The American Criminal Justice System

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that the right to a speedy trail, which is the key feature of the American criminal justice system, is guaranteed under the American Constitution; however, it was not until the cases of "Klopfer v. North Carolina" and "Barker v. Wingo" that this right was handed down to lower courts, too. The author reviews the cyber-crime of identity theft, which is defined as someone stealing another person's name and identification information such as Social Security number, credit card numbers, passwords and personal identification numbers (PIN) and uses them to make unauthorized withdrawals, purchases and other activities. The paper suggests that social learning theory, in which children learn the skills of violence from modeling and observation of sources such as other peers, the media and video games, plays a significant role in the problems of violence in schools and youth violence.

From the Paper:

"Youth gangs are not only on the rise, but their level of violence is becoming increasingly worse. The explanation which best fits for youth gangs would be that of Edwin Sutherland's Differential Association theory. "In longitudinal studies, the most examined mechanism through which gang participation might socialize boys into antisocial activity appears in prior research that has considered boys' association with delinquent peers along with their gang participation." These youths, who are typically lower-class, realize that they will never reach the goals of the middle-class and have no urge to conform to middle-class standards. This cognitive dissonance produces a type of stress or strain. Instead, they form their own deviant subculture with their own rules, norms and mores. Travis Hirschi's Control Theory may also explain gang participation."

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