Howard Journal of Crime and Justice最新文献

A sustained history of white supremacy is in the system of policing. Police engage in state-sanctioned murders of African American women. Too many times, police state-sanctioned violence is disregarded. A critical analysis and applicable theoretical frameworks were used to examine the Fort Worth Police Department's (FWPD's) Use of Force Policy in the case of Atatiana Jefferson's murder. The findings show cultural situatedness impacted this case. In other words, the normed cultural, social and environmental factors versus policy components influenced the case. The employed theoretical perspectives provide policymakers and researchers with critical viewpoints to deconstruct hierarchical systems of power that perpetuate injustices.

From austerity to Brexit to Covid-19, the UK is facing a series of interlinked crises. Regarding austerity in particular, public services like the National Health Service, local government and social security benefits have been affected. Even the criminal justice system has not been spared from financial cuts. Yet, the impoverished status of these key public services defies the logic that the UK is currently the sixth largest economy in the world (World Bank, 2023).

The progressive underfunding of the UK criminal justice system is pushing it to a breaking point. In fact, the position that the system is at breaking point is the one thing on which all our politicians seem to agree. What has not been settled, however, is how the system is being pushed to this state, and at what costs? Does the criminal justice system still serve its purposes to maintain law and order and ensure that offenders and victims receive justice?

Essentially, these are the dilemmas that Daniel Newman and Roxanna Dehaghani explore in their recent book, Experiences of criminal justice: Perspectives from Wales on a system in crisis. Their findings – contextualised in the criminal justice system in Wales – illuminate how austerity blights social safety nets for individuals, and how existing issues that run against the backdrop of the criminal justice system compound their experiences. Again and again, the text in this book reminds me of Callinicos's (2012) observation: those who engineered or profited from the asset bubbles do not bear the brunt of the resulting austerity; rather, workers and the poor do.

Operationalising austerity, Experiences of criminal justice is the result of qualitative research that Newman and Dehaghani undertook in 2018 and 2019. The study involved 69 participants who reported on how they experienced a criminal justice system in crisis. These findings were presented thematically in the concerted effort to champion the voices and experiences of those marginalised by institutionalised state practices.

Newman and Dehaghani put forth a compelling case for the uniqueness of Wales from geographical and cultural perspectives in their opening chapter. The authors also remind us of the slow burn of inequality experienced by people in Wales through increased poverty, social disadvantages and marginalisation, all of which further support the latest statistics: Wales has the highest number of individuals living in relative income poverty (23%) compared with England, Scotland and Northern Ireland (Welsh Government, 2021). Despite these idiosyncrasies, Wales continues to be treated as a silent partner of England in the criminal justice system, while power over this system remains centralised despite the devolution of power in this nation.

Equitable access to justice is characteristic of a healthy state-citizen relationship. Yet, as Chapter 2 progresses, Newman and Dehaghani offer kal

The Welsh criminal justice system: On the jagged edge is a compelling read, groundbreaking in its exposition of the unique formations of the Welsh criminal justice system (WCJS). It is the first academic mapping of the contemporary WCJS and, indeed, the first academic work to establish the existence of a distinct justice system under current devolution arrangements. Although criminal justice remains reserved to the UK government, the authors set out in robust detail the extent to which criminal justice cuts across devolved and reserved competencies in its enmeshment with the wider network of devolved social policy. In addition to establishing the existence of a distinct criminal justice system in Wales, the book's core argument is that this constitutionally forged ‘jagged edge’ of competencies constrains practitioners, the Welsh and UK governments, and ultimately prevents coherent criminal justice reform.

Chapter 1 sets out the nature of Welsh devolution, and the unorthodox – and in many ways incoherent – evolution to present constitutional arrangements. Welsh devolution sits upon a ‘two legged stool’ (departing from the traditional ‘three legged’ Westminster model) with an independent executive and legislature but no independent judiciary (the missing third leg). Instead of this third leg, the stool balances upon a ‘jagged edge’, that is, WCJS responsibilities which are scattered across the ‘England and Wales’ and ‘Wales’ levels. Welsh criminal justice is consequently the result of difficult – at times virtually impossible – collaboration of UK and Welsh governments and practitioners. The argument posed here is the book's central thesis: the constitutional foundations of the Welsh criminal justice system are such that coherent policy or ameliorative reform are significantly constrained. Though the book concludes with a hopeful discussion of what can be done while constitutional arrangements remain as they are, the central argument remains that a more just system requires different constitutional arrangements.

