Books Received
July 2015

Listed below are books received for review over the last two months. Entries include publishing information as well as a description of the book. Unless otherwise stated, the book description is taken from the publisher’s website or the book jacket. Selected titles from this list will be chosen for a full review in forthcoming issues of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice Books. Previous books received are available from the links below.

Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel: The Gangster, the Flamingo, and the Making of Modern Las Vegas, by Larry D. Gragg. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2015. 204p.

“This account of the life of Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel follows his beginnings in the Lower East Side of New York to his role in the development of the famous Flamingo Hotel and Casino. Larry D. Gragg examines Siegel’s image as portrayed in popular culture, dispels the myths about Siegel’s contribution to the founding of Las Vegas, and reveals some of the more lurid details about his life.

Unlike previous biographies, this book is the first to make use of more than 2,400 pages of FBI files on Siegel, referencing documents about the reputed gangster in the New York City Municipal Archives and reviewing the 1950–51 testimony before the Senate Committee on organized crime. Chapters cover his early involvement with gangs in New York, his emergence as a favorite among the Hollywood elite in the late 1930s, his lucrative exploits in illegal gambling and horse racing, and his opening of the “fabulous” Flamingo in 1946. The author also draws upon the recollections of Siegel’s eldest daughter to reveal a side of the mobster never before studied—the nature of his family life.

  • Assesses Siegel’s life as a gangster in organized crime of the time
  • Provides a detailed account of Siegel’s last day in 1947, culminating with his murder at his girlfriend’s house in Beverly Hills
  • Discusses the facts and fallacies about his association with the development of Las Vegas
  • Features a chronological treatment of Siegel in films, novels, documentaries, and accounts in newspapers and magazines
  • Includes photographs of Siegel and the Flamingo Hotel and Casino at the time of its construction and opening.” From Publisher’s Website.
Beyond Deportation: The Role of Prosecutorial Discretion in Immigration Cases, by Shoba Sivaprasad Wadhis. New York: New York University Press, 2015. 233p.

“When Beatles star John Lennon faced deportation from the U.S. in the 1970s, his lawyer Leon Wildes made a groundbreaking argument. He argued that Lennon should be granted “nonpriority” status pursuant to INS’s (now DHS’s) policy of prosecutorial discretion. In U.S. immigration law, the agency exercises prosecutorial discretion favorably when it refrains from enforcing the full scope of immigration law. A prosecutorial discretion grant is important to an agency seeking to focus its priorities on the “truly dangerous” in order to conserve resources and to bring compassion into immigration enforcement. The Lennon case marked the first moment that the immigration agency’s prosecutorial discretion policy became public knowledge. Today, the concept of prosecutorial discretion is more widely known in light of the Obama Administration’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals or DACA program, a record number of deportations and a stalemate in Congress to move immigration reform.

Beyond Deportation is the first book to comprehensively describe the history, theory, and application of prosecutorial discretion in immigration law. It provides a rich history of the role of prosecutorial discretion in the immigration system and unveils the powerful role it plays in protecting individuals from deportation and saving the government resources. Shoba Sivaprasad Wadhia draws on her years of experience as an immigration attorney, policy leader, and law professor to advocate for a bolder standard on prosecutorial discretion, greater mechanisms for accountability when such standards are ignored, improved transparency about the cases involving prosecutorial discretion, and recognition of “deferred action” in the law as a formal benefit.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Big Trial: Law as Public Spectacle, by Lawrence M. Friedman. Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2015. 224p.

“The trial of O. J. Simpson was a sensation, avidly followed by millions of people, but it was also, in a sense, nothing new. One hundred years earlier the Lizzie Borden trial had held the nation in thrall. The names (and the crimes) may change, but the appeal is enduring—and why this is, how it works, and what it means are what Lawrence Friedman investigates in The Big Trial.

What is it about these cases that captures the public imagination? Are the headline trials of our period different from those of a century or two ago? And what do we learn from them, about the nature of our society, past and present? To get a clearer picture, Friedman first identifies what certain headline trials have in common, then considers particular cases within each grouping. The political trial, for instance, embraces treason and spying, dissenters and radicals, and, to varying degrees, corruption and fraud. Celebrity trials involve the famous—whether victims, as in the case of Charles Manson, or defendants as disparate as Fatty Arbuckle and William Kennedy Smith—but certain high-profile cases, such as those Friedman categorizes as tabloid trials, can also create celebrities. The fascination of whodunit trials can be found in the mystery surrounding the case: Are we sure about O. J. Simpson? What about Claus von Bulow—tried, in another sensational case, for sending his wife into a coma.? An especially interesting type of case Friedman groups under the rubric worm in the bud. These are cases, such as that of Lizzie Borden, that seem to put society itself on trial; they raise fundamental social questions and often suggest hidden and secret pathologies. And finally, a small but important group of cases proceed from moral panic, the Salem witchcraft trials being the classic instance, though Friedman also considers recent examples.

Though they might differ in significant ways, these types of trials also have important similarities. Most notably, they invariably raise questions about identity (Who is this defendant? A villain? An innocent unfairly accused?). And in this respect, The Big Trial shows us, the headline trial reflects a critical aspect of modern society. Reaching across the nineteenth and twentieth centuries to the latest outrage, from congressional hearings to lynching and vigilante justice to public punishment, from Dr. Sam Sheppard (the fugitive) to Jeffrey Dahmer (the cannibal), The Rosenbergs to Timothy McVeigh, the book presents a complex picture of headline trials as displays of power—moments of didactic theater” that demonstrate in one way or another whether a society is fair, whom it protects, and whose interest it serves.” From Publisher’s Website.

Blamestorming, Blamemongers and Scapegoats: Allocating Blame in the Criminal Justice Process, by Gavin Dingwall and Tim Hillier. Bristol, UK: Policy Press, 2015. 203p.

“We live in a society that is increasingly preoccupied with allocating blame: when something goes wrong someone must be to blame. Bringing together philosophical, psychological, and sociological accounts of blame, this is the first detailed criminological account of the role of blame in which the authors present a novel study of the legal process of blame attribution, set in the context of criminalisation as a social and political process. This timely and topical book will be essential reading for anyone working or researching in the criminal justice field. It will also be of wider interest to anyone wishing to discover the role of blame in modern society.“ From Publisher’s Website.

Bruno: Conversations with a Brazilian Drug Dealer, by Robert Gay. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015. 232p.

“In the 1980s a poor farmer’s son from Recife, Brazil, joined the Brazilian navy and began selling cocaine. After his arrest in Rio de Janeiro he spent the next eight years in prison, where he joined the Comando Vermelho criminal faction and eventually became one of its leaders. Robert Gay tells this young man’s dramatic and captivating story in Bruno. In his shockingly candid interviews with Gay, Bruno provides many insights into the criminal world in which he lived: details of day-to-day prison life; the inner workings of the Brazilian drug trade; the structure of criminal factions; and the complexities of the relationships and links between the prisons, drug trade, gangs, police, and favelas. And most stunningly, Bruno’s story suggests that Brazilian mismanagement of the prison system directly led to the Comando Vermelho and other criminal factions’ expansion into Rio’s favelas, where their turf wars and battles with police have terrorized the city for over two decades.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Chinese Heroin Trade: Cross-Border Drug Trafficking in Southeast Asia & Beyond, by Ko-lin Chin and Sheldon X. Zhang. New York: New York University Press, 2015. 320p.

“In a country long associated with the trade in opiates, the Chinese government has for decades applied extreme measures to curtail the spread of illicit drugs, only to find that the problem has worsened. Burma is blamed as the major producer of illicit drugs and conduit for the entry of drugs into China. Which organizations are behind the heroin trade? What problems and prospects of drug control in the so-called “Golden Triangle” drug-trafficking region are faced by Chinese and Southeast Asian authorities?

In The Chinese Heroin Trade, noted criminologists Ko-Lin Chin and Sheldon Zhang examine the social organization of the trafficking of heroin from the Golden Triangle to China and the wholesale and retail distribution of the drug in China. Based on face-to-face interviews with hundreds of incarcerated drug traffickers, street-level drug dealers, users, and authorities, paired with extensive fieldwork in the border areas of Burma and China and several major urban centers in China and Southeast Asia, this volume reveals how the drug trade has evolved in the Golden Triangle since the late 1980s. Chin and Zhang also explore the marked characteristics of heroin traffickers; the relationship between drug use and sales in China; and how China compares to other international drug markets. The Chinese Heroin Trade is a fascinating, nuanced account of the world of high-risk drug trafficking in a tightly-controlled society.” From Publisher’s Website.

Code of the Suburb: Inside the World of Young Middle-Class Drug Dealers, by Scott Jacques and Richard Wright. Chicago; London: University of Chicago Press, 2015. 194p.

“When we think about young people dealing drugs, we tend to picture it happening on urban streets, in disadvantaged, crime-ridden neighborhoods. But drugs are used everywhere—even in upscale suburbs and top-tier high schools—and teenage users in the suburbs tend to buy drugs from their peers, dealers who have their own culture and code, distinct from their urban counterparts.

In Code of the Suburb, Scott Jacques and Richard Wright offer a fascinating ethnography of the culture of suburban drug dealers. Drawing on fieldwork among teens in a wealthy suburb of Atlanta, they carefully parse the complicated code that governs relationships among buyers, sellers, police, and other suburbanites. That code differs from the one followed by urban drug dealers in one crucial respect: whereas urban drug dealers see violent vengeance as crucial to status and security, the opposite is true for their suburban counterparts. As Jacques and Wright show, suburban drug dealers accord status to deliberate avoidance of conflict, which helps keep their drug markets more peaceful—and, consequently, less likely to be noticed by law enforcement.

Offering new insight into both the little-studied area of suburban drug dealing, and, by extension, the more familiar urban variety, Code of the Suburb will be of interest to scholars and policy makers alike.” From Publisher’s Website.

A Country Called Prison: Mass Incarceration and the Making of a New Nation, by Mary D. Looman and John D. Carl. New York; Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2015. 264p.

