... incarceration in the United States poses a broad moral and ethical dilemma that stems from years of racial injustice perpetuated against minorities, namely, African American and Hispanic men. America's approach to mass incarceration is racist and flawed because of the lack of sentencing and policing reform, how it ... lives once they get out of prison. It is well documented that there has been a substantial increase in America's prison population within the past 30 years. America's penal population has increased six fold between 1972 and 2000, leaving 1.3 million men in state and federal...

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... a young minority male. In the past minorities between the ages of 18 and 27 made up half of the inmate population in America. America's prison population has traditionally been young and poor, but in recent years it has been aging (Clear & Cole, 2000). In 1997 American prisons held 37,342 offenders over the age of 55, a more than 50% increase in the elderly ... in America (Neffe, 1997). This is due to increased medical science and health care. American's are living much longer today than just 10 years ago. The prison population reflects the general population, if there are more elderly ...

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... Antonio, Texas as well as the population of both areas. Dallas's population in 2010 was 1,197,833, while San Antonio's population was 1,327,605 in 2010. The breakdown of the population was Dallas: Whites 50.7%, San Antonio: Whites 72.6%, Dallas: Black or African American 25.0%, San Antonio: Black or African American 6.9%, Dallas: American Indian and Alaskan Native .7%, San Antonio: American Indian and Alaskan Native .9%, Dallas: ... Asian 2.9%, San Antonio: Asian 2.4%, Dallas: Two or more races 2.6%, San Antonio: Two or more races 3.4%, Dallas: Hispanic or Latino 42.4%, San Antonio: 63....

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... in Miami if he assassinates one of Fidel Castro's top men sent to America. He takes the offer and kills the man. He is now a full American citizen working as a dishwasher in Miami. He quits the job after being offered a better underground job. He must go buy two kilos of cocaine from ... lives in poverty Tony will obviously have different values than the average middle-class people in democratic America. Therefore what Tony does may be wrong in American but tolerable in Cuban. In a communist country where everything you do is told to you and you work for nothing while living in a permane...

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... population in America. The average prison sentence for a violent crime is about one year longer for African-Americans than for Caucasians ("Racial Inequalities in" 1). Many cases in America have been concluded in which a white man gets less prison time than a black man for the same crime. For example, there was a case in New York State where an African-American ... ;Pennsylvania Man Sentenced" 1). This exemplifies that racism in criminal cases exist today. Minorities make up most of the prison population in American for two reasons that should be well known in today's society: minorities ...

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Women in the California State Penitentiary System In the mid 1980's mandatory sentencing laws took effect, thus rapidly increasing the female population in California prisons. The incarceration rate for women still pales in comparison to the male prison population, but the rates for women are steadily increasing. According to the Criminal Justice Consortium of the California Department of Corrections, in 1996 77.6 ... killing in self-defense. The average sentence for killing a husband is twice as long than for killing a wife. Nationally, women prisoners are usually minorities, with African-A...

• Word Count: 950
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... doors. A possible answer that Michael Moore found was the media playing a very significant role in violence. While in Canada, Moore compared American news telecasts to that of Canadians. Moore found that American telecasts sensationalized gun related murders, instilling fear into the American population. Canadian telecasts on the other hand, hardly even mention crime as a part of their news. Moore theorized, and I agree, that the ... media is at least partly responsible for instilling fear into the population, increasing gun related deaths. America's murder rate actually decreased by 20...

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Against the Death Penalty In American society, the threat of capital punishment stands as the ultimate sentence for a criminal. The moral ramifications of the taking of another life, whether it be by murder or as legally ... a group do not have lower rates of criminal homicide than non-death penalty states. In the 1980's death penalty states averaged an annual rate of 7.5 criminal homicides per 100,000 population, and abolition states averaged a rate of 7.4. Further more, most deterrence research has found that the death penalty has virtually the same effect as long imprisonment on homicide ...

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... . Perpetrators of violence have qualities that make them attractive to viewers, especially children. Children and young adults listen to music and watch television in extremely large quantities. The average American child watches 3-4 hours of television daily and the average American teenager listens to 10,500 hours of music during the span of 7th and 12th grade. Before they reach 18, the average ... American sees simulated murders on television reaching the tremendous quantity of 18,000. Youths often view content that is not intended towards them. Musicians and actors are the influence ...

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... someone could be wrongly convicted. For example, African Americans are overrepresented on death row. African Americans make up 13% of the population and around 50% of those on death row (Ruggiero). According to the Capital Defense Litigation Group, African American defendants are more likely to be sentenced to death if the victim is white and are often found guilty by all white ... of the taxpayer's money. The California commission in 2008 concluded housing inmates on death row cost $90,000 more per inmate per year (Ruggiero) and that housing the death row population cost an extra $63 m...

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... Klux Klan, a bunch of cowards who hide under sheets. Need I say more. On the night of August 20, 1980, Joseph Paul Franklin, a 39-year-old member of the KKK and American Nazi Party, murdered two black men as they jogged alongside two white women in a Salt Lake City Park. Franklin said he committed the murders because he was against race mixing ... . (Altschiller, 1999, p.5) On March 21, 1981, Michael Donald, a 19-year-old African American, was lynched by United Klans of America. His mother awarded 7 million dollars. (Altschiller, 1999, p. 5) I don't think 7 million dollars is going to re...

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... Greeks all executed citizens for a variety of crimes. The most famous people to be executed are Socrates and Jesus. Later, Britain reinstated the death penalty and brought it to its American colonies. Although the death penalty was widely accepted throughout the early United States, not everyone approved of it. In the late-eighteen century, enough disagreement of the death penalty lead ... state has capital punishment. They cite such factors as the percentage of urban residents in the state, the level of economic prosperity, and the social and racial makeup of the population. But a smal...

