School of Criminology and Criminal Justice

This thesis provides a comprehensive review of the evolution of Robert Agnew’s
General Strain Theory of Delinquency, and tests his 2002 extension using two
subsamples from the 2013 National Survey on Drug Use and Health: Juveniles between
12 and 17, and “emerging” adults that are 18 years old. Including an “emerging” adult
subsample makes this analysis one of the first full tests of adults. Additionally, this
analysis is the first partial test of Agnew’s 2013 extension of General Strain Theory.
Overall, the results of the analysis lend support to Agnew’s 2002 extension. Measures of
strain are revealed to significantly effect measures of negative emotionality and low selfconstraint,
and measures of negative emotionality and low self-constraint significantly
affect delinquency/deviance and illicit substance use. A major limitation to the thesis is
that there is no negative emotionality measure of anger, which is Agnew’s (1985; 1992)
key measures of negative emotionality.

Disparity in sentence length has long been a topic of discussion (Spohn, 2009).
Though most research is aimed at disparity due to race, few studies utilize sex as a focal
point (Crow & Kunselman, 2009; Embry & Lyons, 2012; Gavin, 2014; Hartley, Kwak,
Park & Min-Sik Lee, 2011; Hasset-Walker, Lateano, Di Benedetto, 2014; Messing, 2008;
Steffensmeier, Ulmer & Kramer, 1998). The focus of this study is to examine the effect
of sex on sentence length, controlling for characteristics derived from the evil woman
hypothesis, chivalry hypothesis, and focal concerns theory, to discuss the potential
paternalism of the criminal justice system, which may cause potential sentence disparities
(Daly, 1989; Nagel & Hagen, 1983; Steffensmeir, Ulmer, & Kramer, 1998). The findings
indicate that women always receive a reduced sentence compared to male offenders,
regardless of the crime type of past criminal offenses. The statistically significant results
indicate that there is a need to review the criminal justice system and implement new
polices such as judicial review to help stymie the differing sentences given (Spohn, 2009). If not, offenders will continue to receive differing sentences, based solely on
extra-legal factors, such as the sex of the offender.

Community-oriented policing implementation has been examined under the
context of large agencies whereas the literature on smaller agencies has ultimately been
lagging behind The purpose of this study is therefore to examine the degree of
community policing implementation within these smaller agencies, controlling for
characteristics derived from the theory of social disorganization, to gather further insight
into what variables may be impacting crimes rates Pearson correlation and OLS
regression analysis is employed to obtain the necessary results The findings indicate that
although community-policing implementation does not significantly impact or explain
the variation of crime rates in small cities, the statistically significant results of particular
social disorganization characteristics should be an indicator of the need to incorporate
theory with practice

This research study examines the American paramilitary units know as Special
Weapons and Tactics. Throughout this thesis, the fundamental and foundational research
on police paramilitary units is presented and discussed. Additionally, this paper focuses
on trends of militarization in American policing. Mainly, these trends are identified by
the tremendous rise and normalization of American paramilitary police units since the
internal societal wars of the 1970s. In this study, research is presented on Special
Weapons and Tactics team deployments in the state of Maryland. Four years of data are
analyzed focusing on proactive search warrant crime deployments from 2010 through
2013. Several independent variables including, violent crime rates, property crime rates,
vice type crime rates and the number of sworn law enforcement officers are examined.
The most important finding of this study is the inverse relationship between proactive
vice type arrests and the proactive search warrant SWAT team deployments.

There is increasing concern in news media sources regarding police killings of
unarmed Black males. However, there is limited research on the portrayal of such
incidents in the news and the implications for police-community relations in African-
American communities. In order to address this gap, this study analyzed 120 experts’
quotes provided by two of the largest and most respected newspapers in the United States
-- the New York Times and USA Today. This research comprised a content analysis of
quotes related to the deaths of Eric Garner (Staten Island, New York), Michael Brown
(Ferguson, Missouri), and Freddie Gray (Baltimore City, Maryland). A number of factors
are discussed: The news organization’s predominate category and specialty of experts
selected; whether the experts’ quotes attributed to pro-police or community bias; if the
experts’ quotes discussed social or racial inequalities in the cities selected; whether the experts addressed evidence-based strategies necessary to improve police-community
relations in the Black community, and whether experts’ quotes discussed solutions to
improve police and community relations in the Black community. The findings suggest
that the selected national news sources, in the one year following the deaths of each of
the unarmed victims, highlighted quotes from state manager, particularly politicians, at a
much higher rate than intellectuals. Although revealing a substantial level of procommunity
bias, the quotes presented very little regarding evidence-based strategies for
improving police-community relations in the Black community and reducing the number
of unarmed deaths caused by police. The implications for research on media and crime as
well as policing strategies are discussed.