“In America, prison is usually the elephant in the room that no one wants to talk about. Prison is seen as a hidden away place to keep the bad people out of society. This elephant is growing however, and threatening to change this view of prison and of criminals as destroying. The United States is the world leader in incarceration. 716 people out of every 100,000 are imprisoned. If the US prison system were a country, it would be the 142nd most populated nation in the world. Aside from looking at the numbers, if we could look at prison from a new view as its own country rather than an institution made up of walls and wires, policies and procedures, and legal statutes, what might we be able to learn?

In A Country Called Prison Mary Looman and John Carl attempt to answer this question by proposing a paradigm shift in the way that American society views mass incarceration. Weaving together sociological and psychological principles, theories of political reform, and real-life stories from experiences working in prison and with at-risk families, Looman and Carl form a fundamental fabric of understanding to demonstrate that prison is a culture, not purely an institution made up of fences, building, and policies. Life in this country called prison that is being proposed begins at birth, growing up in the prisons of disadvantage, abusive and neglected childhoods, and generational criminal families. Prison even continues after incarceration when ex-felons leave correctional facilities without legal identification of citizenship and money often leading them to return to their impoverished neighborhoods. Stuck in this prison of poverty, these legal aliens turn to illegal ways of providing for themselves, and often return to prison in the end. By viewing prison as a nation with its own identity and culture, Looman and Carl suggest concrete, doable, and relatively economic strategies for reform.” From Publisher’s Website.

Copping Out: The Consequences of Police Corruption and Misconduct, by Anthony Stanford. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2015. 176p.

“A Chicago journalist reveals how pervasive police misconduct, brutality, and corruption are changing the perspective of the criminal justice system and eroding the morals of the American people.

In this shocking yet fascinating volume, an award-winning Chicago journalist goes behind the headlines to provide a far-reaching analysis of brutality, vice, and corruption among men and women who have sworn to serve and protect. This timely book draws on actual cases to examine the widespread phenomenon of corruption inside law enforcement agencies. It looks at the effort of criminal elements and gangs to infiltrate police departments and the criminal justice system, and it discusses how vigilante justice is encouraged by claims of police misconduct. Of particular importance to readers, the book also exposes the trickle-down effect of police corruption as it affects American values and society as a whole.

But the news is not all bad. Police departments across the nation are fighting back against abuse of power, and the author sheds light on the escalating battle they are waging against rogue police officers involved in criminal activity. Through Stanford’s investigative work and firsthand interviews with leading law enforcement professionals, readers will be privy to the backstory of the struggle of police commands to insulate their departments against the criminality and corruption so prevalent today.
Features

  • Exposes ever-increasing police corruption and the lures that influence police officers to participate in illicit activities
  • Educates readers about the struggle to rid law enforcement agencies of corrupt officers
  • Examines the ways technology increases the probability of police officers becoming involved in illegal activities, as well as how advances in technology can prevent a crossing of the threshold
  • Features interviews with leading law enforcement professionals who discuss the challenges of police corruption
  • Points out steps that should be taken by law enforcement to curb police corruption, including stricter screening standards and more careful psychological monitoring of law enforcement personnel” From Publisher’s Website.
The Crimes of the Economy: A Criminological Analysis of Economic Thought, by Vincenzo Ruggiero. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2014. 208p.

“Economists have often paid visits to the field of criminology, examining the rational logic of offending. When economists examine criminal activity, they imply that offenders should be treated like any other social actor making rational choices.

In The Crimes of the Economy, Vincenzo Ruggiero turns the tables by examining a variety of economic schools of thought from a criminological perspective. Each one of these schools, he argues, justifies or even encourages harm produced by economic initiative. He investigates – among others – John Locke’s notion of private property, Mercantilism, the Physiocrats and Malthus, and the arguments of Adam Smith, Marshall, Keynes and neoliberalism. In each of these, the author identifies the potential justification of different forms of ‘crimes of the economy’ and victimisation.

This book re-examines the history of economic thought, assessing it as the history of a discipline which, while attempting to gain scientific status, in reality seeks to make the social harm caused by economics acceptable. The book will be interesting and relevant to students and scholars of social theory, criminology, economics, philosophy and politics.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Criminal Act: The Role and Influence of Routine Activity Theory, edited by Martin A. Andresen and Graham Farrell. London; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. 273p.

“Marcus Felson has been a leader in crime theory and crime science, and his name has become synonymous with routine activity theory. This volume provides a rich collection of essays that honour the work of Marcus Felson, acknowledging his pioneering work whilst also making a substantive original contribution to the field.

Bringing together some of the foremost thinkers in criminology today, alongside former students of Felson and those most influenced by his work, the contributors explain and apply the work of Marcus Felson in the fields of criminal investigations, the crime drop, crime analysis, criminological theory, transnational crime, violence, burglary, vehicle theft, and offender typologies. The breadth of these topics highlights the impact that Marcus Felson has had on the field of environmental criminology and criminology more widely.

This original volume of thought-provoking readings will be relevant to all scholars, researchers and practitioners of Criminology and Crime Science.” From Publisher’s Website.

Criminal Capital: How the Finance Industry Facilitates Crime, by Stephan Platt. Basingstoke, UK; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. 227p.

“In the first book to expose the role played by the international financial services industry in facilitating crime and laundering criminal property, one of the world’s leading anti-financial crime specialists scrutinises the vulnerability of banks, brokerages, trust companies, and investment funds to criminal abuse.
Discover:
– How the finance industry enables corruption, drug trafficking, terrorism, human trafficking, proliferation, piracy, and tax evasion
– Why extreme and dangerous industry behaviour correlates with the risk taking that toppled the global economy in 2008
– What measures can be taken to prevent criminals from compromising the legitimacy of the global financial system

Examining the role of the traditional powerhouse financial centres as well as offshore centres and rapidly emerging international financial centres in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia, this highly informative book challenges the reader to consider whether following the 2008 crisis, sufficient steps have been taken to address toxic behaviours in financial services; or whether radical reform is needed.” From Publisher’s Website.

Criminology Theory and Terrorism: New Applications and Approaches, edited by Joshua D. Freilich and Gary LaFree. Abington, Oxon, UK: New York: Routledge, 2015. 209p.

“Although there has been an increase in research on terrorism across the social and behavioural sciences in the past few decades, until recently most of this work has originated from political science, psychology or economics. Therefore, our focus in this book on criminological conceptual frameworks and empirical studies that engage terrorism and responses to it is unique. We include a distinguished group of researchers that offer their distinctive insights into criminological perspectives on terrorism.

The contributors focus on criminological perspectives that have rarely, if ever, been previously applied to the study of terrorism. This includes a range of perspectives from rational choice to social disorganization; from strain to routine activities theory. This volume will advance understanding of terrorism by taking advantage of criminological contributions, and at the same time will serve as a useful update to the criminologists and their students already working in this area. It would also be a helpful introduction to those criminologists and their students who would like to be more engaged in this important area of research.

This book was originally published as a special issue of Terrorism and Political Violence.” From Publisher’s Website.

Dark Tourism and Crime, by Derek Dalton. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2015. 216p.

“Dark tourism has become widespread and diverse. It has passed into popular culture vernacular, deployed in guide books as a short hand descriptor for sites that are associated with death, suffering and trauma. However, whilst books have been devoted to dark tourism as a general topic no single text has sought to explore dark tourism in spaces where crime – mass murder, genocide, State sanctioned torture and violence – has occurred as an organising theme.

Dark Tourism and Crime explores the socio-cultural contours of this unique type of tourism and explains why spaces/places where crime has occurred fascinate and attract tourists. The book is marked by an ethics of respect for the suffering a place has experienced and an imperative to learn something tangible about the history and legacy of that suffering. Based on empirical ethnographic research it takes the reader from the remnants of Auschwitz concentration camp to the tranquil Australian island of Tasmania to explore precisely what things a dark tourist might encounter – architecture, art installations, gardens, memorials, physical traces of crime – and how these things invoke and evoke past crimes.

This volume furthers understanding of dark tourism and will be of interest to students, researchers and academics of criminology, tourism and cultural studies.” From Publisher’s Website.

Death and Other Penalties: Philosophy in a Time of Mass Incarceration, edited by Geoffrey Adelsberg, Lisa Guenther, and Scott Zeman. New York: Fordham University Press, 2015. 424p.

“Mass incarceration is one of the most pressing ethical and political issues of our time. In this volume, philosophers join activists and those incarcerated on death row to grapple with contemporary U.S. punishment practices and draw out critiques around questions of power, identity, justice, and ethical responsibility.

This work takes shape against a backdrop of disturbing trends: The United States incarcerates more of its own citizens than any other country in the world. A disproportionate number of these prisoners are people of color, and, today, a black man has a greater chance of going to prison than to college. The United States is the only Western democracy to retain the death penalty, even after decades of scholarship, statistics, and even legal decisions have depicted a deeply flawed system structured by racism and class oppression.

Motivated by a conviction that mass incarceration and state execution are among the most important ethical and political problems of our time, the contributors to this volume come together from a diverse range of backgrounds to analyze, critique, and envision alternatives to the injustices of the U.S. prison system, with recourse to deconstruction, phenomenology, critical race theory, feminism, queer theory, and disability studies. They engage with the hyper-incarceration of people of color, the incomplete abolition of slavery, the exploitation of prisoners as workers and as “raw material” for the prison industrial complex, the intensive confinement of prisoners in supermax units, and the complexities of capital punishment in an age of abolition.

The resulting collection contributes to a growing intellectual and political resistance to the apparent inevitability of incarceration and state execution as responses to crime and to social inequalities. It addresses both philosophers and activists who seek intellectual resources to contest the injustices of punishment in the United States.” From Publisher’s Website.

Defending the Jury: Crime, Community, and the Constitution, by Laura I. Appleman. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015. 241p.

“This book sets forth a new approach to twenty-first-century criminal justice and punishment, one that fully involves the community, providing a better way to make our criminal process more transparent and inclusive. Using the prism of the Sixth Amendment community jury trial, this book offers fresh and much-needed ways to incorporate the citizenry into the procedures of criminal justice, thereby resulting in greater investment and satisfaction in the system. It exposes the various challenges the American criminal justice system faces because of its ongoing failure to integrate the community’s voice. Ultimately, the people’s right to participate in the criminal justice system through the criminal jury – a right that is all too often overlooked – is essential to truly legitimizing the criminal process and ensuring its democratic nature.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Enigma of Diversity: The Language of Race and the Limits of Racial Justice, by Ellen Berrey. Chicago; London: University of Chicago Press, 2015. 352p.

