{"id":177,"date":"2019-01-26T20:05:42","date_gmt":"2019-01-26T20:05:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/integrations.pressbooks.network\/thomtestnew\/chapter\/3-1-importance-of-policy-in-cj\/"},"modified":"2022-04-20T19:13:27","modified_gmt":"2022-04-20T19:13:27","slug":"3-1-importance-of-policy-in-cj","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/integrations.pressbooks.network\/thomtestnew\/chapter\/3-1-importance-of-policy-in-cj\/","title":{"raw":"4.1. Importance of Policy in Criminal Justice","rendered":"4.1. Importance of Policy in Criminal Justice"},"content":{"raw":"

Why is Policy so Important in Criminal Justice?<\/strong><\/p>\nEveryone is affected by the criminal justice system through public policy. Policy represents social control and ensures members of society are compliant and conform to the laws. Policies include issues related: to juvenile justice, drug legislation, intimate partner violence, prison overcrowding, school safety, new federal immigration laws, terrorism, and national security.\n\nModern-day crime policies can be traced to changes in crime and delinquency in the 1960s. That decade saw major increases in the crime rate along with widespread social unrest as a result of the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights movement. The work of the 1967 President\u2019s Commission on Law Enforcement and the Administration of Justice highlighted the crime problem, and the criminal justice system\u2019s failure to address the problem. The commission called for new approaches, programs, policies, funding models, and research on the cause of crime. In addressing the causes of crime (theory), and using appropriate data collection (research), effective policies and programs could be proposed.\n\n[caption id=\"attachment_176\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"736\"]\"\" Theory-Policy-Research[\/caption]\n\nWhen discussing crime policies, it is important to understand the difference between \u201ccrime prevention\u201d and \u201ccrime control.\u201d Policies and programs designed to reduce crime are crime prevention techniques.\u00a0Specifically, crime prevention<\/strong> \u201centails any action designed to reduce the actual level of crime and\/or the perceived fear of crime.\u201d [footnote] Lab, S. (2016). Crime Prevention: Approaches, Practices, and Evaluations. <\/em>(9th ed.). New York, NY: Routledge. [\/footnote] On the other hand, crime control alludes to the maintenance of the crime level.\u00a0 Policies, such as the three strikes law or Measure 11, seek to prevent future crime by incapacitating offenders through incarceration. Other policies like sex offender registration acknowledge that sex offenders exist and registering them will control the level of deviation, sometimes preventing-or perceiving to prevent future offenses.\n\nPublic policies and laws are created at different levels of government, with micro-level policies enacted on the local level and macro level applied at the federal or state level. For example, at the local level, some towns and cities might create specific ordinances tailored to their unique needs, such as banning cigarette smoking in the downtown area. At the federal level, policies are created that apply to the federal criminal justice system and can apply to states as well.\u00a0However, federal laws can differ from state laws, such as marijuana legalization. Individual organizations can also make policies that address their individual agency needs, such as requirements for local police officers.\u00a0Therefore, depending on who creates the policies, they can be far-reaching or extremely localized. [footnote]Lab, S P., Williams, M.R. Holcomb, J.E.,\u00a0Burek, M.W., King, W.R., & Buerger, M.E. (2013). Criminal Justice: The Essentials<\/em> (3rd ed.). New York, NY. Oxford University Press. [\/footnote]\n

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Fake News Exercise<\/strong><\/p>\n\n<\/header>\n

\n\nFake News has received a lot of press lately.\u00a0In fact \u201cfake news\u201d was the top word in 2017.\u00a0 For people under 30, online news is more popular than TV news and people under 50 get half of their news from online sources.\n\nHere are 4 steps for evaluating News:\n
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  1. Vet the Publisher\u2019s Credibility.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n