Prior neighborhood crime research has sought to explain differences in crime between black and white communities using such criminological theories as social disorganization and concentrated disadvantage. While supportive in their findings, these perspectives did not explain the entirety of neighborhood crime differences. The current study attempts to add to this literature by integrating concepts from the larger urban sociological tradition from which criminology grew out of, such as spatial assimilation and place stratification. Research in this tradition has found that African Americans have not been able to translate higher levels of income into more desirable communities, including those with low crime rates, due to a dual housing market steering them away from the best residential areas in a city. By including city level measures that could either eliminate or dampen the efforts of these channeling processes, the hierarchical linear models used found support for variations in place stratification across urban and suburban areas. However, convergence in crime levels for white and black communities was dependent on the social class of the community and crime type. / A Dissertation submitted to the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester, 2014. / April 4, 2014. / Crime, Neighborhoods, Place Stratification, Race, Spatial Assimilation / Includes bibliographical references. / Brian J. Stults, Professor Directing Dissertation; Rebecca Miles, University Representative; Eric P. Baumer, Committee Member; Eric A. Stewart, Committee Member.

There is evidence in the literature that regulation may be a more efficient means of harm reduction in prostitution than criminalization. However, prostitution is illegal everywhere in the United States except for eight counties in Nevada where regulated brothels are licensed. Studies indicate these brothels are effective at controlling the violence, sexually transmitted diseases, and community disorder typically associated with prostitution. What remains unknown is whether they deter demand for illegal prostitution, which remains plagued by these harms. Comparisons of prostitution arrest rates among counties with and without brothels in Nevada, prostitution arrest rates among all U.S. states, and drug arrest rates among counties in Nevada were completed. While existing data are largely insufficient for evaluating the viability of Nevada's legal brothels as model alternatives to criminalization, it is clear that the brothels, which are located in Nevada's more rural areas, do not adequately address illegal prostitution in urban areas. Debate about the appropriateness of legalization will continue. Nevertheless, some consensus options, such as increasing access to resources for women trying to escape prostitution and emphasizing demand-side controls over supply-side controls, have emerged. / A Thesis Submitted to the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Science. / Fall Semester, 2010. / October 20, 2010. / Nevada, brothels, prostitutes, prostitution, legalization, regulation, harm reduction, violence, women, sex, disease, community disorder / Includes bibliographical references. / Daniel Mears, Professor Directing Thesis; Sonja Siennick, Committee Member; William Bales, Committee Member.

The impact of victim SP on the outcomes in a given criminal events has rarely been examined or fully understood. This study develops a new theory of victimization, which I will refer to as the Power Advantage Theory (PAT), that holds crime victimization is completed only when there are motivated offenders who have contact to victims and possess physical or psychological power advantage over the victims. Based on PAT, this study assesses the impact of 16 types of victim self protection (SP) actions on three types of outcomes of criminal incidents: whether the incident resulted in property loss, whether it resulted in injury to the victim, and whether it resulted in serious injury. Data on 27,595 personal contact crime incidents recorded in the National Crime Victimization Survey for 1992-2001 are used to estimate multivariate models of crime outcomes with logistic regression. Results indicate that self-protection in general reduces the likelihood of property loss and injury, compared to nonresistance. A variety of mostly forceful tactics, including resistance with a gun, appear to have the strongest effects reducing the risk of injury, though some of the findings were unstable due to the small numbers of sample cases of such resistance. The appearance, in past research, of resistance contributing to injury is found to be largely attributable to confusion concerning the sequence of SP actions and injury. In crimes where both occurred, injury followed SP in only 10 percent of the incidents. Combined with the fact that injuries following resistance are almost always relatively minor, victim resistance appears to be generally a wise course of action. In two auxiliary test, it was found that victims used forceful self-protection, especially weapon use and defensive gun use, in the most adverse circumstances and that victims' perceptions of the efficacy of SP were much more favorable than those implied by rates of actual post-SP injury although two measures were highly significantly correlated. These findings imply that actual effects of SP may be stronger than they appear to be in the previous study. Taken together, the results of three empirical tests generally support the hypotheses of PAT. / A Dissertation Submitted to the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Summer Semester, 2005. / June 24, 2005. / Power Advantage Theory, Victimology, Self-Defense, Self-Protection, Victim Resistance / Includes bibliographical references. / Gary Kleck, Professor Directing Dissertation; James Orcutt, Outside Committee Member; Spencer Li, Committee Member.

