and with a taillight out, so he pulls him over, and the guy stops right on the side of the main road, but whatever, lights freak people out I guess. Anyway turns out he had a revoked license! See that's what I tried to tell him before, LOL just kidding, he knows what he's doing. So we tried and tried to write out a summons using the new laptop software. In John's new cruiser he has a printer in the middle arm rest, pretty neat. But the software is just loaded with problems and doesn't work very well, so we just gave up and he went "old skool" with the handwritten summons. In CO you can't arrest someone physically for this, a summons serves as an arrest. Then you instruct them to park the vehicle, then you turn your head and drive the other way...

It was getting late so we went to a local taco joint and John ordered me something, I don't remember what they were called but they were delicious!! Some little miniature tacos, very filling though.

To end out the night we decided to go cruise the Ave. for hookers and clean up the town. We contacted several hookers up and down the strip, and of course they were all just walking somewhere, waiting for a ride, were from out of town and had "no idea" why we were stopping them, they had no clue this area was used for prostitution, meanwhile standing in skin tight shorts up to their pubic hair and very small shirts. It cracks me up the stories we get out on this strip are the funniest. The last girl we contacted gave us a name, but John asked her for her SSN # and it didnt match the name, well turns out it was her sister. So she finally came clean with the truth and she said she had a $10,000 warrant. She was right, it was for a public health order. When someone is arrested for prostitution they are ordered by the court to submit to STD tests.
If they fail to appear, they get a huge price on their head. John felt bad for her because she had a pretty rough life, her baby had just died and he knew her father who had ran an escort service and made her work for him. He didn't want to arrest her, but had no choice with that kind of bond. So he kicked me to the back of the car and let her ride up front. We took her down to the jail, which was cool it was my first time getting to see the city jail. Usually when I ride with John his guys take care of most of the arrests. Well that was about it, John took me back to my truck at midnight and he headed home. Funny thing is he told me Saturday night, two days later they had a shootout and a car chase. That figures...used to be every time I rode with John there would be a car chase, even though we never got into one ourselves. We almost did that one time, we were on the way at a high rate of speed and the bad guys had been shooting too. But it ended quickly. Well maybe next time...I'm headed back to CO right now, so maybe I'll get a chance to grab another ride.

Worst Trip on the Road - English Essay

Worst Trip on the Road

This is a story from April of 2008. It was supposed to be a good time for my wife and me to spend together out on the road in my semi truck; instead it turned into the worst trip ever. The story began as I went home for my scheduled home time in Ohio, after which we decided that my wife would come out and spend some time with me on the road. On the day we were supposed to head out, we got a load assignment that was supposed to pick up in Indiana the day before and be in Colorado the next day; which is about thirteen hundred miles away.

We headed down to Seymour, Indiana to pick up the load from a Wal-mart distribution center. I had to drop off my empty trailer and they had just finished having a snow storm there. I ended up getting my tractor wheels stuck on the ice, when I tried to pull out from underneath the empty trailer. The only way for me to get going was to drag out my heavy set of double chains, ones which cover both the outside and inside tires. I struggled putting them on while not being able to move the truck. I finally got them secured enough to get traction and pull out from under the trailer, but I was a muddy mess by the time it was all through.

We then took the loaded trailer and headed for Colorado. Due to federal regulations on driving which only allow a truck driver to drive eleven hours before taking a ten hour break, or be on duty a total of no more than fourteen hours, I was not going to be able to deliver the load on time and had to change out with another driver near Kansas City, MO. His load was also going to CO but for the next day, so I could legally deliver this load, which had three stops, two in Denver and one in Grand Junction. I took off from there after my break was over and headed for CO.

This first stop was going to a place I was familiar with for picking up loads, but I’d never delivered one there. Since it was a refrigerated load I took it to the warehouse we normally use for loading, they told me to go to their other warehouse across the highway, so I drove down there and they unloaded my trailer and signed my bills and I went off to make the second drop and then back to my companies terminal for a break.

After my break was complete I fueled up my truck and pulled up to the guard shack, I then realized I had forgotten to put my fuel cap on and was leaking diesel all the way across the parking lot. So someone told me to go ahead and leave and they would take care of it. We pulled out and start heading up the mountain and they sent me a message over the satellite communication system telling me that I must return to the terminal and clean up the spill or be charged five hundred dollars. So we turn around and go back and I have to clean up the diesel with a shovel, broom and oil-dri over the entire lot.