“Diversity these days is a hallowed American value, widely shared and honored. That’s a remarkable change from the Civil Rights era—but does this public commitment to diversity constitute a civil rights victory? What does diversity mean in contemporary America, and what are the effects of efforts to support it?

Ellen Berrey digs deep into those questions in The Enigma of Diversity. Drawing on six years of fieldwork and historical sources dating back to the 1950s and making extensive use of three case studies from widely varying arenas—housing redevelopment in Chicago’s Rogers Park neighborhood, affirmative action in the University of Michigan’s admissions program, and the workings of the human resources department at a Fortune 500 company—Berrey explores the complicated, contradictory, and even troubling meanings and uses of diversity as it is invoked by different groups for different, often symbolic ends. In each case, diversity affirms inclusiveness, especially in the most coveted jobs and colleges, yet it resists fundamental change in the practices and cultures that are the foundation of social inequality. Berrey shows how this has led racial progress itself to be reimagined, transformed from a legal fight for fundamental rights to a celebration of the competitive advantages afforded by cultural differences.” From Publisher’s Website.

Escape to Prison: Penal Tourism and the Pull of Punishment, by Michael Welch. Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2015. 286p. New York: Columbia University Press, 2015. 677p.

“The resurrection of former prisons as museums has caught the attention of tourists along with scholars interested in studying what is known as dark tourism. Unsurprisingly, due to their grim subject matter, prison museums tend to invert the “Disneyland” experience, becoming the antithesis of “the happiest place on earth.” In Escape to Prison, the culmination of years of international research, noted criminologist Michael Welch explores ten prison museums on six continents, examining the complex interplay between culture and punishment. From Alcatraz to the Argentine Penitentiary, museums constructed on the former locations of surveillance, torture, colonial control, and even rehabilitation tell unique tales about the economic, political, religious, and scientific roots of each site’s historical relationship to punishment.” From Publisher’s Website.

An Evil Day in Georgia: The Killing of Coleman Osborn and the Death Penalty in the Progressive-Era South, by Robert N. Smith. Knoxville, TN: The University of Tennessee Press, 2015. 296p.

“On the night of August 5, 1927, someone shot and killed Coleman Osborn, a store owner in Chatsworth, Georgia, in his place of business. Police and neighbors found only circumstantial traces of the murderer: tire tracks, boot prints, shell casings, and five dollars in cash near Osborn’s body. That day, three individuals—James Hugh Moss, a black family man locally renowned for his baseball skills; Clifford Thompson, Moss’s white friend who grew up in the Smoky Mountains; and Eula Mae Thompson, Clifford’s wife and a woman with a troubling history of failed marriages and minor run-ins with the law—left Etowah, Tennessee, unknowingly on a collision course with Deep South justice.

In chilling detail, Robert N. Smith examines the circumstantial evidence and deeply flawed judicial process that led to death sentences for Moss and the Thompsons. Moving hastily in the wake of the crime, investigators determined from the outset that the Tennessee trio, well known as bootleggers, were the culprits. Moss and Clifford Thompson were tried and convicted within a month of the murder. Eula Mae was tried separately from the other two defendants in February 1928, and her sentence brought her notoriety and celebrity status. On the night of her husband’s execution, she recanted her original story and would change it repeatedly in the following years. As reporters from Atlanta and across Georgia descended on Murray County to cover the trials and convictions, the public perception of Eula Mae changed from that of cold-blooded murderer to victim—one worthy of certain benefits that suited her status as a white woman. Eula Mae Thompson’s death sentence was commuted in 1928, thanks in part to numerous press interviews and staged photos. She was released in 1936 but would not stay out of trouble for long.

An Evil Day in Georgia exposes the historic deficiencies in death penalty implementation and questions, through its case study of the Osborn murder, whether justice can ever be truly unbiased when capital punishment is inextricably linked to personal and political ambition and to social and cultural values.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Evolution of the Global Terrorist Threat: From 9/11 to Osama Bin Laden’s Death, edited by Bruce Hoffman and Fernando Reinares. New York: Columbia University Press, 2015. 696p.

“Examining major terrorist acts and campaigns undertaken in the decade following September 11, 2001, internationally recognized scholars study the involvement of global terrorist leaders and organizations in these incidents and the planning, organization, execution, recruitment, and training that went into them. Their work captures the changing character of al-Qaeda and its affiliates since the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and the sophisticated elements that, despite the West’s best counterterrorism efforts, continue to exert substantial direction over jihadist terrorist operations.

Through case studies of terrorist acts and offensives occurring both in and outside the West, the volume’s contributors investigate al-Qaeda and other related entities as they adapted to the strategies of Operation Enduring Freedom and subsequent U.S.-led global counterterrorism programs. They explore whether Osama bin Laden was indeed reduced to a mere figurehead before his death or continued to influence al-Qaeda’s global activities. Did al-Qaeda become a loose collection of individuals and ideas following its expulsion from Afghanistan, or was it reborn as a transnational terrorist structure powered by a well-articulated ideology? What is the preeminent terrorist threat we face today, and what will it look like in the future? This anthology pinpoints the critical patterns and strategies that will inform counterterrorism in the coming decades.” From Publisher’s Website.

Exiting Prostitution: A Study in Female Desistance, by Roger Matthews, Helen Easton, Lisa Young, and Julie Bindel. Basingstoke, UK; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. 176p.

Exiting Prostitution provides a critical re-examination of the growing body of literature on exiting and desistance. Moving beyond accounts which are mainly centred on men desisting from crime, this book focuses on female desistance, particularly in relation to prostitution and the exiting process.

With interviews from over one hundred women involved in prostitution, the authors uniquely examine the exiting process considering not only the barriers and obstacles that women face when trying to leave prostitution, but also their individual strengths, capacities and aspirations. In this way, this book aims to present an approach that is more positive and progressive. It also provides a guide to best practice through an examination of the types of support that are currently available to those women involved in both on-street and off-street prostitution, and develops an outline model of support.

Written by a highly experienced team of experts in the field, this book provides useful guidelines for practitioners and policymakers on types of intervention and ways in which to further develop exiting programmes.” From Publisher’s Website.

Exploring Green Criminology: Introducing the Legal, Sociological and Criminological Contexts of Environmental Harm, by Matthew Hall. London; New York: Palgrave, 2015. 281p.

“The application of criminological perspectives to discussion of the environment is a rapidly developing field at the cutting edge of criminology. This innovative but accessible introduction to the key debates in green criminology both familiarises newcomers to the field with the core theories and methodological precepts and challenges them to take a critical approach.

In addition to analysing an extensive range of contemporary issues – environmental harm, food and water security, fracking, climate change and genetically modified crops – the text steps back to examine overarching themes, including the power relationships between states, corporations and the human and non-human components of our environment.

In this way, Exploring Green Crime prepares readers to approach environmental criminology with a questioning and analytical mind-set. With useful end of chapter summaries, review questions and further reading, the text is ideal for students of criminology, criminal justice, law, sociology and environmental studies.” From Publisher’s Website.

Exploring Sentencing Practice in England and Wales, edited by Julian V. Roberts. Basingstoke, UK; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. 288p.

“How are offenders sentenced in England and Wales? This is the first volume to analyse the empirical and normative aspects of sentencing, exploring a range of important issues including the role of previous convictions, sentencing female offenders, offender remorse and the sentencing in cases of multiple crimes. This unique collection reveals how courts in this jurisdiction sentence offenders, providing a portrait of practices in the magistrates and Crown courts from 1996 to the present day.

With expert contributions from scholars in criminal justice and law, this authoritative account presents the latest data trends relating to sentencing, as well as conclusions for policy and practice.” From Publisher’s Website.

The First Global Prosecutor: Promise and Constraints, edited by Martha Minow, C. Cora True-Frost, and Alex Whiting. Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press, 2015. 396p.

“The establishment of the International Criminal Court (ICC) gave rise to the first permanent Office of the Prosecutor (OTP), with independent powers of investigation and prosecution. Elected in 2003 for a nine-year term as the ICC’s first Prosecutor, Luis Moreno Ocampo established policies and practices for when and how to investigate, when to pursue prosecution, and how to obtain the cooperation of sovereign nations. He laid a foundation for the OTP’s involvement with the United Nations Security Council, state parties, nongovernmental organizations, victims, the accused, witnesses, and the media.

This volume of essays presents the first sustained examination of this unique office and offers a rare look into international justice. The contributors, ranging from legal scholars to practitioners of international law, explore the spectrum of options available to the OTP, the particular choices Moreno Ocampo made, and issues ripe for consideration as his successor, Fatou B. Bensouda, assumes her duties. The beginning of Bensouda’s term thus offers the perfect opportunity to examine the first Prosecutor’s singular efforts to strengthen international justice, in all its facets.” From Publisher’s Website.

From Cuba with Love: Sex and Money in the Twenty-First Century, by Megan Daigles. Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2015. 296p.

“From Cuba with Love deals with love, sexuality, and politics in contemporary Cuba. In this beautiful narrative, Megan Daigle explores the role of women in Cuban political culture by examining the rise of economies of sex, romance, and money since the early 1990s. Daigle draws attention to the violence experienced by young women suspected of involvement with foreigners at the hands of a moralistic state, an opportunistic police force, and even their own families and partners.

Investigating the lived realities of the Cuban women (and some men) who date tourists and offering a unique perspective on the surrounding debates, From Cuba with Love raises issues about women’s bodies–what they can or should do and, equally, what can be done to them. Daigle’s provocative perspective will make readers question how race and politics in Cuba are tied to women and sex, and the ways in which political power acts directly on the bodies of individuals through law, policing, institutional programs, and social norms.” From Publisher’s Website.

Gangland New York: The Places and Faces of Mob History, by Anthony M. DeStefano. Guilford, CT: Lyons Press, 2015. 216p.