The deskilling of labor and the loss of social networking has accounted for part of the crime problem in recent decades. Vocational training and other correctional programming is meant to reverse the effects of these problems by providing inmates with usable, legal, and employable skills. Over the last five to ten years, the role of rehabilitative services has become highly questionable. The lack of confidence in such services has led to a decline in the number and type of prison programming available to inmates. In addition, fiscal concerns on the part of privately owned correctional industries have sharpened this decline. This paper reports results of an evaluation performed on PRIDE Enterprises, one of the largest providers of privately operated inmate vocational training in Florida, in regards to its effect on inmates' post release employment and recidivism. This study found that working in the vocational program, PRIDE, significantly increases the likelihood of the participant being employed after release. This study also found that PRIDE has no direct effect on recidivism. / A Thesis Submitted to the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Science. / Summer Semester, 2005. / July 6, 2005. / Vocational Training, Life Course, Social Capital, Recidivism / Includes bibliographical references. / Gordon Waldo, Professor Directing Thesis; William Bales, Committee Member; Marc Gertz, Committee Member.

Spohn and Holleran (2002) have stated that "little evidence exists that the crime control polices pursued during the past 20 years have produced a predicted reduction in crime (p. 336)." This sentiment has been voice by many researchers for the last 30 years. As early as 1973, the National Advisory Commission on Criminal Justice Standards and Goals, concluded that "the prison, the reformatory and the jail have achieved only a shocking record of failure (p. 358)," and recommended that "no new institutions for adults should be built" (p. 358). Notably absent from the literature are studies that examine the effectiveness of sentencing policies that incarcerate offenders with their effectiveness to reduce recidivism. This study responds to this void in the prior literature on incarceration and recidivism. The purpose of this study is to explore the effectiveness of Florida's Minimum 85% Sentence Served Law on recidivism rates. Specifically, what is the effect of the 85% law on the probability of recidivism among released inmates and does the effect vary across different demographic characteristics, offense categories or prior recidivism events? The major findings are that sentencing offenders to serve at least 85% of their court-imposed sentence significantly reduces the probability of recidivism regardless of the time served incarcerated. It was found that the 85% law reduces the likelihood of recidivism among violent and drug offenders. Moreover, when evaluating the effectiveness of the 85% law across different types of offender demographic characteristics it was found that the effect of the 85% law on recidivism was statistically greater for younger than older offenders, males than females and blacks than whites. However, the 85% law had an equivalent effect on recidivism for Hispanic's and non-Hispanics. Finally, the effect of 85% law in reducing recidivism is greater for those with more prior recidivism events. The findings from this study lend support that punishment certainty may explain the consistent impact of the 85% law on recidivism rates. Since the length of sentence and numerous known recidivism factors were controlled for, certainty of punishment may explain the findings. After serving 85% of their court imposed sentence some people may reason that the cost-benefit calculation of the consequence of doing another 85% of a sentence is too costly. While the 85% law has been shown to be an effective sentencing policy, as shown by the reduction in recidivism, it has not been determined what it is about the policy that reduces the likelihood of recidivism. However, these findings do suggest that states contemplating a move towards a more determinate sentencing strategy will not necessarily experience increased prison populations and the associated increase in correctional expenditures. The differential effects presented in this study suggest policymakers could change sentencing policies to those it has the biggest impact (i.e., age 20 to 40 year olds, those with prior recidivism events and drug or violent offenses). This would potentially reduce the growing impact on the prison system while maintaining public safety. Future studies should focus on the 85% laws theoretical underpinnings, cost-effectiveness, impact on crime rates, effect on ex-offender behavior and if the results found in this study can be replicated in other states. / A Dissertation Submitted to the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester, 2010. / April 1, 2010. / Policy, Recidivism, Sentencing / Includes bibliographical references. / Thomas G. Blomberg, Professor Directing Dissertation; Joyce Carbonell, University Representative; William Bales, Committee Member.

Labeling theory studies have generally focused on the creation of secondary deviance through the process of internalizing the applied label. The combination of labeling theory studies focusing on secondary deviance and the belief that labeling theory was 'dead' as of the 1980s has created a dearth of research regarding the impact of labels on criminal or juvenile justice processing. The purpose of the current study is to determine if there is a relationship between the gang member label and juvenile justice decisions at three stages: (1) intake, (2) disposition, and (3) incarceration release. There are a total of five primary findings related to the impact of the gang member label on juvenile justice recommendations and incarceration length. Three of the five findings are significant (p<.05), including one intake decision, one disposition decision, and the length of incarceration. These three findings all support the hypothesis that the gang member label increases the severity of the recommendation and the number of days incarcerated. Variables representing the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice staffs' perception of offender attitudes are incorporated into the analyses to determine if these variables mediate the hypothesized relationship between the gang member label and juvenile justice decisions. The findings weakly support the hypothesis that perceptions of the offenders will partially mediate the relationship between the gang member label and recommendation severity or the number of days incarcerated. However, the variables only mediate a small portion of the impact of the gang member label on the dependent variables. Finally, interaction terms are included in the analyses to see if the hypothesized impact of the gang member label on juvenile justice decision-making varies based on individual characteristics (e.g., race, sex). The hypothesis that the impact of the gang member label will vary based on demographic characteristics is largely unsupported. / A Dissertation Submitted to the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Summer Semester, 2010. / April 19, 2010. / Labeling, Gangs, Juveniles / Includes bibliographical references. / Gary Kleck, Professor Directing Dissertation; Irene Padavic, University Representative; William Bales, Committee Member; William Doerner, Committee Member.