We finally get that finished up and head back up the mountain a few hours later, again. My plan was to drive all the way to Grand Junction that night to get unloaded first thing in the morning, but this too went horribly wrong when the interstate was shut down half way up to Grand Junction because of a truck wreck. They said it would be shut down the rest of the night. We had to turn around and go back the other way and park for the night beside the on ramp. We woke up in the morning and the interstate was open, but now we were going to be late for our delivery.

It was a clear, warm, sunny spring day when we left Grand Junction to head back to Denver. Along the way we stopped at several view areas off the side of the highway and we walked around and took pictures, at last we were spending quality time together. At the last stop in a rest area just east of Vail, CO, I was busy making some lunch in the sleeper area of the truck. My wife said we had better get moving quick because it was starting to snow. I said it was April; it was not going to be that bad. I finished up my lunch and we took off again onto the interstate.

It began to snow heavier now; it seemed as if it was chasing us from behind. We approached the entrance to the Johnson/Eisenhower tunnel; a one mile long tunnel through the mountain. Traffic was slowed to about twenty miles per hour as we approached the exit. There is a sharp right downhill turn immediately exiting the tunnel, making it an almost blind curve. As I exited the tunnel I noticed suddenly cars were swerving to the left and the right like a V. I looked up and a small white six wheeled box truck had slid sideways across the interstate, I tapped the brakes and I was on solid ice with an empty trailer. Immediately my trailer starting swinging around to the right side, I counter steered to keep from jackknifing and I knew I had no choice at this point but to hit the truck.

I held on tight to the wheel and we slammed right into the back of the box, pushing it down the road further, my truck went into a partial jackknife and landed in the median, my trailer still across the interstate. A pickup truck ran into the tires of my truck as I slid sideways, another behind him pulling a small trailer went into the median. Car after car came crashing into one another, I also later found out I hit a few cars with my trailer before I hit the other truck. Luckily there were no injuries, except for my wife and I suffered minor injuries to our shoulders and were taken to Denver in an ambulance for treatment.

This was certainly not the trip we had in mind when we set out together. To top it off I found out the next day that the delivery I made to the first warehouse was the wrong one. That was their dry warehouse and I had a load of milk. They signed for the product and left it sit on the dock and spoil. Now they were holding me responsible for one thousand dollars of the claim, also my safety director was holding me at fault for the accident even though the state patrol and witnesses all said there was nothing I could do. I was charged an additional one thousand dollars for that. This was one trip I was glad when it was through.

SuperMax prison

The SuperMax prison in Florence, CO is supposed to be the nation’s most secure correctional facility, housing only the highest risk, serious offenders. Such as Olympic bomber Eric Rudolph, Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, Ramzi Yousef, as well as several gang leaders. But recent discoveries show there may be a serious flaw in the security at SuperMax.

Mexican mafia leader Reuben Catsro was indicted on charges of conspiracy for continuing to run his gangs drugs sales in Los Angeles from his cell. Two leaders of the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang were indicted on charges of conspiracy for inciting a murderous race war at a Pennsylvania prison though messages smuggled out of their SuperMax cells. Colorado State Democratic Rep. Buffie McFayden says that terrorists inside the SuperMax could be plotting another major attack on the United States from within this prison.

A justice department investigation was initiated when Spanish authorities found that inmate Mohammed Salameh, who rented the Ryder truck in the 1993 world trade center bombing, had been sending letters to a terror cell with links to the 2004 Madrid train bombings.

The justice department report found that the SuperMax staff had failed to monitor at least half of all the inmates’ telephone conversations for the last year. So what is causing these lax conditions at a so called “Super” maximum security prison? The heart of the problem seems to be centered on budget, and low staffing. The prison employees’ union says the staffing of SuperMax has fallen well below its original staffing level of when the facility opened a dozen years ago, and has now fallen below the established minimum staff levels allowed.

A federal arbitrator recently said that because of the low levels of staffing at SuperMax; entire cell blocks were left without staffing for an entire shift on several occasions. He also discovered that inmate cells were no longer being searched on a regular basis.

An inspector general’s report found that at times, the special investigation staff whose job is to read inmate mail were pulled from their duties to fill vacancies in cell block staff. This may be a key contributor to the secret messages that have been discovered leaving the prison and giving the gang leaders behind bars the power to still run their criminal activities.

I think in light of the recent discoveries of a total lapse in security at the SuperMax prison, it’s almost more of a joke than an accurate name. One would expect that a super maximum security prison would be a top priority as far as budget is concerned. In order to get these prisons back to their intended use, we must allocate the necessary funds to them. We should not blame the staff entirely for the lapse in security, it seems as though they are just stretched thin and they can’t oversee all the requirements to maintain such a high level of security all at the same time.