“Get a taste of New York’s underworld by seeing where mobsters lived, worked, ate, played, and died. From the Bowery Boys and the Five Points Gang through the rise of the Jewish “Kosher Nostra” and the ascendance of the Italian Mafia, mobsters have played a major role in the city’s history, lurking just around the corner or inside that nondescript building. Bill “the Butcher” Poole, Paul Kelly, Monk Eastman, “Lucky” Luciano, Carlo Gambino, Meyer Lansky, Mickey Spillane, John Gotti—each held sway over New York neighborhoods that nurtured them and gave them power. As families and factions fought for control, the city became a backdrop for crime scenes, the rackets spreading after World War II to docks, airports, food markets, and garment districts. The streets of Brooklyn, swamps of Staten Island, and vacant lots near LaGuardia Airport hosted assassinations and hasty burials for the unlucky. The bloodlettings, arrests, and trials became front-page fodder for tabloids that thrived on covering Mulberry Street. Chinese, Russian, and Greek mobsters rose to prominence and wrought bloody havoc as well. Each of the book’s five sections—one for each borough—traces criminal activities and area exploits from the nineteenth century to now. Everyone knows about Umberto’s Clam House in Little Italy, but now you can find Scarpato’s restaurant in Coney Island where Joe Masseria was killed by henchmen of Salvatore Maranzano, who in turn died in a Park Avenue office building at the hands of “Lucky” Luciano a few months later. From the Bronx to Brighton Beach, from New Springville to Ozone Park, here is a comprehensive, on-the-ground guide to mob life in the Rotten Apple.” From Publisher’s Website.

Green Harms and Crimes: Critical Criminology in a Changing World, edited by Ragnhild Aslaug Sollund. Basingstoke, UK; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. 304p.

“Critical criminologists have come to recognize the major impact that environmental crime has on society, and have begun to consider what role the concept of harm should play in its analysis. A broadened field of criminology has especially engendered changes in the way environmental crimes are perceived and the victims that are considered to be produced through environmental crime. In this volume, leading international scholars analyze the injustices produced by the powers that drive harmful practices, such as capitalism and consumerism. They adopt a number of perspectives that importantly encapsulate both human and non-human animal rights, including: speciesism, environmental (in)justice, species (in)justice and ecological (in)justice.

Green Harms and Crimes celebrates the 40th anniversary of the European Group for the Study of Deviance and Social Control and particularly pays tribute to the theoretical roots of critical criminology, as well as its developments, alongside empirical contributions in this field. The contributors address pressing topics encompassing: victimization, waste and corporate crimes,
agribusiness and food crimes, biomedical research, illegal wildlife trafficking, and political protest and oppression..” From Publisher’s Website.

Harmful Societies: Understanding Social Harm, by Simon Pemberton. Bristol, UK: Policy Press, 2015. 176p.

“While the notion of social harm has long interested critical criminologists it is now being explored as an alternative field of study, which provides more accurate analyses of the vicissitudes of life. However, important aspects of this notion remain undeveloped, in particular the definition of social harm, the question of responsibility and the methodologies for studying harm. This book, the first to theorise and define the social harm concept beyond criminology, seeks to address these omissions and questions why some capitalist societies appear to be more harmful than others. In doing so it provides a platform for future debates, in this series and beyond. It will be a valuable resource for academics and researchers across criminology, sociology, social policy, socio-legal studies and geography.” From Publisher’s Website.

A History of Political Murder in Latin America: Killing the Messengers of Change, by W. John Green. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2015. 382p.

“This sweeping history depicts Latin America’s pan-regional culture of political murder. Unlike typical studies of the region, which often focus on the issues or trends of individual countries, this work focuses thematically on the nature of political murder itself, comparing and contrasting its uses and practices throughout the region. W. John Green examines the entire system of political murder: the methods and justifications the perpetrators employ, the victims, and the consequences for Latin American societies. Green demonstrates that elite and state actors have been responsible for most political murders, assassinating the leaders of popular movements and other messengers of change. Latin American elites have also often targeted the potential audience for these messages through the region’s various “dirty wars.” In spite of regional differences, elites across the region have displayed considerable uniformity in justifying their use of murder, imagining themselves in a class war with democratic forces. While the United States has often been complicit in such violence, Green notes that this has not been universally true, with US support waxing and waning. A detailed appendix, exploring political murder country by country, provides an additional resource for readers.” From Publisher’s Website.

The History of Street Gangs in the United States: Their Origins and Transformations, by James C. Howell. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2015. 165p.

“This book is an historical account of the emergence of youth gangs and the transformation of these into street gangs in the United States. The author traces the emergence of these gangs in the four major geographical regions over the span of two centuries, from the early 1800s to 2012. The author’s authoritative analysis explains gang emergence and expansion from play groups to heavily armed street gangs responsible for a large proportion of urban crimes, including drive-by shootings that often kill innocent bystanders. Nationwide, street gangs now account for 1 in 6 homicides each year, and for 1 in 4 in very large cities. In recent years, the number of gangs, gang members, and gang homicides increased, even though the U.S. has seen a sharp drop in violent and property crimes over the past decade.

The author’s historical analysis reveals the key contributing factors to transformation of youth gangs, including social disorganization that occurred following large-scale immigration early in American history and urban policies that pushed minorities to inner city areas and public housing projects. This analysis includes the influence of prison gangs on street gangs. The first generation of prison gangs emerged spontaneously in response to dangers inside prisons. The second generation was for many years extensions of street gangs that grew enormously during the 1980s and 1990s, particularly in large urban areas in which public housing projects have served as incubators for street gangs. The third generation of prison gangs is extremely active in street-level criminal enterprises in varied forms, often highly structured and well managed organizations that are actively involved in drug trafficking. In recent years, returning inmates are a predominant influence on local gang violence. Now, prison gangs and street gangs often work together in street-level criminal enterprises.

This book identifies the most promising ways that gang violence can be reduced. The best long-term approach is a combination of gang prevention, intervention, and suppression strategies and programs. Targeted suppression of gang violence is imperative. Street-workers that serve as violence interrupters can break the cycle of contagious gang violence.” From Publisher’s Website.

How Corrupt is Britain?, edited by David Whyte. London: Pluto Press, 2015. 208p.

“Banks accused of rate-fixing. Members of Parliament cooking the books. Major defense contractors investigated over suspect arms deals. Police accused of being paid off by tabloids. The headlines are unrelenting these days. Perhaps it’s high time we ask: just exactly how corrupt is Britain?

David Whyte brings together a wide range of leading commentators and campaigners, offering a series of troubling answers. Unflinchingly facing the corruption in British public life, they show that it is no longer tenable to assume that corruption is something that happens elsewhere; corrupt practices are revealed across a wide range of venerated institutions, from local government to big business. These powerful, punchy essays aim to shine a light on the corruption fundamentally embedded in UK politics, police and finance.” From Publisher’s Website.

Immigration Detention: The Migration of a Policy and its Human Impact, edited by Amy Nethery and Stephanie J. Silverman. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2015. 168p.

“Before the turn of the century, few states used immigration detention. Today, nearly every state around the world has adopted immigration detention policy in some form. States practice detention as a means to address both the accelerating numbers of people crossing their borders, and the populations residing in their states without authorisation.

This edited volume examines the contemporary diffusion of immigration detention policy throughout the world and the impact of this expansion on the prospects of protection for people seeking asylum. It includes contributions by immigration detention experts working in Australasia, the Americas, Europe, Africa and the Middle East. It is the first to set out a systematic comparison of immigration detention policy across these regions and to examine how immigration detention has become a ubiquitous part of border and immigration control strategies globally. In so doing, the volume presents a global perspective on the diversity of immigration detention policies and practices, how these circumstances developed, and the human impact of states exchanging individuals’ rights to liberty for the collective assurance of border and immigration control.

This text will be of key interest to scholars, students and practitioners of immigration, migration, public administration, comparative policy studies, comparative politics and international political economy.” From Publisher’s Website.

In Cold Storage: Sex and Murder on the Plains, by James W. Hewitt. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 2015. 160p.

“In 1973 the small southwest Nebraska railroad town of McCook became the unlikely scene of a grisly murder. More than forty years later, author James W. Hewitt returns to the scene and unearths new details about what happened.

After pieces of Edwin and Wilma Hoyt’s dismembered bodies were found floating on the surface of a nearby lake, authorities charged McCook resident Harold Nokes and his wife, Ena, with murder. Harold pleaded guilty to murder and Ena pleaded guilty to two counts of wrongful disposal of a dead body, but the full story of why and how he murdered the Hoyts has never been told.

Hewitt interviews law enforcement officers, members of the victims’ family, weapons experts, and forensic psychiatrists, and delves into newspaper reports and court documents from the time. Most significant, Harold granted Hewitt his first and only interview, in which the convicted murderer changed several parts of his 1974 confession. In Cold Storage takes readers through the evidence, including salacious details of sex and intrigue between the Hoyts and the Nokeses, and draws new conclusions about what really happened between the two families on that fateful September night.” From Publisher’s Website.

Inmates’ Narratives and Discursive Discipline in Prison: Rewriting Personal Histories Through Cognitive-Behavioral Programs, by Jennifer A. Schlosser. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2014. 152p.

“The question of ‘what works’ in offender treatment has dominated the field of prisoner re-entry and recidivism research for the last thirty years. One of the primary ways the criminal justice system tries to reduce the rates of recidivism among offenders is through the use of cognitive behavioural programs (CBP) as in-prison intervention strategies. The emphasis for these programs is on the idea that inmates are in prison because they made poor choices and bad decisions. Inmates’ thinking is characterized as flawed and the purpose of the program is to teach them to think and act in socially appropriate ways so they will be less inclined to return to prison after their release.

This book delves into the heart of one such cognitive behavioural programme, examines its inner workings, its effects on inmates’ narrated experience and considers what happens when a CBP of substandard quality and integrity is used as a gateway for inmates’ release.

Based on original empirical research, this book provides realistic suggestions for improving policy, for reforming current in-prison programs engaging in problematic practices and for instituting alternatives that take the needs of the inmates into greater account. This book is essential reading for students and academics engaged in the study of sociology, criminal justice, prisons, social policy, sentencing and punishment.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Insane Chicago Way: The Daring Plan by Chicago Gangs to Create a Spanish Mafia, by John M. Hagedorn. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 2015. 320p.

