This study measured police officers perception of the validity of General Theory of Crime. Using a sample of 117 officers and an adapted version of the Grasmick et al. (1993) self-control scale, this study measures the level of agreement officers exhibit that low self-control traits are present in property and violent offenders. Measurement is also performed to determine variation in officers agreement based on the personal characteristics gender, age, education, experience, and rank. Findings indicate officers show agreement with self-control items across the six dimensions of self control traits, as well as significant variation in agreement with the property offender self-control scale based on gender. Analysis on individual items of the property and violent offender self-control scales indicates significant variation in agreement on several items based on personal characteristics. Conclusions demonstrate the need for further studies measuring police perception of offenders and the validity of criminological theories. Limitations of this study are also discussed.

The purpose of this study was to analyze juveniles' attitudes toward the police and how their attitudes were affected by prior victimization and delinquency, controlling for race, gender, and city of residence. All variables used in this study came from the Gang Resistance Education and Training (G.R.E.A.T.) data collected by Esbensen (1999). The analysis indicated that females held more favorable attitudes toward the police than males, Whites held more favorable attitudes toward the police than non-Whites, and juveniles living in small rural/suburban areas held more favorable attitudes than those living in large urban areas. The major finding of this study was that a spurious relationship existed between prior victimization and attitudes toward the police with delinquency being the true predictor of juveniles' attitudes. A possible explanation for this finding is that those juveniles at the greatest risk of victimization are the same ones committing the majority of the delinquent acts.

The purpose of this study was to analyze the factors that affect the use of marijuana by juveniles and how outside influences such as peer pressure, race, parental influence, and prevention programs such as the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.) contribute to the use of marijuana by juveniles. All of the variables used in this study came from the Gang Resistance Education and Training (G.R.E.A.T.) data collected by Esbensen and Osgood (1999). The analysis indicated that juveniles are most influenced by their peers such as friends, that African American juveniles would be less likely than Whites and Hispanics to become regular users of marijuana, that juveniles living with both parents would be less likely to use marijuana compared to those with alternative living conditions, and that the programs such as the D.A.R.E. program would have little long-term effect on marijuana usage by juveniles.

While the process of restorative justice is fairly new, several programs have been implemented globally and found to be effective in various aspects over the past 30 years. Very little empirical research has been gathered from these global programs though members of the criminal justice community as well as members of the general public have expressed interest in learning more about the programs and effectiveness and opinions of the programs. This study takes a closer look at what victims have expressed as being important to them regarding the criminal justice system, and satisfaction with how their cases are handled in both traditional court proceedings as well as through restorative justice processes.

This study was undertaken in an attempt to investigate the impact of family, threatened egotism, and reciprocity on a person’s use of intimate violence. Threatened egotism proposes that aggression is the result of high but unstable self-esteem, which is conceptualized as high self-esteem coupled with high narcissism. Self-report questionnaires were administered to randomly selected cluster samples of 423 college students, 147 males and 276 females. The mean age is approximately 22 with 93% indicating they are White and 7% non-White. While no support was found for threatened egotism, violence witnessed in the family of origin and reciprocity were found to significantly impact intimate violence. Analyses conducted separately for males and females indicate that these factors operate differently based on gender.

Bullying is a form of peer violence needing extensive research to help understand the differences in gender for the prevention of such behavior. Most research has been performed in school settings and in a quantitative manner. This study was conducted by six researchers in an after-school facility with a qualitative approach. A minimum of 15 hours per researcher was spent observing behaviors and 20 interviews were performed. A grounded theory approach was used for the analysis of data which tend to show more similarities than differences in the way children bully as well as their perceptions of bullying.

Police executives must be responsive to the needs of the citizens in order to receive their cooperation. This study used survey responses from 190 residents of the unincorporated part of Washington County, Tennessee, to measure citizens' satisfaction with the services provided by the Washington County TN Sheriff's Office, and to determine what services and special components of the Sheriff's Office were important to them. A significant difference was found in satisfaction with police services when compared by race, polite treatment by the police, type of contact with police, and night walking safety. However, no significant difference was found in satisfaction with police services when compared by socioeconomic status, fair treatment by the police, visibility of patrol cars in neighborhoods, and prior victimization. It was also found that the citizens felt the greatest needs of their Sheriff's Office were more officers and more jail and administrative office space.

Nowadays, one of the issues of concern that brought on by the aging population is legal disputes that have been increasing in number every year. One core problem in these legal disputes involves handwriting identification. There are however not many previous studies in China that have been concentrated on this field. Hence, the study on elderly Chinese subjects' handwriting has an extremely broad potential value for its application for academic usage and practical meaning. This study uses an empirical technique, gathering first hand data and analysing them by employing proper methods. There are 7 handwriting features and characteristics that have been found in the study to represent the key characteristics of the elderly Chinese subjects' handwriting. They are: Pen pressure, occurrence rate of traditional Chinese words, letter size, poor structure, tremor, half-way stop sign, and towing sign at beginning and end of strokes.

The undergraduate thesis began with the research question of whether the Islamic community is being profiled by the use of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) following the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. At the beginning of the project, the researcher's hypothesis was that Muslim community had fallen victim to profiling through the use of electronic surveillance conducted by the American government. The research presented reveals a pattern of profiling and injustices against many different groups of Americans throughout the history of United States surveillance laws starting with the illegal alcohol producers in the 1920's. Amendments to FISA have set necessary modern electronic surveillance regulations back 30 years. The researcher brings to light the injustices the Islamic community has endured out of the panic caused by the attacks on 9/11. The research presented was achieved by using empirical legal studies techniques of incorporating a mix-methods approach to utilize both quantitative and qualitative research components. The researcher developed a spreadsheet that included all published federal opinions of prosecutions involving FISA since its enactment in 1978. Statistical data was analyzed using frequency and average software, known as Stata, and the results of study suggest an extreme increase in the amount of prosecutions involving the Islamic community since 9/11 compared to prior.

This thesis examines the concept of parental liability and the effect it has in deterring juvenile delinquency, with an emphasis on Florida Law. It will also consider the concept's ability to properly compensate victims of juvenile offenses. The thesis focuses on the circumstances in which a parent or guardian may be liable for the actions of a child and how liability insurance law plays a key role in compensating innocent victims. It discusses Florida's public policy of seeking justice by holding parents responsible and the problems that it faces by doing so. The thesis further examines what issues arise when parents are found vicariously liable for their negligence or contribution to a child's offense, but are not covered by liability insurance coverage or the insurers deny coverage.