End of term

We have reached the end of another term here at Westwood. I'm sorry I have not been loyal to the blog this term. I was getting a little overwhelmed with three classes and trucking, also the criminology stuff is so in-depth I would not even know where to begin explaining. Basically criminology is the study of crime, we looked at many different aspects, physical, sociological, mental, and many others.

The corrections class was very interesting, I was surprised by what corrections is all about. It entails so much more than just locking people up, as a matter of fact most prisoners only spend eight hours a day in there cells. The rest of the time they have jobs, and any special treatments that they need, such as drug counseling. We looked at how the war on crime and drugs has a long term affect on the prison system. Politicians love to parade around with their "get tough on crime" laws, but when it comes time to fund the corrections department to take care of all these long term sentences they are handing out, well they don't see so enthusiastic anymore.

The underfunding and under staffing of the prison system is pathetic. In one assignment I reported on the so-called "SuperMax" in Florence,CO, also known as, "SuperLax." The security here was so bad that the 1992 world trade center bombing was planned by a terrorist behind bars. In yet another case an L.A. Gang leader was still running his operation from within this super maximum security prison. I should post that report so you can see the whole thing, it's very interesting.

Anyway I have a lot of respect for these men and women now, they are locked in every day and greatly outnumbered by many dangerous felons. They don't walk around with a whole belt full of different weapons like the officers on streets, in there the best defense is communication.


In English class I brushed up on my grammar skills and wrote two essays, one was a process essay on pre-trip inspections, and the other was a narrative essay on my worst trip on the road.

Over all I finished with a 95% grade in all classes, another great semester. However I have dropped my course schedule to part time, which is only two classes per semester. This will extend my time in school longer, but it makes it less stressful on me, and gives me a chance to devote more time to each class, so that I can really get the full benefit of each one. My next semester is pre-algebra and criminal law.

Process Essay - Pre-Trip Inspection

The objective of this assignment was to use process writing skills to describe something we do often, and of course, I do this EVERY day. Really, I'm a trucker, would I lie to YOU?!?

________________

Doing a pre-trip inspection

When you’re driving a forty ton tractor trailer, safety is always your number one concern. Failure to detect a potential problem before you start driving down the highway is dangerous, and it can be deadly. Serious accidents can occur when you fail to ensure your vehicle is in safe condition by conducting a thorough pre-trip inspection before you begin driving each day.

The first thing you want to do is start from the inside of the cab. You turn your key to the on position and begin pumping your brakes and watching the air gauge on your dashboard. When the air pressure reaches 60 psi you want to hear an alarm go off; letting you know that you’re low on air. Next you will turn on your wipers to make sure both blades are functioning correctly. Now you want to tap your city horn, that’s the one on the steering wheel that is legal for use in cities. You should hear a horn that sounds similar to a car horn, next you want to pull your air horn and make sure it is working also. Air horns are not required by the department of transportation (DOT) to be working, but your city horn must be working. Finally check all your windows and mirrors for clarity, clean them if they need attention. Now turn on your headlights and four way flashers and pull down on the trailer brake handle, then exit the truck.

Once outside the truck walk around to the front of the truck and look underneath to make sure you do not see any fluids leaking on the ground, then open the hood. You want to start out by pulling the dipstick for the oil and wiping it off with a towel and then reinsert it and pull it back up again to check your oil level. Next you will check your coolant level, if you have a clear plastic tank this can be done by simple observation. For older metal tanks you must remove the cap and look inside the reservoir, using a flashlight if necessary. Finally you want to check the power steering fluid level; this is always in a clear plastic tank on the left side of the truck, so a simple observation is all that is required. Left and right sides are always determined by standing at the rear of the truck facing forward. Now you will look at your shock and check for any wear or oil leaking from the tube, and also check the leaf spring or airbag for any suspension damage, you will repeat this step on both sides of the tractor. On the left side of the tractor you will grab hold of the steering linkage bar coming through the firewall from the steering wheel and shake it, you are checking for any excessive looseness in it.

Now you’re ready to check your tires. With a tire pressure gauge that is capable of reading up to 100 psi you will check the air pressure in the left and right front steer tires, then you will take a tire depth measuring instrument and stick it between the tread on both tires making sure you are not below DOT minimum tread level. Finally you will look in behind the steer tires and check the brake pads and drums for any damage or worn down brake pads. Now go back to the front of the truck and close the hood and secure it back in place with the provided latches.