“The Insane Chicago Way is the untold story of a daring plan by Chicago gangs in the 1990s to create a Spanish Mafia—and why it failed. John M. Hagedorn traces how Chicago Latino gang leaders, following in Al Capone’s footsteps, built a sophisticated organization dedicated to organizing crime and reducing violence. His lively stories of extensive cross-neighborhood gang organization, tales of police/gang corruption, and discovery of covert gang connections to Chicago’s Mafia challenge conventional wisdom and offer lessons for the control of violence today.

The book centers on the secret history of Spanish Growth & Development (SGD)—an organization of Latino gangs founded in 1989 and modeled on the Mafia’s nationwide Commission. It also tells a story within a story of the criminal exploits of the C-Note$, the “minor league” team of the Chicago’s Mafia (called the “Outfit”), which influenced the direction of SGD. Hagedorn’s tale is based on three years of interviews with an Outfit soldier as well as access to SGD’s constitution and other secret documents, which he supplements with interviews of key SGD leaders, court records, and newspaper accounts. The result is a stunning, heretofore unknown history of the grand ambitions of Chicago gang leaders that ultimately led to SGD’s shocking collapse in a pool of blood on the steps of a gang-organized peace conference.

The Insane Chicago Way is a compelling history of the lives and deaths of Chicago gang leaders. At the same time it is a sociological tour de force that warns of the dangers of organized crime while arguing that today’s relative disorganization of gangs presents opportunities for intervention and reductions in violence.” From Publisher’s Website.

Inside Crown Court: Personal Experiences and Questions of Legitimacy, by Jessica Jacobson, Gillian Hunter, and Amy Kirby. Bristol, UK: Policy Press, 2015. 240p.

“Within the criminal justice system of England and Wales, the Crown Court is the arena in which serious criminal offences are prosecuted and sentenced. On the basis of up-to-date ethnographic research, this timely book provides a vivid description of what it is like to attend court as a victim, a witness or a defendant; the interplay between the different players in the courtroom; and the extent to which the court process is viewed as legitimate by those involved in it. This valuable addition to the field brings to life the range of issues involved and is aimed at students and scholars of criminal justice, policy-makers and practitioners, and interested members of the general public.” From Publisher’s Website.

Intersectionality and Criminology: Disrupting and Revolutionizing Studies of Crime, by Hillary Potter. Abington, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2015. 193p.

“The use of intersectionality theory in the social sciences has proliferated in the past several years, putting forward the argument that the interconnected identities of individuals, and the way these identities are perceived and responded to by others, must be a necessary part of any analysis. Fundamentally, intersectionality claims that not only are people’s lived experiences affected by their racial identity and by their gender identity, but that these identities, and others, continually operate together and affect each other.

With “official” statistical data that indicate people of Color have higher offending and victimization rates than White people, and with the overrepresentation of men and people of Color in the criminal legal system, new theories are required that address these phenomena and that are devoid of stereotypical or debasing underpinnings.

Intersectionality and Criminology provides a comprehensive review of the need for, and use of, intersectionality in the study of crime, criminality, and the criminal legal system. This is essential reading for academics and students researching and studying in the fields of crime, criminal justice, theoretical criminology, and gender, race, and socioeconomic class.” From Publisher’s Website.

Introduction to Critical Criminology, by Pamela Ugwudike. Bristol, UK: Policy Press, 2015. 312p.

“Critical criminological theories and perspectives are typically major components of Criminology degree courses. An Introduction to Critical Criminology is the first accessible text on these topics for students of criminology, sociology and social policy. Written by an experienced lecturer who specialises in the topic, it offers an in-depth but accessible introduction to foundational and contemporary theories and perspectives in critical criminology. In doing so, it introduces students to theories and perspectives that challenge mainstream criminological theories about the causes of crime, and the operation of the criminal justice system. With the inclusion of boxed examples, key points and sample essay questions An Introduction to Critical Criminology is ideal for students of Criminology because it explores in detail a vast array of critical criminological theories and perspectives.” From Publisher’s Website.

Juvenile Justice in Global Perspective, edited by Franklin E. Zimring, Maximo Langer, and David S. Tanenhaus. New York: New York University Press, 2015. 416p.

“Among developed nations, the United States has one of the most extreme and harsh criminal justice systems in the world—there is overwhelmingly more violence, more punishment, and more incarceration for both adults and juveniles here. But while American scholars may have extensive knowledge about other justice systems around the world and how adults are treated, juvenile justice systems and the plight of youth who break the law throughout the world is less often studied. This important volume fills a large gap in the study of juvenile justice by providing an unprecedented comparison of criminal justice and juvenile justice systems across the world, looking for points of comparison and policy variance that can lead to positive change in the United States.

Edited by three distinguished scholars on this topic, Juvenile Justice in Global Perspective contains original contributions from some of the world’s leading voices. The contributors cover countries from Western Europe to rising powers like China, India, and countries in Latin America. The book discusses important issues such as the relationship between political change and juvenile justice, the common labels used to unify juvenile systems in different regions and in different forms of government, the types of juvenile systems that exist and how they differ, and the impact of national characteristic differences on outcomes of treatment. Furthermore, the book uses its data on criminal versus juvenile justice in a wide variety of nations to create a new explanation of why separate juvenile and criminal courts are felt to be necessary. Offering a unique, proactive and comprehensive approach to juvenile justice, Juvenile Justice in Global Perspective is an important resource for scholars, prosecutors, lawmakers, and judges who hope to shape a better future for youth involved with the criminal justice system.” From Publisher’s Website.

Law’s Cut on the Body of Human Rights: Female Circumcision, Torture and Sacred Flesh, by Juliet Rogers. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2014. 174p.

“Scenes of violence and incisions into the flesh inform the demand for law. The scene of little girls being held down in practices of female circumcision has been a defining and definitive image that demands the attention of human rights, and the intervention of law. But the investment in protecting women and little girls from such a cut is not all that it seems. Law’s Cut on the Body of Human Rights: Female Circumcision, Torture and Sacred Flesh considers how such images come to inform law and the investment of advocates of law in an imagination of this scene. Drawing on psychoanalytic and postcolonial theory, and accompanying ideas in political theology, Juliet Rogers examines the language, imagery and excitement that accompanies recent initiatives to legislate against what is called ‘female genital mutilation’. The author compliments this examination with a consideration of the scene of torture exposed in images from Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay. Rogers argues that the modes of fascination and excitement that accompany scenes of torture and female circumcision betray the fantasy of a political condition against which the subject of liberal law is imagined; this is subjectivity in a state of non-mutilation, non-prohibition or, in a psychoanalytic idiom, non-castration. To support the fantasy of this subject, the mutilated subject, the authors suggests, is rendered as flesh cut from the democratic nation state, deserving of only selective human rights, or none at all.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Mafia: A Cultural History, by Roberto M. Dainotto. London: Reaktion Books, 2015. 240p.

“What is it about Tony Soprano that makes him so amiable? For that matter, how is it that many of us secretly want Scarface to succeed or see Michael Corleone as, ultimately, a hero? What draws us into the otherwise horrifically violent world of the mafia? In The Mafia, Roberto Dainotto explores the irresistible appeal of this particular brand of organized crime, its history, and the mythology we have developed around it.

Dainotto traces the development of the mafia from its rural beginnings in Western Sicily to its growth into a global crime organization alongside a parallel examination of its evolution in music, print, and on the big screen. He probes the tension between the real mafia—its violent, often brutal reality—and how we imagine it to be: a mythical potpourri of codes of honor, family values, and chivalry. But rather than dismiss our collective imagining of the mafia as a complete fiction, Dainetto instead sets out to understand what needs and desires or material and psychic longing our fantasies about the mafia—the best kind of the bad life—are meant to satisfy.

Exploring the rich array of films, books, television programs, music, and even video games portraying and inspired by the mafia, this book offers not only a social, economic, and political history of one of the most iconic underground cultures, but a new way of understanding our enduring fascination with the complex society that lurks behind the sinister Omertà of the family business.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Matrix of Insanity in Modern Criminal Law, by Gabriel Hallevy. Heidelberg; New York: Springer, 2015. 204p.

“This book challenges the assumptions of modern criminal law that insanity is a natural, legally and medically defined phenomenon (covering a range of medical disorders). By doing so, it paves the way for a new perspective on insanity and can serve as the basis for a new approach to insanity in modern criminal law.

The book covers the following aspects: the structure of the principle of fault in modern criminal law, the development of the insanity defense in criminal law, tangential in personam defenses in criminal law and their implications for insanity and the legal mechanism of reproduction of fault.
The focus is on the Anglo-American and European-Continental legal systems. Given the attention consistently drawn by international and domestic events in this context, the book will be of interest to a broad and growing international audience.” From Publisher’s Website.

Muslims in US Prisons: People, Policy, Practice, edited by Nawal H. Ammar. Boulder, CO: Lynne S. Rienner Publisher, 2015. 260p.

“How realistic are media portrayals of radical, “homegrown” Islamic terrorists filling US prisons? With prisons a fertile recruiting ground for Islam, what impact does the religion have on life behind bars? Muslims in US Prisons systematically explores the cultural, legal, political, and religious issues shaping the Muslim prison experience.

The authors probe the topic from the perspectives of both prisoners and the criminal justice system. In the process, they illuminate larger issues of race and imprisonment, inmate culture, and rehabilitation. The result is a revealing look at an often sensationalized but understudied population.” From Publisher’s Website.

Narrative Criminology: Understanding Stories of Crime, edited by Lois Presser and Sveinung Sandberg. New York: New York University Press, 2015. 336p.

“Stories are much more than a means of communication—stories help us shape our identities, make sense of the world, and mobilize others to action. In Narrative Criminology, prominent scholars from across the academy and around the world examine stories that animate offending. From an examination of how criminals understand certain types of crime to be less moral than others, to how violent offenders and drug users each come to understand or resist their identity as ‘criminals’, to how cultural narratives motivate genocidal action, the case studies in this book cover a wide array of crimes and justice systems throughout the world.