Research within the criminological literature has consistently found an association between drug use and crime. Despite this strong empirical association, however, debate still remains regarding the mechanisms responsible for the relationship between these behaviors. An obstacle to the study of this association has been that observational data are highly susceptible to confounding factors. Thus, relationships hypothesized to be causal based on observational data may in fact be spurious. One type of confounding factor that is especially important to understanding the drug–crime relationship is that of selection effects. Because substance use is not a randomly assigned event, it is likely that substance users and non-users differ on a number of important factors. These factors likely influence not only the likelihood of using drugs, but of participating in criminal and delinquent behavior as well. Those who make the decision to use drugs, then, may be more likely to engage in other types of antisocial behavior as well, regardless of whether substance use occurs. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), this thesis employs propensity score matching to explore the role of selection effects in the relationship between drug use and crime. Possible explanations for, and past research addressing, the drug–crime relationship will be reviewed. Following this, the sample, measures, and statistical analyses employed within the thesis will be introduced, and the results of the propensity score analyses will be explained. Finally, the conclusion of this thesis discusses key findings, the implications of these findings, and the study's limitations. / A Thesis Submitted to the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Science. / Summer Semester, 2009. / June 8, 2009. / Crime, Substance Use, Drugs, Delinquency, Propensity Score Matching, Selection Effects / Includes bibliographical references. / Kevin M. Beaver, Professor Directing Thesis; Bruce Bullington, Committee Member; Daniel P. Mears, Committee Member.

This work shows that classical criminological doctrine has been misunderstood and that the consequences of this misunderstanding for contemporary criminological theory and research are grave. In particular, classical criminologists subscribe to a view of rationality that is strikingly different from that which is usually attributed to them. Classical criminologists deny that behavior is invariably rational, and hold that emotional considerations are determinative of the degree of rationality expressed in any given behavior. This view, called "emotional determinism", is used to generate a theory of criminal propensity that can be empirically tested. The theory is intended as a replacement for Gottfredson and Hirschi's 1990 low self-control theory, which, while influential, succumbs to the criticism that it is too heavily reliant on rational choice principles. Finally, the work suggests that the genuine distinction between classical and positivist criminologies consists in the fact that as empiricists classical criminologists are committed to holding that environmental forces can in principle be used to dissuade even the most committed of criminals. / A Dissertation submitted to the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester, 2004. / November 10, 2004. / Reality Principle, Positivist Criminology, Rational Choice Theory, Classical Criminology, Pleasure Principle, Criminal Propensity / Includes bibliographical references. / Daniel Maier-Katkin, Professor Directing Dissertation; Barney Twiss, Outside Committee Member; Cecil Greek, Committee Member.

Research shows that social-psychological factors, such as fear of victimization, influence public opinion and, in turn, social control policies. Using survey data, this study tests hypotheses from the instrumental model and the social sensibilities theory. The results show that respondents who fear victimization are more likely to be punitive while support for due process rights and liberties are related to less punitive attitudes. Race is also influential in predicting punitiveness. These findings help explain support for punitive social control policies and provides ways of understanding and making changes in policies. / A Thesis submitted to the College ofcriminology and Criminal Justice in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. / Spring Semester, 2006. / March 3, 2006. / Punitiveness, Social Control Policy, Public Opinion / Includes bibliographical references. / Michael D. Reisig, Professor Directing Thesis; Carter Hay, Committee Member; Daniel P. Mears, Committee Member.

Sentencing systems throughout the United States have experienced great change over the past 30 years. Sentencing policy is often the target of reform as policymakers, judges, and other judicial decision makers grapple with the issues of discretion, sentencing disparity, and sentence severity. Determinate sentencing systems, which regularly entail the use of sentencing guidelines, are commonly employed in an effort to address a number of policy goals. Among the objectives of sentencing reforms are the reduction or elimination of unwarranted sentencing disparity based on extra-legal factors such as an offender's race, gender, or location. Previous research reports mixed findings regarding the level and existence of unwarranted sentencing disparity. Little is known about the effect of policy transformations on the determinants of sentencing outcomes. The present study examines the influence of legal and extra-legal factors on sentencing outcomes in Florida under three distinct sentencing policies. The analysis indicates that legally prescribed factors are the primary determinants of sentencing across all three policies, but extra-legal influences operate to impact outcomes as well. Important differences across policies in the effects of both legal and extra-legal factors are also revealed. The evidence presented here suggests that highly deterministic sentencing policies are not necessarily more successful at reducing unwarranted sentencing disparity. / A Dissertation submitted to the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester, 2005. / April 1, 2005. / Sentencing Guidelines, Sentencing / Includes bibliographical references. / Marc Gertz, Professor Directing Dissertation; Charles Barrilleaux, Outside Committee Member; William Doerner, Committee Member; William Bales, Committee Member.