Now stand in front of your truck and check to make sure that the headlights are both working as well as any other marker lights on the truck and four way flashers. You are now ready to inspect the rest of your tractor and trailer. Walk between the tractor and trailer and check the red and blue air lines for damage or leaks and check the electric cord for damage. The process for checking tires, suspension and lights will be the same all the way around the vehicle as you did for the front of the tractor.

You will want to check the air lines hanging under the trailer for leaks or damage and also check the hub oil levels on the trailer wheels through the see through hubs in the center of the wheel. The reason you pulled the trailer brake handle before you exited the truck was to make sure that the brake lights on the tractor and trailer are working.

If everything is satisfactory you may sign off on your log sheet that the vehicle is safe for operation on the highway and you’re free to begin your day driving.

Week 3

INTRO TO CRIMINOLOGY I

This week we looked at where criminology theories come from. We looked at theory building and the role of research and development. It's very detailed studies, so I'm not even going to attempt to write it all out in detail. For the assignment we chose three criminology and sociology based journals from the EBSCO host and described them in an essay. In the discussion we talked about how we would build a research theory into the neighborhood watch program to convince the mayor of a fictional town whether or not he should start the program in his town.

INTRO TO CORRECTIONS I

This week we reviewed the sentencing and correctional process. We start out by reviewing the pretrial process including arrest, prosecutors who can offer plea bargains and finally the courts if the case does go to trial. We then learn about pretrial diversion programs which can be used to offer and offender a chance to enter into treatment programs, and if completed successfully they may have the charges dropped.

We reviewed other programs such as the bail system which can allow some offenders to be free while awaiting court.We then looked at the pretrial investigation into the offenders background, and the sentencing guidelines that judges have at their discretion for sentencing an offender.

In the discussion we talked about the use of plea bargains and also for the assignment we wrote an essay on plea bargains. This is a very important part of the process since 90% of all cases never have to go to trial, without plea bargains the system would literally collapse under the workload of trying every case before a jury, it's just not possible.

Week 2

INTRO TO CRIMINOLOGY I


This week we looked at crime statistics, based on the traditional FBI uniform crime reporting (UCR), and the new National incident-based reporting system(NIBR) of the UCR, and National crime victimization survey (NCVS). The UCR collects data on crime reported to law enforcement agencies around the nation based on seven major offense categories, murder, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, and motor vehicle theft. All percentages on based on a per 100,000 person ratio, for instance murder is reported as 5.7 per 100,00 with a 60.7 clearance rate.

The NIBR is much more detailed data based on each individual incident, such as victim and offender information and all crimes committed in each instance gets recorded, unlike the previous UCR system. The NCVS is nationwide surveys taken to ask people about crimes they have had committed against them whether reported or not, this sytem is not totally reliable though because the information is impossible to prove, and many people might make up stories to impress the interviewers. The NCVS does often turn up a much higher crime picture than the UCR because the UCR is based only on crimes cleared, which means an arrest was made, or the agency knows who is responsible but an arrest is not possible, such as the offender being killed by the police, or a murder-suicide. The overall clearance rates for crimes in America is pretty low, so there is a lot of crimes out there being commited that we don't know who commited them.

We also covered a recent addition to UCR data, the "hate crime", agencies report when a crime was committed based on racial, religious, or sexual hate. Surprisingly, organized hate groups such as the KKK actually make up a small percentage of these crimes, it seems to be mostly random, especially after 9/11 when middle eastern people were targeted, and also Indian (India) people were a lot of times mistaken as Muslim, and became victims of hate crimes. We then reviewed the crime statistics over the last thirty years, including the peak of the crime waves in the mid nineties and the sharp decline since then. Although these numbers may be a little misleading, as one expert said in the text, it's like falling off of a very high peak, to a smaller, still high peak, below. So in other words, it's not that crime has fallen to a low level, it's just a lot lower than it was when it was extremely high.














Students from Guilford College in NC protest the attack of three Palestinian students.



You must take these numbers with a grain of salt, they are in no way an accurate representation of what's really going on, the extent to which we may not even have any way of understanding. So many crimes go unreported for one reason or another, which is why we have the NCVS, but yet there is also no way of proving that information is correct either, it's based soley on what someone tells the interviewer.

We then look at age and crime, also race. Trends show that the older we get the less likely we are to be involved in crime. Young blacks males up to 25 years old have the highest rate of involvement, and also victimization. Race as far as the statistics show, seems to be more among African-Americans. This was also the topic of our class discussion this week, however like I stated previously, the stats are based solely on clearance rates, and there are a lot of crimes being committed that never get cleared so it's impossible for anyone to have an accurate number of race involvement in all crimes. Why does it matter anyway, does it serve us any purpose to have this break down of information, if we truly want to all be American's then why do we need to be segregated into categories by the color of our skin? Just the term African-American, or Mexican-American alone should be offensive, I mean for those who were born American citizens just like the rest of us. People refer to me as an "American", not as German-American, or Irish-American or what have you. My great Grandmother was a Cherokee, but nobody calls me a Native-American. Anyway enough with the rant, we're getting off topic here.