The contributors uncover the narratives at the center of their essays through qualitative interviews, ethnographic fieldwork, and written archives, and they scrutinize narrative structure and meaning by analyzing genres, plots, metaphors, and other components of storytelling. In doing so, they reveal the cognitive, ideological, and institutional mechanisms by which narratives promote harmful action. Finally, they consider how offenders’ narratives are linked to and emerge from those of conventional society or specific subcultures. Each chapter reveals important insights and elements for the development of a framework of narrative criminology as an important approach for understanding crime and criminal justice. An unprecedented and landmark collection, Narrative Criminology opens the door for an exciting new field of study on the role of stories in motivating and legitimizing harm.” From Publisher’s Website.

Pirates, Prisoners, and Lepers: Lessons from Life Outside the Law, by Paul H. Robinson and Sarah M. Robinson. Omaha, NE: Potomac Books (An Imprint of the University of Nebraska Press), 2015. 360p.

It has long been held that humans need government to impose social order on a chaotic, dangerous world. How, then, did early humans survive on the Serengeti Plain, surrounded by faster, stronger, and bigger predators in a harsh and forbidding environment? Pirates, Prisoners, and Lepers examines an array of natural experiments and accidents of human history to explore the fundamental nature of how human beings act when beyond the scope of the law. Pirates of the 1700s, the leper colony on Molokai Island, prisoners of the Nazis, hippie communes of the 1970s, shipwreck and plane crash survivors, and many more diverse groups—they all existed in the absence of formal rules, punishments, and hierarchies. Paul and Sarah Robinson draw on these real-life stories to suggest that humans are predisposed to be cooperative, within limits.

What these “communities” did and how they managed have dramatic implications for shaping our modern institutions. Should today’s criminal justice system build on people’s shared intuitions about justice? Or are we better off acknowledging this aspect of human nature but using law to temper it? Knowing the true nature of our human character and our innate ideas about justice offers a roadmap to a better society.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Police and the Expansion of Public Order Law in Britain, 1829-2014, by Iain Channing. Abingdon, Oxon, UK: New York: Routledge, 2015. 252p.

“Incidences of public disorder, and the manner in which they have been suppressed, have repeatedly ignited debate on the role of policing, the effectiveness of current legislation and the implications for human rights and civil liberties. These same issues have reverberated throughout British history, and have frequently resulted in the enactment of new legislation that reactively aimed to counter the specific concern of that era. This book offers a detailed analysis of the expansion of public order law in the context of the historical and political developments in British society.

The correlation of key historical events and the enactment of consequent legislation is a key theme that resonates throughout the book, and demonstrates the expanding influence of the law on public assemblies and protest, which has continued to criminalise and prohibit certain social behaviours. Crucial movements in Britain’s social and political history who have all engaged in, or have provoked public disorder, are examined in the book. Other incidents of riot and disorder, such as the Featherstone Riot (1893), the Battle of Cable Street (1936), the Inner City Riots (1980s) and the UK riots (2011) are also covered.

By positioning legal developments within their historical context, the book demonstrates the ebb and flow between the prominence of the competing demands of the liberties of free expression and assembly on the one hand and the protection of the general public and property on the other. This book is essential reading for academics and students in the fields of criminology, history and law.” From Publisher’s Website.

Policing Cybercrime and Cyberterror, by Thomas J. Holt, George W. Burruss, and Adam M. Bossler. Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press, 2015. 174p.

“The purpose of Policing Cybercrime and Cyberterror is to provide an in-depth discussion of the perceptions and responses of U.S. law enforcement agencies at all levels in dealing with cybercrime and cyberterror. The themes for this book include the challenges that cybercrime and digital evidence handling pose for local and state agencies, the jurisdictional and investigative hurdles that hinder the response capabilities of police agencies, and the complexities of the actual investigation of these offenses and their impact on officers.

This text analyzes data collected from local law enforcement agencies in the U.S., in order to understand officer perceptions of and responses to cybercrime and cyberterrorism, along with samples from digital forensic examiners, to understand their stress, satisfaction, secondary trauma, and coping mechanisms in response to work experiences. The findings demonstrate the realities of policing cybercrimes and those involving digital evidence processing relative to traditional offenses. Policing Cybercrime and Cyberterror addresses a gap in the policing literature by examining the various technological and policy changes needed to increase the investigative response of police agencies, along with various internal policies to improve support for forensic investigators.” From Publisher’s Website.

Policing in Northern Ireland: Delivering the New Beginning? By Desmond Rea and Robin Masefield. Liverpool, UK: Liverpool University Press, 2014. 670p.

“The Independent Commission On Policing For Northern Ireland, headed by Lord Patten, concluded in its 1999 report ‘A new beginning for democratic accountability is key to a new beginning for policing and to involving the community as a whole in the delivery of policing. We recommend that an entirely new Policing Board be created …’ This book is about the delivery of that ‘new beginning for policing’ in Northern Ireland, achieved at a time when most commentators considered the Policing Board was itself likely to fragment along traditional community lines.

The story of the Policing Board, from its establishment in 2001 through to the reconstitution of the membership in 2009 is in many ways an inspirational one, showing what can be done by politicians and community representatives working together to bring about a fundamentally different way of policing that better meets the needs of the whole community.

It offers valuable lessons and contemporary insights for law enforcement officers, accountability ‘bodies’ and academics world-wide, in key areas, including the need for a police service’s composition to reflect the community that it serves; promoting public confidence in policing and policing with the community; upholding human rights in the context of policing civil unrest and terrorism; holding a police service to account while providing the support it requires; and dealing with the legacy of inter-communal violence with over 3,500 deaths.

Drawing largely on publicly available material, it is an account by two individuals uniquely well-placed to produce an authoritative record: Professor Sir Desmond Rea, the Policing Board’s Chairman for its first seven and a half years, and Robin Masefield, the senior civil servant who headed the British Government’s team implementing the recommendations of the Independent Commission.” From Publisher’s Website.

Policing Wildlife: Perspectives on the Enforcement of Wildlife Legislation, by Angus Nurse. Basingstoke, UK; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. 248p.

“Wildlife crime is a fringe area of criminal justice, despite its importance as one of the highest value areas of global crime and its long term effects on ecosystems. This book examines the enforcement of wildlife law, one of the fastest growing areas of crime globally. It examines the extent of wildlife crime, the role of NGOs in policy development and practical law enforcement, and considers how justice systems deal with contemporary wildlife crime.

Policing Wildlife importantly examines the pressing threat of organised crime and terror groups in wildlife crime. It highlights the weaker enforcement regimes and more lenient attitudes to wildlife crimes by the courts, despite the strong provisions which actually exist in wildlife law. Ultimately, it considers how enforcement regimes need to adapt to contemporary wildlife crime threats and argues for the better integration of wildlife crime into mainstream justice systems.” From Publisher’s Website.

Positive Criminology, edited by Natti Ronel and Dana Segev. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2014. 356p.

“How can we best help offenders desist from crime, as well as help victims heal? This book engages with this question by offering its readers a comprehensive review of positive criminology in theory, research and practice. Positive criminology is a concept – a perspective – that places emphasis on forces of integration and social inclusion that are experienced positively by target individual and groups, and may contribute to a reduction in negative emotions, desistance from crime and overcoming the traumatic experience of victimization. In essence, positive criminology holds a more holistic view, which acknowledges that thriving and disengagement from distress, addiction, mental illness, crime, deviance or victimization might be fostered more effectively by enhancing positive emotions and experiences, rather than focusing on reducing negative attributes.

Each chapter in this book is written by key scholars in the related fields of criminology, victimology and addiction and, thus, assembles varied and extensive approaches to rehabilitation and treatment. These approaches share in common a positive criminology view, thereby enriching our understanding of the concept and other strength-based approaches to dealing with offenders and victims.

This edited book elaborates on positive criminology core ideas and assumptions; discusses related theories and innovations; and presents various benefits that this perspective can promote in the field of rehabilitation. For this reason, this book will be essential reading for those engaged in the study of criminology, criminal justice and victimology and may also assist scholars and professionals to help offenders desist from crime and improve victims’ well-being.” From Publisher’s Website.

Preventing Money Laundering: A Legal Study on the Effectiveness of Supervision in the European Union, by Melissa van den Broek. The Hague: Eleven International Publishing, 2015. 544p.

“Money laundering is criminalised virtually all around the world and has been a law enforcement priority since the early 1990s. The international nature of money laundering, combined with estimations on the scope and the distorting effects it may bring about, make it a grave danger to national and international financial markets. At the same time money laundering is considered to be a danger to society due to its strong interaction with organised drugs and white-collar crime. Over the years a ‘twin-track approach’ has been developed, aiming at the prevention of money laundering on the one hand, and punishing the money launderers on the other.

This book analyses the effectiveness of the anti-money laundering supervision of banks, real estate agents and accountants in the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom. It thoroughly analyses the legislation, the institutional settings and competences of anti-money laundering supervisors, as well as the application of these competences in practice. Based on this analysis, a number of recommendations for the EU legislators and the national legislators are formulated in order to strengthen and increase the effectiveness of anti-money laundering supervision.” From Publisher’s Website.

Privatising Probation. Is Transforming Rehabilitation the End of the Probation Ideal? By John Deering and Martina Y. Feilzer. Bristol, UK: Policy Press, 2015. 149p.

“Over the past 20 years, there have been many changes to probation governance in England and Wales aimed at controlling it from central government. However, the changes introduced under the Transforming Rehabilitation (TR) agenda, introduced in 2013, are unprecedented: the service has been divided and part-privatised and no longer exists as a unified public body. This topical book looks at the attitudes of probation practitioners and managers to the philosophy, values, and practicalities of TR. Based on a unique online survey of over 1300 respondents which found that they were unequivocally opposed to its broad aims and objectives, it provides unique insights into the values, attitudes and beliefs of probation staff and their delivery of services. Including broader discussion of the privatisation/marketisation debate, the context of privatisation of criminal justice services and questions of legitimacy and governance, this is essential reading for everyone interested in the future of the service.” From Publisher’s Website.

Protecting Our Kids? How Sex Offender Laws Are Failing Us, by Emily Horowitz. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2015. 185p.

“This thought-provoking work raises important questions about sex offender laws, drawing from personal stories, research, and data to prove the policies promote fear, destroy lives, and fail to protect children.

