Master of Arts / Department of Economics / Wayne Nafziger / This Master Thesis analyzes the factors that influence the occurrence of democide. The study focuses on a set of fifty three developing countries from 1960 to 2001. The dependent variable is democide and independent variables include: democide, International Monetary Fund (IMF) credits, consumer price index (CPI), gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, Gini index, military expenditures as a percentage of GDP, incidence of intrastate conflict, and democracy. An important limitation of the current literature has been the shortage of studies using yearly democide dataset. Even fewer of those studies strive to incorporate the actual number of people killed; instead they use democide as a dummy variable in their models. This study aims to fill this gap. The objective of this thesis is to answer an important question of whether the economic and social factors such as gross domestic product, IMF credits, income inequality, inflation, conflict history, and democracy play an important role in influencing murders by governments in the less developed and developing countries. The results when using democide as a dummy variable are consistent with the previous studies showing that conflict history and GDP per capita increase the likelihood of democides. This study also reveals that an increase in IMF funding last year can potentially lead to an increase in democide this year. Controlling for democracy does not have a significant effect on the regressions. The history of conflict remains statistically significant at one percent significance level in both fixed and random effect models using democide variable as an actual number of people killed regardless whether democracy variable is included or not. Military expenditures as a percentage of GDP also appear to be statistically significant at ten percent level. Even when IMF variable is replaced by IMF as a percentage of GDP and GDP per capita variable is replaced by a squared GDP, the history of conflict variables remain consistently statistically significant at one percent significance level in logit, probit, fixed, and random effect models.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Family Studies and Human Services / William H. Meredith Jr / Children experience catastrophic loss when they have a parent killed by intimate partner violence. Their lives are immediately changed by this event. They are often left orphaned and separated from natural support systems. This study looks at the social support that children and their families have had after the death of a parent from intimate partner violence. The support is reported as seen by mental health professionals who worked with the children and their caretakers after the death. The study is a phenomenological study taken from interviews with six mental health professionals in three communities in three states. The themes found were described by at least five of the six interviewees and were also identified by a secondary rater. The themes outlined the existence of social support prior to the death as well as knowledge by the community that violence was present in the family before the murder. Stressors after the death of the parent were significant and required family re-organization. Families took steps to engage both existing and potential social supports but were often not able to utilize formal services at the time that they were offered. The importance of a consistent long-term attachment for the child was reinforced repeatedly. Grief response for both the child and the primary caretaker were complicated by the reality of the parent/son or daughter having been killed by their intimate partner. Finally, the difficulty of providing care and support for these children extracted a toll on the caretakers in their physical and mental health. Several messages emerged beyond these themes. Caretakers needed to provide emotional as well as physical care. When the emotional support was available children were able to tell the story of their experience, which they needed to do over and over again. The most problematic situations that participants described were with children who had not discussed this life event since it occurred. These children did not explore their feelings about the death of their parent or share what the loss meant to them with others.

What happened to the people in the bogs, and will we ever know why? This paper will try to answer this by studying cases from the bronze-to-Iron age in the North of Europe, by applying forensic, historic and criminological methods. In my paper I have conclu- ded that there is not a single motive to why the people in the bog were murdered. Ho- wever I have determined that they were all murdered.

This research paper addressed the following question: Do select case studies conform to Dr. Freda Adler's theory regarding socio-economic influences on female criminal behavior or dispute her theory? My research involved three female criminals: Karla Faye Tucker, Andrea Yates, and Susan Smith. I addressed Adler's theory in detail, other theories, the makeup of the female criminal and various female crimes. This study provided evidence that all three case studies conform to Adler's theory. nIn accordance with Adler's theory, each of these three females committed crimes of accessibility. None of the three individuals sought to commit a premeditated act or to murder unknown victims. They were motivated by emotions arising at a point in time when access/opportunity presented itself.