Also understand that a clearance only means an arrest, so if an African-American is arrested for a crime but later found not guilty, it still is a mark against his race for that crime, or any race.
I would like to share with you the clearance rates for all crimes known to police under the 2006 UCR, so you can see what I'm talking about, I will give you the total number,then the clearance rate.

• Murder 17,034 60.7%
• Forcible Rape 92,455 40.9%
• Robbery 447,403 25.2%
• Aggravated Assault 860,853 54%
• Burglary 2,183,746 12.6%
• Larceny(includes all petty theft) 6,607,013 17.4%
• Motor vehicle theft 1,192,809 12.6%
• Arson 69,055 18%

So you can see there is A LOT of unsolved crime here we can't pin on anyone.
Also understand the difference between a robbery and a burglary. A robbery is the taking of something from someone with the use of force,or threat of use of force. A burglary is the unlawful entry of a structure with the intent to commit a theft or felony, and includes forced entry, non-forced entry and attempted forced entry. So you see, someone can break into an establishment and commit a felony and it's still a burglary, whether or not they steal anything.

Also on the same token, someone can enter an establishment, but if there is no proof of intent to commit a felony or theft, it's not a burglary. That pretty much made up the basis for all the studies this week, crime rates and different race,age and social factors involved.

For the assignment we used the UCR website to do research on burglary rates between Denver and Tampa, and we compared the rates for 2007, 2000, and 2002.






































































































Intro to Corrections I


We started out this week by looking at the early responses to crime, before the corrections system was developed. These were often very violent and brutal practices, involving beatings,torture and mutilation. The punishments were sought to fit the crime, liars had their tongues ripped out, thieves had there fingers or hand cut off, adulterers had an 'A' had branded to their forehead. Banishing was also popular, as we discussed last week with the English convict ships to Australia. The brutal corporal punishments were also used in colonial America, as well as whipping posts and stocks and pillories for minor offenses, this is wear an offender would be locked into a wooden device and ridiculed in the center of town.















William Penn, the governor of Pennsylvania was unhappy with the brutal treatment of criminals in those days. The Quakers, who had settled Pennsylvania were the victims of religious persecution themselves and they decided to abolish capital punishment for all crimes except murder and they developed the idea of the first prison system in America as an alternative way of dealing with criminals. Inmates were kept in individual cells and were not allowed to communicate with any other inmates, in fear of moral contamination among themselves. They were even moved about the prison with masks over their faces in case inmates met up after being released, they did not want them to recognize each other. Prisoners were put to work during the day making handicrafts in their cells, and nights were for bible studies and penance on their crimes. The objectives were hard labor,solitary confinement, and religious study.
The first Pennsylvania prison was opened in 1826, the Eastern State Penitentiary just outside Philadelphia. The first idea of a prison was opened in 1790 when a wing of the Walnut Street Jail into housing for sentenced offenders, this was also in Philadelphia.














In 1817 New York opened a prison in Auburn which was originally designed around the Pennsylvania model of corrections,but in 1823 they began making changes and came up with their own system. They kept inmates separate at night, but allowed them to congregate during the day to work in factories to improve the goods that could be sold to help cover the costs of the facility.

Beginning in 1870 and lasting until 1910 the system entered into the "reformatory era" in which the emphasis began to shift from punishment to reforming prisoners through education and other programs so they could have a future back in society and be deterred from future criminal ways. We then learned about all the changes that have led to the system currently in place today and reviewed the importance of each of the sentencing goals, punishment,deterrence,incapacitation,rehabilitation and restitution.

In the class discussion we talked about which of these goals we felt were most important, and for the assignment we wrote a report on Phrenology, the study of the brain and certain physical features that some criminals have that are believed to be from way back in the evolution of humans, which may indicate they are not as developed mentally as the rest of us in today's sociecty.

The Night Rider - Practice for English writing course

The Night Rider
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Experience the thrill of the lone, all night trucker.