Do sex offender laws protect children, or are they inherently unfair practices that, at their worst, promote vigilante justice? The latter, this book argues. By analyzing the social, political, historical, and cultural context surrounding the emergence of current sex offender policies and laws, the work shows how sex offenders have come to loom as greater-than-life monsters when, in many cases, that is not true at all. Looking at its subject from a fresh viewpoint, the book shares research and new analyses of data and qualitative evidence to show how sex-offender laws are not only ineffective, but engender destructive fear and anxiety.

To help readers understand the impact of these laws, the author presents interviews with sex offenders and their families as they describe the day-to-day reality of living on the sex offender registry. Citing research and statistics, the book challenges the idea that sex offenders must be continually monitored and publicly identified because they are incurably predatory. Most important, the study shows that undue sex offender panic is preventing policymakers from addressing the true threats to children—poverty and growing inequality.

Features

  • Provides research-based evidence that the mean-spirited and panic-driven sex offender laws, aimed at branding a group of offenders as inhuman and unworthy of civil liberties and human rights, increases fear, destroys the lives of offenders and their families, and fails to protect children
  • Shows that emphasizing sex offenders and stranger-danger as the primary threat to child well-being and safety prevents focus on and attention to policies that prevent far more pervasive forms of child abuse, such as physical abuse, neglect, and maltreatment
  • Analyzes the sociohistorical context surrounding the emergence of current draconian sex offender policies
  • Challenges the idea that sex offenders must be continually monitored and publicly identified
  • Tells the stories of convicted sex offenders and their families and how they survive in a society that views them as the ‘worst of the worst’”

From Publisher’s Website.

Public Indecency in England 1857-1960: ‘A Serious and Growing Evil’, by David J. Cox, Kim Stevenson, Candida Harris, and Judith Rowbotham. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2015. 198p.

“Throughout the nineteenth century and twentieth century, various attempts were made to define and control problematic behaviour in public by legal and legislative means through the use of a somewhat nebulous concept of ‘indecency’. Remarkably however, public indecency remains a much under-researched aspect of English legal, social and criminal justice history.

Covering a period of just over a century, from 1857 (the date of the passing of the first Obscene Publications Act) to 1960 (the date of the famous trial of Penguin Books over their publication of Lady Chatterley’s Lover following the introduction of a new Obscene Publications Act in the previous year), Public Indecency in England investigates the social and cultural obsession with various forms of indecency and how public perceptions of different types of indecent behaviour led to legal definitions of such behaviour in both common law and statute.

This truly interdisciplinary book utilises socio-legal, historical and criminological research to discuss the practical response of both the police and the judiciary to those caught engaging in public indecency, as well as to highlight the increasing problems faced by moralists during a period of unprecedented technological developments in the fields of visual and aural mass entertainment. It is written in a lively and approachable style and, as such, is of interest to academics and students engaged in the study of deviance, law, criminology, sociology, criminal justice, socio-legal studies, and history. It will also be of interest to the general reader.” From Publisher’s Website.

Punish and Expel: Border Control, Nationalism, and the New Purpose of the Prison, by Emma Kaufman. Clarendon Studies in Criminology. Oxford, UK; New York: Oxford University Press, 2015. 272p.

“In 2006, after a scandal that gripped the country, the British government began to transform its prison system. Under pressure to find and expel foreigners, Her Majesty’s Prison Service began concentrating non-citizens in prisons with ’embedded’ border agents. Today, prison officers refer anyone suspected of being foreign to immigration authorities and prisoners facing deportation are detained in special prisons devoted to confining non-citizens. Those who cannot be deported linger, sometimes for years, indefinitely detained behind prison walls. The British approach to foreign nationals reflects a broader trend in punishment. Over the past decade, penal institutions across England, the United States, and Western Europe have become key sites for border control.

Offering the first comprehensive account of the imprisonment of non-citizens in the United Kingdom, Punish and Expel: Border Control, Nationalism, and the New Purpose of the Prison draws on extensive empirical data, based on fieldwork in five men’s prisons, to explore the relationship between punishment and citizenship. Using first-hand testimonies from hundreds of prisoners, prison officers, and high-level policy makers, it describes how prisons create a national identity and goes inside citizenship classes and ‘all-foreign’ prisons, documenting the treatment of non-citizens by other prisoners and staff. Passionately argued and meticulously researched, Punish and Expel links prisons to the history of British colonialism and the contemporary politics of race, whilst challenging readers to rethink their approach to prisons, and to the people held inside them.” From Publisher’s Website.

Revitalizing Criminological Theory: Towards a New Ultra-Realism, by Steve Hall and Simon Winslow. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2015. 154p.

“This book provides a short, comprehensive and accessible introduction to Ultra-Realism: a unique and radical school of criminological thought that has been developed by the authors over a number of years. After first outlining existing schools of thought, their major intellectual flaws and their underlying politics in a condensed guide that will be invaluable to all undergraduate and postgraduate students, Hall and Winlow introduce a number of important new concepts to criminology and suggest a new philosophical foundation, theoretical framework and research programme. These developments will enhance the discipline’s ability to explain human motivations, construct insightful representations of reality and answer the fundamental question of why some human beings risk inflicting harm on others to further their own interests or achieve various ends.

Combining new philosophical and psychosocial approaches with a clear understanding of the shape of contemporary global crime, this book presents an intellectual alternative to the currently dominant paradigms of conservatism, neoclassicism and left-liberalism. In using an advanced conception of “harm”, Hall and Winlow provide original explanations of criminal motivations and make the first steps towards a paradigm shift that will help criminology to illuminate the reality of our times.

This book is essential reading for academics and students engaged in the study of criminology, sociology, criminological theory, social theory, the philosophy of social sciences and the history of crime.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Routledge International Handbook of the Crimes of the Powerful, edited by Gregg Barak. London; New York: Routledge, 2015. 556p.

“Across the world, most people are well aware of ordinary criminal harms to person and property. Often committed by the powerless and poor, these individualized crimes are catalogued in the statistics collected annually by the FBI and by similar agencies in other developed nations. In contrast, the more harmful and systemic forms of injury to person and property committed by powerful and wealthy individuals, groups, and national states are neither calculated by governmental agencies nor annually reported by the mass media. As a result, most citizens of the world are unaware of the routinized “crimes of the powerful”, even though they are more likely to experience harms and injuries from these types of organized offenses than they are from the atomized offenses of the powerless.

Research on the crimes of the powerful brings together several areas of criminological focus, involving organizational and institutional networks of powerful people that commit crimes against workers, marketplaces, taxpayers and political systems, as well as acts of torture, terrorism, and genocide. This international handbook offers a comprehensive, authoritative and structural synthesis of these interrelated topics of criminological concern. It also explains why the crimes of the powerful are so difficult to control.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Securitization and Policing of Art Theft: The Case of London, by John Kerr. Farnham, Surrey, UK; Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing, 2015. 218p.

“The subject of many films and books, art theft is a fascinating topic that continues to capture the popular imagination. However, it is one of many types of art crime that remain under-researched and which require much more academic, empirical investigation.

This book examines who is performing, managing, governing and controlling the securitization and policing of art theft in London. Through giving the first map of the policing and securitization of one of the world’s largest centres of art, it helps our understanding of art security at city, national and international levels and offers practical recommendations for those who operate within art security.

Providing the first clear single account of the London art security terrain, this book also advances current knowledge of policing, environmental criminology and insurance. Moreover, it adds to the previous research into the traditionally restricted worlds of private policing, public policing and the art world.” From Publisher’s Website.

The Securitization of Society: Crime, Risk, and Social Order, by Marc Schuilenburg. New York; London: New York University Press, 2015. 345p.

“Traditionally, security has been the realm of the state and its uniformed police. However, in the last two decades, many actors and agencies, including schools, clubs, housing corporations, hospitals, shopkeepers, insurers, energy suppliers and even private citizens, have enforced some form of security, effectively changing its delivery, and overall role.

In The Securitization of Society, Marc Schuilenburg establishes a new critical perspective for examining the dynamic nature of security and its governance. Rooted in the works of the French philosophers Michel Foucault, Gilles Deleuze and Gabriel Tarde, this book explores the ongoing structural and cultural changes that have impacted security in Western society from the 19th century to the present. By analyzing the new hybrid of public-private security, this volume provides deep insight into the processes of securitization and modern risk management for the police and judicial authorities as well as other emerging parties. Schuilenburg draws upon four case studies of increased securitization in Europe – monitoring marijuana cultivation, urban intervention teams, road transport crime, and the collective shop ban – in order to raise important questions about citizenship, social order, and the law within this expanding new paradigm. An innovative, interdisciplinary approach to criminological theory that incorporates philosophy, sociology, and political science, The Securitization of Society reveals how security is understood and enacted in urban environments today.” From Publisher’s Website.

Sex Crimes: Transnational Problems and Global Perspectives, edited by Alissa R. Ackerman and Rich Furman. New York: Columbia University Press, 2015. 246p.

“Sex crimes, such as rape, child sexual abuse, and intimate partner violence, are increasingly transnational in nature, introducing unique cross-border and cross-cultural challenges for police, the courts, and the law. Policy makers and practitioners are in need of a resource that explores the incidence, prosecution, and treatment of sexual crimes across different countries and cultures.

This book is the first to investigate all aspects of sexual crimes and the policy and management initiatives developed to address them from a transnational, global perspective. Introducing an array of tools for reducing the prevalence and consequences of sex crimes, this volume brings together leading scholars in criminology, criminal justice, social work, and law to discuss topics ranging from sex trafficking and sex tourism to pornography, cyberstalking, and sexual abuse in the military and the Catholic church. Case studies track the reporting of these crimes, the methods used to interview victims and perpetrators, and the policies enacted to punish those involved.” From Publisher’s Website.

Silence and Confessions: The Suspect as the Source of Evidence, by Susan Easton. Basingstoke, Hampshire, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. 280p.

”Silence and Confessions examines the treatment of suspects in interrogation and explores issues surrounding the right to silence and confession evidence. Employing a socio-legal approach, it draws from empirical research in the social sciences including social psychology to understand the challenges in obtaining reliable evidence and maintaining the integrity of the interrogation process.