S v Mshumpa dealt with the very controversial issue of third party foetal violence that terminates prenatal life. The decision of the Eastern Cape Division emphasised that, until live birth, a foetus is not a legal subject with constitutional rights. As a result of its position in the law, a foetus cannot be the victim of criminal conduct. The court refused to develop the common law crime of murder to include a foetus and referred this issue to the legislature to address. Concerns raised by the research task relate to the most effective method of law reform and the implications of law reform for well established legal principles concerning legal subjectivity, vestment of constitutional rights and female reproductive rights. In order to avoid these concerns, the introduction of a statutory crime is determined as the preferred method for law reform. The aim of the study is to develop a suitably defined statutory crime, with definitional elements that conform to the Constitution and criminal law principles. Before embarking on the mission of exploring possible grounds that justify law reform, the research first examines the extent of inability of the law to impose criminal liability in cases of third party violence that terminates prenatal life. Aspects that are specifically investigated include the common law crime of murder, contravention of the Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act, attempting the impossible and the common law crime of abortion. A further purpose of this examination is to determine the reasons why foetal interests are not taken into account. Appreciating the lack of criminal remedy, private law principles are considered in order to determine whether there are any principles available to supplement the deficiencies in criminal law. This research found that the value of dignity established by the founding principles of the Constitution and applied in the Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act demonstrates that the state has an interest in prenatal life. The value of dignity serves as the foundation for law reform. Having established the existence of a sound legal basis which justifies law reform, the research requires an investigation into foreign jurisdictions where the crime of third party foetal violence exists as a result of a state interest in foetal life. The purpose of the investigation is to determine whether the crime is effectively implemented. The United States of America is the selected country to study because third party foetal violence receives attention at both state and federal level. The research found that the implementation of foetal homicide laws in the United States infringes on female reproductive rights and to a certain extent, the foetal homicide laws also grants a foetus legal subjectivity. The United States fails to effectively implement the crime of third party foetal violence in line with its own established legal principles. The research benefits from the study conducted on the United States in that the United States demonstrates the definitional elements the proposed crime should contain in order for the statutory crime to be harmonious with established constitutional and criminal law principles. The study concludes with the recommendation that a statutory crime be developed in the context of female reproductive rights rather than considering the foetus as the victim of crime. The statutory crime is a response to unauthorised third party violence that terminates a woman’s pregnancy. The definitional elements include foetal viability for purposes of causation and will only be applicable to intentional conduct. The value of dignity in relation to prenatal life serves as a support structure for the driving force of female reproductive rights. / Dissertation (LLM)--University of Pretoria, 2011. / Public Law / unrestricted

Multimedia installation combining photography, music and noises, representing the story of the killer and the victim, from their meeting up to death in five main parts.

The main title of the doctoral thesis - ART/CRIME - CRIME/ART - point to a general investigation of these two phenomenons. This investigation makes up the background of the main theme of the thesis, which is an actual event of the mysterious death of the painter and shepherd K.. At work I spend time with alternative investigations of this death and the goal is an attempt to reconstruct the events and effort of discovering the answers what happened that night and whether or not a killer really existed or not.

Magister Artium - MA / In 1987 Ntombikayise Priscilla Kubheka was abducted, tortured, killed and her body dumped by apartheid security police. She was an uMkhonto WeSizwe (MK), the armed wing of the African National Congress (ANC), commander based in Durban and was in charge of weaponry storage and organised safe houses for those returning from exile. Amnesty applications and perpetrator testimony given at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s (TRC) amnesty hearings alleged that Kubheka had died, while being interrogated, from a heart attack. The perpetrators claimed the heart attack was possibly as a result of Kubheka being overweight.

The thesis deals with the crime of women in Czechoslovakia. The aim of the theoretical and empirical work is to map the crime of women in Czechoslovakia, namely its occurrence, and to use selected case studies to find out the motives of women perpetrators, who were victims, and apply selected theories of crime to specific cases. In the theoretical part will be introduced basic theories and concepts related to crime , from the sociological, psychological and biological point of view. Given that the work focuses primarily on female crime, the next section will specifically focus on the specificities of female crime and define the types of female criminals with the motives behind the crime, especially with a focus on murder. The last part of the theoretical part is focused on how crime was measured not only in the period of Czechoslovakia, but also how it is measured today, and where it is possible to get information about this social phenomenon. The empirical part of the thesis is devoted to the research itself, in which both qualitative and quantitative data were used. It also includes research on historical archival research, as it was worked from sources from archives. In the empirical part of the thesis, we are already working with specific data, namely data that map women's crime in...

The Issue of an Offender's Personality in Criminology Serial killers The cardinal topic of this diploma thesis is an analysis of an offender's personality and the major focus is given on serial killers. Although the serial killer's personality is the main topic of the thesis, a significant part deals with a criminological, forensic psychological and legal theory, involving the explanation of the relevant legal terms. This diploma thesis aims to provide the reader a comprehensive overview of serial killers. The main goal of the thesis is not only to offer probable profile of the serial killer, but to introduce Czech and foreign expert findings into the context with the Czech law and jurisprudence as well. Also, the thesis aims to help the reader to perceive differences among serial killers, mass killers and spree killers, as these multiple killers are often confused. I present some real cases for better illustration of the issue. From the huge amount of serial killers, I have chosen the most interesting or the most recent ones. In the first chapter I explain the term offender. I distinguish the legal and criminological point of view. The cardinal topic of the second chapter is the offender's personality. The first part of this chapter is focused psychologically, nevertheless in the introduction I...