You awake from a deep sleep to the sound of your alarm; you wipe the sleep from your eyes and roll over to silence the alarm. You look at the clock and you see it has been nine and half hours since you ended your last tour of duty from the prior days work, you only have thirty minutes until it’s time to do it all again, just like you’ve done so many times before. As you crawl from your bunk and open the curtains you are greeted with the beautiful, serene vision of dusk. The sun is setting slowly over the western mountains. You see many truckers coming in, crowding the parking lot, fighting for that last few remaining spots. For many this is the end of their day, but for you, the night rider, it marks the beginning of another day.

You gather your thermos and walk inside the truck stop; you sit down at a table and order a cup and begin to collect your thoughts. You listen to all the not so discreet conversations going on among the other drivers as they take a few breaks to eat their dinners. You try and keep quiet, because you know that any little disagreement will spark a heated debate. You secretly laugh in amusement at how most of what you’re hearing is all nonsense, and how truckers seem to be experts in every field; law, medicine, politics… whatever the debate is, someone is an “expert” on it. It’s a phrase you will sometimes hear as “truck stop lawyer”, or “truck stop politician.”

You order yourself up something small for dinner, maybe a sandwich; you don’t want anything to heavy that may make you sleepy to early in the night. You sit and listen to the busy chatter of dinner time all around you, dishes clanking in the kitchen, people talking way to loud on cell phones, “expert” truckers having not to subtle debates with each other. This is the typical scene of a truck stop restaurant. After your meal has arrived, you down it quickly; as the time to get going is quickly approaching by now. You pay the cute waitress and leave her a few extra bucks for being sweet and calling you “hun” and “darlin’” and all that stuff, out here you don’t get a lot of female interaction, so these little things make your day.

You walk back into the store and fill up your thermos with the night’s coffee, as you pull down that lever on the coffee maker you hear the rushing sound as the liquid starts to swirl and fill your thermos, and you smell that wonderful aroma that you love so much. You head back out to the truck and open the hood and turn on all the lights and flashers to make sure everything is in order for your journey this evening. You close the hood and hop back in the truck, you reach down and turn the key to the on position and listen for that beeping sound, then you crank it the rest of the way over and feel that sweet vibration as the cab rocks side to side slightly and finally she fires up. You listen to the purring of the motor and smell the fresh diesel fumes, you are ready to ride!

You reach down and press in the air brakes knobs, listening for that familiar hiss of the air going through the lines; you put it in gear and begin to roll out. Some lucky driver shows up at just the right time to take your spot, you feel good knowing that you helped that tired driver find a safe place to park for the night. As you turn onto the on ramp and head for interstate you start grabbing gears one after another and you hear the marvelous roar of that big motor as you begin to pick up speed, you look out the mirrors as you place your blinker on and see your fellow drivers moving over to let you on the highway. You reach up and turn your CB on for the night, and give thanks to the courteous drivers for allowing you to merge onto the highway. You reach your cruising speed by this point and you got the truck in tenth gear and are rolling off into the night, the sun has finished setting now and the sky is lit by a full moon and all the beautiful stars of the distant skies. The traffic is starting to thin out now from the typical rush of the daylight hours, with each exit you lose more and more traffic as people and big trucks jump off searching for a place to spend the night. But you are one of the few, the special breed of drivers, you are a night rider! You’re only love is that night sky, the lonesome rumbling of your own wheels in the silence of the night and the glow of the chicken lights illuminating the highway on all sides of your rig as you roll on through the darkness.

This is where I fell in love with the night, while working for Jamestown Transportation; I had a 2005 Freightliner Classic XL, with the name “Flight 837” painted on the sleeper and the hood, this was my baby, just me and ‘ol flight 837 and the midnight sky over the desert southwest.

She was cherry red with chrome lettering, loaded with chicken lights and chrome from all sides, man she was beautiful! The best part was rolling through the night and looking in my mirrors and seeing the glow of my chicken lights illuminating the empty lane beside me. You reach down and grab a big chug of that black coffee and reach up and turn on your stereo that’s tuned to your favorite XM music channel, this is what it’s all about the freedom of the open road. You approach your first major city to pass through, it’s just after midnight and you glide right on through town, never lose a gear.

Unlike your fellow drivers you passed at the last truck stop, which will be coming around about 5 am and start piling on the highway with all the local people headed to their 9 to 5 dead end jobs. They start their day off with bumper to bumper traffic, and an hour later they make it to the other end of town finally and still have to deal with traffic all around, and angry, inconsiderate drivers all day long, people weaving in and out of lanes and such, you never know what some of these people on the road are going to do next, but you don’t have that problem now, it’s just you and highway out here, along the way you pass a smokey bear in the median sitting in his car with the lights out. You cruise on by and he doesn’t budge, you wander if he is still awake at all.