• Word Count: 1084
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• Grade Level: Undergraduate

In January of 2003, The American Journal of Sociology published an article written by Eric P. Baumer, Steven F. Messner, and Richard Rosenfeld, titled, "Explaining Spatial Variation in Support ... U.S. Census Bureau, and the GSS using geographic identifiers. The data used form the Census was to measure two aspects of their theory, the minority population size and the economic inequality. They were taken from county level census information form 1970, 1980, and 1990. The dependant variable for their study was ... or coded with a "0". While the 2 independent variables were the homicide rate, th...

• Word Count: 823
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... shops, slaughter houses, railroad yards, and gas works. It was the home of New York's most dangerous criminals known during that time in our history . The population consisted of poor people who lived in a disorderly fashion and expressed themselves with a demanding spirit. Reports of criminal homicide from the late nineteenth century only supply a minimal ... began, there were some contributing factors that led to this hostility among the society and the diverse ethnic groups. The first major change, was the soaring population that reached over 350,000 by the start of the Civil War, mo...

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... are down, but school shootings are increasing, and the decline in gun related homicide is not happening at an outstanding rate. The streets of the American Urban City, are still unsafe. There is much speculation on how to manage these types of problems. For one, there are registration laws regarding the ... those of the United States, and have only increase faster since the introduction of guns into standard police gear. If guns are to remain a part of American society, than it is essential that strict definitions of "self-defense," and "protection of family" are established. Furthermore,...

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... we know it now could very well still be an extension of England if it wasn't for the widespread use of guns. Without the use of guns in the general population, great generals such as George Washington would not have been as successful in battles as they were. Regardless of how great a leader he may have been, his army was only ... be full agreement by all states to implement similar laws. These laws should be friendlier towards people who are mentally stable enough to properly operate them. Just like during the American Revolution, if more people are encouraged to be armed with guns, cr...

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Legalizing Gambling in California Gambling has always been part of the American culture since the beginning of its history. It has come in the form of saloon card rooms, horse racing and up to today's high tech computerized slot machines. Many different ... . Indian casinos have hired a large number of both Indian and non-Indian peoples for both skilled and unskilled jobs. (Berkeley) 2. California has everything the gambling industry desires for success: a large population, a flourishing tourism industry, and a stable economy. These three ingredients reduce the amount of advertising and free ...

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... era, gun battles and Mob violence caused for alarm. In general, police had a tough job but they were just beginning. Today, things are different. With the massive increase in the population, change of technology, development of civil rights, expansion of society, and growth of crime, police have a new world to maintain. According to Criminal Justice Today, Sixth Edition, by Doctor Frank ... Schmalleger, states that, according to The American Institute of Stress ranks Policing among the top ten most stressful jobs. This rank is attributed to the danger, frustration, paperwork, daily, dem...

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... the rise, wouldn't then, homicide rates and overall crime be rising? Media violence is unarguably on the rise. So then must youth violence. Although almost 2/3's of the entire United States population strongly believes and would agree with that statement, that juvenile homicide rates and overall violence is increasing steadily, and more than 70% of the ... population believes that their child being shot or assaulted would not be uncommon. In fact, crime rates are not even at a standstill, but dropping dramatically. The actual numbers are, a 30% decline ... serve as the ultimate arbite...

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... strongest arguments against the destruction of the parole system is the overpopulation problem in most prisons. Since the early 1990's, the population of inmates in correctional institutions has grown astronomically. Between 1996 and 1999, prisons have seen a 41% increase in the population of violent crime offenders. For drug related offenses, the number has increased three-fold. So it would make sense to ... offenders are less likely to commit new offenses than unmarried offenders. In many cases offenders with a long record of offenses are less favorable risks than first offenders. Mor...

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... (Faley, Jonathan. (1997). Fact Sheet: Drug Data Summary. White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. 1-4. Retrieved from http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov). Due to this, the nation's prison population has risen 5.2% (Gilliard, Darrell. (1998). Prisoners in 1997. Bureau of Justice Statistics. 1. Retrieved from http://www.marijuana.com). Federal prisons have now resorted to using smaller, local state ... jails to house serious criminals, and even then both state and federal prisons are overwhelmed with the capacity of people that are incarcerated. The country's prison population...

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... violence by controlling the general ownership and use of guns among the public at large, we are attempting to control the behaviors of a very small fraction of the population, the violent or criminally-inclined fraction, by controlling the behaviors and activities of roughly half the American population, and whatever else might be said about such an approach, it is certainly not very efficient. ...

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Reforming America's criminal justice system is a top priority, in order to end racism, and to clear up the population's tarnished image of law enforcement. Although the media, has its right to portray things the way they desire, we still have to fix what they depict, as it is our ... fact that it occurs in all areas of the field. That's right! It can even be found inside the police station itself between other officers. There have been countless African American men and women who report being subject, to not being promoted because of their color and who they are affiliated with, according to...

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... . The convict is killed almost immediately and feels nothing. However, the death penalty is still highly controversial and remains a source of argument among American's today. Some say it is cruel and inhuman, however over 60% of the American population believe in the implementation of the death penalty in our court's judicial system. They feel the act of execution of a criminal is ok. If ... the ground rules for those who committed acts of murder we would be able to see more clearly the benefits of capital punishment. Rehabilitation should be the main goal of American's judicial system,...

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... does say, after calling for crimes to be punished by death, that it should be used sparingly and justly. Statistical evidence conducted on cases of similar crimes found that African American defendants are over four times as likely to be executed as their White counterparts. A similar study noted that White defendants face almost no chance of execution when their victim is ... African-American. While African Americans make up only 13% of the U.S. population, over 40% of death row inmates are African-American. This does not seem so just to me. And with over 3,500 people on death, it does...

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