In 2003, Congress passed the Prison Rape Elimination Act to address the problem
of sexual violence in prison. Although research has shed light on the prevalence and
incidence of sexual violence in U.S. prisons, few studies examine inmates’ perceptions of
rape and safety from rape in prison. This study examined rape perceptions and the
likelihood to seek mental health treatment in prison of three distinct groups of male
inmates who are at greater risk of sexual victimization or exposure to sexual violence
while incarcerated: gay and bisexual inmates, inmates with a juvenile incarceration
history, and inmates who were first incarcerated in the adult criminal justice system
during adolescence or emerging adulthood. This study examined the relationships
between sexual orientation and inmates’ perceptions of the threat of rape and seeking
of mental health treatment in prison. Data from 409 incarcerated men residing in 23
maximum security correctional institutions revealed that gay and bisexual inmates were
significantly more likely than straight inmates to fear the threat of rape and to voluntarily
request mental health treatment in prison. Incarcerated men with a history of childhood abuse were significantly more likely than inmates without an abuse history to fear the
threat of rape. Having a history of childhood sexual abuse, identifying as black, and being
incarcerated for longer than 18 years also significantly predicted increased likelihood to
voluntarily request mental health treatment in prison. Implications for practice and policy
are discussed.

Criminologists have long since documented a connection between peer deviance and personal deviance. Some theories suggest that this connection is due to a learning process where individuals may adopt the attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors of those with whom they have significant interactions, such as friends. While individuals may be susceptible to learning anti-social behavior from peers, it is unclear if certain personality characteristics may affect this relationship. The purpose of this study is to determine if differences in specific personality characteristics, such as self-esteem, introversion and extroversion, can have a moderating effect on the pressures to participate in the use of drugs and alcohol that are projected on to individuals during their adolescent years. The findings of the current study can lead to new pathways in substance use prevention and personality assessment in conjunction with risk assessment for juveniles during their middle and high school years.

Previous researchers have recommended that universities should be deemed very safe places. However, reports of crime have dominated the news, including shootings and mass murders at schools and universities. The issue of reality versus perception is of foremost importance when student safety is at stake. In this paper, the researcher presents the findings from unique data collected from university students related to situational crime prevention, fear of crime, self-protective behaviors, and perceptions of crime prevention programs to better understand the antecedent variables relating to crime prevention.

Poorly integrated crime analysis may be a detriment to crime reduction efforts and financial resources. The purpose of this research is to identify deficiencies and successes in crime analysis integration and to understand which agency factors are related. Using the Stratified Model of Problem Solving, Analysis, and Accountability and data from a national PERF survey of police agencies, this study quantifies the levels of production and consumption-based integration disconnect as well as other important agency factors. To determine which agency factors contribute most to integration disconnect, bivariate correlation and multiple regression analyses are used to examine the relationships, while controlling for agency type, centralization, officers per analyst, crimes per officer, and agency size. Findings indicate that production- and consumption-based disconnect are positively related to one another and that passive patrol-analyst interactions, an agency’s analysis integration disconnect.

Over the years, innovations such as community-oriented policing, problem-oriented
policing, and hot spots policing have enabled the police to make substantial crime control and reduction gains. However, empirical research has shown that police occasionally misuse these strategies in practice. One possible solution is the co-implementation of these strategies with crime analysis. Yet, little is known about this relationship in practice. Using national survey data collected by the Police Executive Research Forum in 2008 from a sample of over 1,000 United States police agencies this thesis explores this relationship. Results of bivariate analysis between agency commitment to and integration of crime analysis within operations and the use of innovative strategies revealed positive relationships. Additionally, bivariate analysis between agency use of accountability mechanisms and innovative strategies revealed a strong positive relationship. Multivariate regression analysis revealed the use of accountability mechanisms and commitment to crime analysis as strong positive predictors of police agency innovation.