As you roll on for about five hours you decide (or that thermos of coffee) that it’s time to hit the next truck stop, you see the exit approaching, you step on the brake and feel the powerful roar of the jake brakes engage as it quickly reduces your momentum and you glide graciously off the ramp making a lone roar all the way to the bottom, breaking the total silence of this little mountain town. You reach the stop sign at the bottom and turn right and drive into the truck stop, you pull up into the fuel island and park, something that would raise a lot of anger in your fellow drivers during the day time, and may even start a fight, but nobody cares now because the only other drivers around are parked off to the side and they are fast asleep. You grab your thermos for another round of go-go juice.

As you pull the door open of this little mom and pop café you hear that distinct chime of a bell hanging above to let the clerk know you’ve entered. You look over at the clerk and she greets you with a smile and a “good morning”, you smile back and return the greeting. You hear the slight sound of country music playing overhead; you head straight for the restroom to relieve yourself of that thermos of coffee you consumed in the first half of your shift and walk back into the store to get another round for the last half of your shift. As your fill your thermos with the sweet aroma of another fresh (or somewhat recent by this time) pot; you feel a little rumble in your stomach and decide to grab a pastry to go. You climb back in the truck, fire it up put ‘er in gear and drive away, nobody outside will ever even know you were here. You’re rolling back down the freeway again with just the sight of another big truck with lots of lights going the other way every once in awhile. The CB radio is pretty quiet for the most part, not like during the day time when it’s filled with want to be disc jockeys and the Rambo’s all threatening to whoop each other. The silence is broken every once awhile by another lonely trucker trying to say something silly to stay awake, or a few drivers running together passing by and chatting to pass the time away.

You reach up and tune your satellite radio to the overnight trucking show, but after a short while you realize this is nothing more than an electronic dining area, much like the one you were in at the beginning of your shift. A bunch of “expert” truck drivers with all the solutions, and a lot of them with invalid, uninformed complaints which amounts to nothing more than adults whining, you’re not interested in listening to this for very long so you switch to coast to coast am with George Noory for awhile and listen to peoples ghost stories, and how they were abducted by alien life forms and flown off in UFO’s to distant galaxies, only to be returned with sore behinds. Not very believable, but it is certainly entertaining for a few hours.

As the break of day starts to rise over the eastern horizon your body takes it’s natural toll and tells you it’s time for bed, you start to get sleepy but you just keep driving you got only a few more hours left, you finish off that second thermos of coffee and crank up your favorite tunes on the stereo. Finally you reach your destination for today and again you pull off the ramp and rumble your way to the bottom, as you pull in the truck stop you have full access, all the trucks have left to go on their way in the day time and you pick a spot and pull those air brakes, you’re tired and glad to hear that familiar sound of the air popping and you look out your window and see a puff of dust scatter around your truck as you set the air brakes, you close your curtains and hop in bed and drift off until it’s time to do it again. That’s the end of the day for the “Night Rider.”

Copyright Richard Goon (2009)

Week 1

For the first week in the criminology course we start out by defining "criminology", which is simply "the study of crime." Now what is crime? Initially it's defined as "the human conduct that violates the laws of a state,federal government or local jurisdiction which has the power to make such laws." There are four main perspectives that make up contemporary criminology 1. Legalistic ,2. political, 3.sociological, 4. psychological. The purpose of this course is going to follow the legalistic perspective, which defines crime as I have stated. Without laws that define what a crime is, there can be no crime, regardless of how heinous an act may be to society. However in a "common law" state, a person can be prosecuted on what is accepted acts of right and wrong, it does not need to be any written formal law. These prosecutions are rare, and often unsuccessful though.

A quick look at the other perspectives of criminology are political, which defines crime as laws made by those in power to try and control the people from committing acts which would jeopardize their control. Sociological defines crime as an antisocial act that needs to be repressed in order to preserve the current system of society. Psychological perspective defines crime as a form of social maladjustment ,difficulty of the offender in reacting to the stimuli of his environment. It is a problem behavior which makes it difficult for the offender to live in a socially acceptable manner. But we will focus on the legalistic perspective only, for the purpose of this course. There is a difference between criminal behavior, and deviant behavior. Deviant behavior is simply human activity that violates social norms, the kinds of things that might get you in trouble in a "common law' state.

What is a criminologist, what do they do? A common broad stroking definition is of a person who studies crime, and criminals.  It's bit more complicated than that when you break it down though. Sometimes the scope of a criminologist gets overshadowed to those who are really criminalist, one who works in crime labs, or a crime scene investigator, or anyone who works with a special knowledge in a specific area of crime. Criminologist is reserved for academics and researchers with advanced degrees involved in the study of crime and trends and societal

reactions to crime.