Chapter 2 is in itself a considerable contribution in its detailed account of the existing data on outcomes across criminal justice in Wales (recorded offending, policing, prosecution, imprisonment and reoffending rates). The authors note the scarcity of such data, particularly at the disaggregated level. This sparse and scattered data on Wales rather than ‘England and Wales’ (or, indeed, just England) is another of the jagged edge's consequences. While it is a comprehensive overview of the existing official data, the chapter calls for much more disaggregated and localised data collection on the WCJS. This existing ‘top-line’ data provides a limited picture - as acknowledged by the authors - but it highlights a range of concerning outcomes in Welsh criminal justice. While the book does not argue a causal link between constitutional arrangements and these outcomes (or imply that an independen

One of the more striking recent miscarriages of justice was perpetrated by the UK's Post Office when subpostmasters and subpostmistresses were prosecuted for fraud that actually arose from malfunctioning software. Over 700 were victimised, losing homes and livelihoods. We first use a zemiological lens to examine the harms caused by these events at both a first and second-order range – referred to as ‘ripples’. Yet, the zemiological analysis, while useful in identifying the personal harms suffered by postmasters, is less successful in associating with some of the wider costs – especially to the justice system itself. Additional tools are required for identifying how technology might be culpable in the damage that unfolded. We use a technological injustice lens to augment the zemiological analysis, to reveal how and why technology can harm, especially when appropriate checks and balances are missing, and naïve belief in the infallibility of technological solutions prevails.

This article is based on 48 interviews and five writing testimonies of 23 men convicted, incarcerated and released from high-security prisons in the French part of Switzerland. Through a longitudinal and phenomenological perspective, this contribution explores the role of affective states in desistance from crime. The findings show that giving up crime requires navigating through three ‘emotional seeds’ that qualify the most significant affective states of the desistance process: distress; disillusionment; and hope. Thus, this research develops the notion of ‘emotional balance’ in desistance from crime, which consists of being neither overwhelmed by one's feelings nor repressing them.

Most employees, including prison employees, want their employers to treat them fairly. Distributive justice (perceived fairness of outcomes) and procedural justice (perceived fairness of processes and procedures) are important dimensions of organisational justice. Limited research among correctional staff in the US suggests that views of distributive and procedural justice spill over and result in a strain-based form of work-family conflict. Strain-based conflict occurs when work problems follow a person home and create conflict at home. Based on multivariate regression analysis of survey data from 120 Nigerian prison staff, distributive justice had significant negative effects on the strain-based form of work-family conflict. Contrary to findings among US staff, procedural justice did not have a similar significant association. The connection between views of organisational justice and strain-based work-family conflict appears to vary by nation.

Wilenmann, J. & Gambardella, M. (2023) A developmental model of sentencing evolution: The emergence of the politics of probation in Chile. The Howard Journal of Crime and Justice, 62, 81–101. https://doi.org/10.1111/hojo.12510

In the above article, the author would like to replace figure 4 with the following new figure. The figure differs from the printed version because of a problem with the data. The updated figure 4 is as follows:

The author apologies for this error.

This article presents the results of an opportunistic, cross-sectional, self-report survey of the well-being of staff working in prisons throughout the UK. The survey was completed by 594 participants in the early part of 2021 at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. Self-report measures indicated concerning levels of burnout and 43.4% of participants were above the established cut-offs on the Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD-7) scale. Eighty-one per cent reported that their mental and physical health had deteriorated and many said emotional support was lacking. Further research is required to establish how typical and persistent these concerns are.

An estimated 84,000 incarcerated individuals face solitary confinement in the United States criminal justice system. Solitary confinement is seen as a cruel punishment, with lasting effects, for incarcerated individuals. Human rights organisations, medical associations, policymakers, and incarcerated people have argued for the discontinuation of solitary confinement. After being in solitary confinement for an extended period, incarcerated people can suffer worsening and future mental health issues, physical health concerns and issues with relationships during and after serving their time in prison. This article reviews the available research and the purpose of the article is to show the detrimental effects solitary confinement has on incarcerated individuals. Clinical and policy implications for prisons that use solitary confinement are discussed to dissuade usage.

In this article we examine the curious stability of outdoor penal labour in California in the 20th century against a shifting social and penal field. Analysing state archival data on prison highway and forestry camps between 1915 and 2000, we frame the persistence of these practices as evidence of a penal labour palimpsest. We demonstrate how the agency and interpretive innovation of penal administrators – as the architects and interpreters of this palimpsest – served as a stabilising mechanism akin to, but distinct from, existing theories of path dependence. Zooming out from the intricacies of the historical record, we position this case as revealing some of the limits of strict theories of path dependence and, instead, as offering a more dynamic understanding of the complex, intersecting and malleable ways in which history matters.