The desire to understand the criminal mind predates written history, prehistoric skeletal evidence shows a primitive cranial surgery. It is believed that people assumed deviant behavior was caused by spiritual possession, and the surgery was an attempt to free the evil spirit.

Unfortunately the understanding of what criminology is, is not as simple as the explanation sounds. It's very detailed and covers many different theories. There is not one right or wrong theory, in my opinion, they all have valid ideas that need to be looked at.

 

Theoretical criminology is the type most often found in colleges and universities, it attempts to posit explanations for criminal behavior. There is also a category called "general theory" which attempts to define all criminal behavior under one explanation, this is one theory I would not bother looking to much into, because that is impossible to do. The integrated theory takes  concepts from different sources and merges them together to try and develop an understanding of crime. This theory seems like the most reasonable approach to me, and is part of what makes criminology an inter-discipline science.

The overall theme of this course is going to be one of social policy, the social problems perspective, which holds that crime is the manifestation of an underlying social problem such as poverty, inequality, and lower levels of education and so on. We must ask what we can do to control crime from these factors.

The opposite of this perspective is the social responsibility, which holds that individuals are responsible for their own actions, and they choose crime over law-abiding courses of action.

We will be contrasting these two perspectives in this course. Advocates of social responsibility believe that regardless of social programs to deter crime, certain individuals are always going to be prone to a criminal life, because that's what they choose to do. They want to see harsher enforcement and punishments, rather than government programs. This policy was best displayed in 1994, when the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act was passed.

It expanded the number of capital offenses to 52, billions of dollars was made available to put 100,000 new police officers on the streets,it also funded money for prisons.

Every crime that occurs has a unique set of causes, consequences, and participants. Everyone from the offender, victim, bystanders, police, courts, and society as a whole,a criminal act has a different affect on them. Which usually leads to some sort of new law being enacted if society feels deeply offended by the case and realizes a need for change to prevent future instances as much as possible. The roles of the criminal justice system are (1) prevent crime, (2) adequately identify and inhibit specific offenders  prior to there involvement. (3) prevent the release of potential repeat offenders. 

Finally we change our definition of crime to an "emergent phenomenon" , a lawbreaking event that rises from an intricate social nexus involving a wide variety of participants.

In the discussion we talked about why society needs crime, on the surface we condemn crime, and punish offenders, but deep down crime and punishment is a ritual of our lives. Long ago, before television was made popular in America, the airwaves were filled with hundreds of radio programs of detectives solving murders, and the glamorous life of the old west lawmen, marshals and of course the Lone Ranger. Many of early televisions program were remakes of previously popular radio programs. Throughout the years since, criminal justice shows have been some of the highest rated programs ever. 

Today CSI : Miami is "THE" highest rated show in the world, with over fifty million viewers in over fifty five countries. Even though I hate to be the one to burst the big bubble and tell you that things don't really work quite that way in the real world, it just shows the desire and attraction people have to crime. Can you think of anytime in your life a criminal justice program wasn't popular? CHP's, Murder She Wrote, Matlock,COPS, Real Stories of the Highway Patrol,CSI,Law and Order... it could go on forever, I think it shows a positive conjunction for the thesis of this discussion.

We marvel at criminal behavior, as in the case of the old west outlaws, who were by all rights cold blooded killers, but society seen them as romanticized heroes. I'm not sure exactly where this comes from, I believe it's more of the detective in all of us coming out, and we don't stop to realize the true horror and life changing affects that a crime can cause. Hollywood really has desensitized us to the truth about crime over the last century, and sometimes it's not until it hits us directly that we realize what it's really about. 

We posted our introductions this week, some students are returning from my previous classes and some are new. Every criminal justice student takes a little different path in the order of the classes, so the ones that I've been with the last two terms will be with me to the end, and the rest will be mixed.

No assignments were due this week.

The same procedure in this course as well for week 1, post introductions to the class. We did not have any book reading assignment this week, we just read from the online lecture material and discussed why it's important for students to study corrections, which most people think of only as jail and prison. We must not forget that parole and probation as well as other rehabilitation programs are all included in the corrections branch of the system.

For the assignment I had to write a short three paragraph report summarizing the "convict ships" of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries that took convicted criminals from England away to exile to live in Australia. I covered the early days of cruel treatment and many deaths, until after 1801 when the English government got involved and put their own doctors on the ships who did not have to answer to the Captain, and also offered bonuses to the crew for the safe delivery of all the convicts.