Providing insights into the process of interrogation and the experiences of the suspect during interview, this book highlights the dangers facing vulnerable suspects and the problems of identifying and preventing false confessions. It approaches the topic of the right to silence broadly and includes in-depth discussion of the problems with confession evidence.

Easton’s examination of the relationship between the state and the suspect, the equality of arms principle and the problem of reconciling competing interests and principles in the criminal justice process will be essential reading for scholars in Criminology, Criminal Justice and Law, particularly those interested in the relationship between law and society.” From Publisher’s Website.

Stigma and the Shaping of the Pornography Industry, by Georgina Voss. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2015. 166p.

“The idea of ‘pornography’ is often employed to invoke titillation, anger, and disgust. Stigma and the Shaping of the Pornography Industry explores the effects that this stigmatized identity has on the pornography industry itself. From the video era to the emergence of the internet, to trade shows, white-collar workers, technological innovation, and industry-wide characteristics, this book looks beyond content production to explore how stigma has shaped the structures, practices, norms, and boundaries of the wider sector. By drawing on concepts such as dirty work, core-stigmatized industries, and outlaw innovation, this book offers rich insights into the ways in which stigma is socially constructed and managed, and the deep structural effects that it has on the industry.” From Publisher’s Website.

Stolen, Smuggled, Sold: On the Hunt for Cultural Treasures, by Nancy Moses. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2015. 160p.

Stolen, Smuggled Sold: On the Hunt for Cultural Treasures tells the dark and compelling stories of iconic cultural objects that were stolen, smuggled or sold, and eventually returned back to their original owner.

There are many books about museum heists, Holocaust artwork, insider theft, trafficking in antiquities, and stolen Native American objects. Now, there’s finally a book for the general public that covers the entire terrain. The book includes full-color photos of the objects.

Stolen, Smuggled, Sold features seven vivid and true stories in which the reader joins the author as she uncovers a cultural treasure and follows its often-convoluted trail. Along the way author and reader encounter a cast of fascinating characters from the underbelly of the cultural world: unscrupulous grave robbers, sinister middlemen, ruthless art dealers, venal Nazis, canny lawyers, valiant academics, unstoppable investigative reporters, unwitting curators, and dedicated government officials. Stories include Gustav Klimt’s Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer 1, the typset manuscript for Pearl Buck’s The Good Earth, a ceremonial Ghost Dance short from the massacre at Wounded Knee, the theft of 4,800 historical audio discs by a top official at the National Archives, a missing original copy of The Bill of Rights, the mummy of Ramses I, and an ancient treasure from Iraq.

While each story is fascinating in and of itself, together they address one of the hottest issues in the museum world: how to deal with the millions of items that have breaks in the chain of ownership, suspicious ownership records, or no provenance at all. The issue of ownership touches on professional practices, international protocols, and national laws. It’s a financial issue since the illicit trade in antiquities and cultural items generates as much as $4 billion to $8 billion a year.” From Publisher’s Website.

Talking About Torture: How Political Discourse Shapes the Debate, by Jared Del Rosso. New York: Columbia University Press, 2015. 296p.

When the photographs depicting torture at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison were released in 2004, U.S. politicians attributed the incident to a few bad apples in the American military, exonerated high-ranking members of the George W. Bush administration, promoted Guantánamo as a model prison, and dismissed the illegality of the CIA’s use of “enhanced interrogation.” By the end of the Bush administration, members of both major congressional parties had come to denounce enhanced interrogation as torture and argue for the closing of Guantánamo.

What initiated this shift? In Talking About Torture, Jared Del Rosso reviews transcripts from congressional hearings and scholarship on denial, torture, and state violence to document this wholesale change in rhetoric and attitude toward the use of torture by the CIA and the U.S. military during the War on Terror. He plots the evolution of the “torture issue” in U.S. politics and its manipulation by politicians to serve various ends. Most important, Talking About Torture integrates into the debate about torture the testimony of those who suffered under American interrogation practices and demonstrates how the conversation continues to influence current counterterrorism policies, such as the reliance on drones.” From Publisher’s Website.

Terrorism, Inc.: The Financing of Terrorism, Insurgency, and Irregular Warfare, by Colin P. Clarke. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger Security International, 2015. 289p.

“Terrorist financing is an ongoing game of creating, concealing, and surreptitiously utilizing funds. This intriguing book considers every facet of guerrilla funding—from how activities are financed, to what insurgents do with the revenue they generate, to the range of countermeasures in place for deterring their moneymaking activities. Case studies prompt an analysis of past government responses and inform recommendations for countering irregular warfare worldwide.

Author Colin P. Clarke presents the business side of terrorism, taking a look at the cash-producing ventures he labels “gray activities” such as diaspora support, charities, fraudulent businesses, front companies, and money laundering as well as “dark activities” including kidnapping for ransom, robbery, smuggling, trafficking, and extortion. He considers the transnational efforts to stop terrorist activities—from wiretaps and electronic surveillance to financial sanctions and the freezing of funds and accounts—and points to the emergence of interagency task forces for detaining and destroying the operations of major criminal organizations across the globe.
Features

  • Examines the financing of major terrorist organizations such as ISIS, Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Taliban, and other significant groups
  • Features maps of key regions and graphs comparing funding streams of various groups
  • Includes information derived from interviews with expert threat finance practitioners, academics, scholars, and policy professionals
  • Provides a chronology of critical events.” From Publisher’s Website.
Terrorism Online: Politics, Law and Technology, edited by Lee Jarvis, Stuart Macdonald, and Thomas M. Chen. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2015. 210p.

“This book investigates the intersection of terrorism, digital technologies and cyberspace.

The evolving field of cyber-terrorism research is dominated by single-perspective, technological, political, or sociological texts. In contrast, Terrorism Online uses a multi-disciplinary framework to provide a broader introduction to debates and developments that have largely been conducted in isolation. Drawing together key academics from a range of disciplinary fields, including Computer Science, Engineering, Social Psychology, International Relations, Law and Politics, the volume focuses on three broad themes: 1) how – and why – do terrorists engage with the Internet, digital technologies and cyberspace?; 2) what threat do these various activities pose, and to whom?; 3) how might these activities be prevented, deterred or addressed? Exploring these themes, the book engages with a range of contemporary case studies and different forms of terrorism: from lone-actor terrorists and protest activities associated with ‘hacktivist’ groups to state-based terrorism. Through the book’s engagement with questions of law, politics, technology and beyond, the volume offers a holistic approach to cyberterrorism which provides a unique and invaluable contribution to this subject matter.

This book will be of great interest to students of cybersecurity, security studies, terrorism and International Relations.” From Publisher’s Website.

Understanding Street Culture: Poverty, Crime, Youth and Cool, by Jonathan Ilan. Basingstoke, UK; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. 216p.

“How do poverty, youth and crime relate to the concept of being ‘cool’? Jonathan Ilan presents a unique, theoretically informed overview of street culture in various parts of the world – its origins, functions, manifestations and appeal – examining both its bearing on criminal lifestyles and on the cultivation of ‘cool.’

Drawing on contemporary research and original examples to evidence new ways of thinking about street culture – from the favelas of Brazil to housing projects in the USA – the text locates street culture within its particular social, cultural and economic contexts. Covering diverse subjects from brutal violence to contemporary fashion it explores the ways in which street culture is intertwined with processes of social exclusion and inclusion.

An in-depth and even-handed guide to understanding the practices, styles and struggles associated with a particular section of the socio-economically disadvantaged, this text stands as an invaluable resource for students and academics across a range of disciplines, including youth studies, urban studies, criminology, sociology, cultural studies and geography.” From Publisher’s Website.

Unfair: The New Science of Criminal Injustice, by Adam Benforado. New York: Crown Publishing, 2015. 379p.

“A child is gunned down by a police officer; an investigator ignores critical clues in a case; an innocent man confesses to a crime he did not commit; a jury acquits a killer. The evidence is all around us: Our system of justice is fundamentally broken.

But it’s not for the reasons we tend to think, as law professor Adam Benforado argues in this eye-opening, galvanizing book. Even if the system operated exactly as it was designed to, we would still end up with wrongful convictions, trampled rights, and unequal treatment. This is because the roots of injustice lie not inside the dark hearts of racist police officers or dishonest prosecutors, but within the minds of each and every one of us.

This is difficult to accept. Our nation is founded on the idea that the law is impartial, that legal cases are won or lost on the basis of evidence, careful reasoning and nuanced argument. But they may, in fact, turn on the camera angle of a defendant’s taped confession, the number of photos in a mug shot book, or a simple word choice during a cross-examination. In Unfair, Benforado shines a light on this troubling new field of research, showing, for example, that people with certain facial features receive longer sentences and that judges are far more likely to grant parole first thing in the morning.

Over the last two decades, psychologists and neuroscientists have uncovered many cognitive forces that operate beyond our conscious awareness. Until we address these hidden biases head-on, Benforado argues, the social inequality we see now will only widen, as powerful players and institutions find ways to exploit the weaknesses of our legal system.

Weaving together historical examples, scientific studies, and compelling court cases—from the border collie put on trial in Kentucky to the five teenagers who falsely confessed in the Central Park Jogger case—Benforado shows how our judicial processes fail to uphold our values and protect society’s weakest members. With clarity and passion, he lays out the scope of the legal system’s dysfunction and proposes a wealth of practical reforms that could prevent injustice and help us achieve true fairness and equality before the law.” From Publisher’s Website.

Urban Legends: Gang Identity in the Post-Industrial City, by Alistair Fraser. Clarendon Studies in Criminology. Oxford, UK; New York: Oxford University Press, 2015. 270p.

”As the youth gang phenomenon becomes an important and sensitive public issue, communities from Los Angeles to Rio, Cape Town to London are facing the reality of what such violent groups mean for their children and young people. Complex dangers and instabilities, as well as high levels of public fear and anger, fuel an amplification of anxious public and political rhetoric in relation to gangs, in which the stereotype of the American street-gang – a ruthless, hierarchical, street-based criminal organisation capable of corrupting youth and fracturing communities – looms large.

Set against this backdrop, Urban Legends: Gang Identity in the Post-Industrial City tells a unique and powerful story of young people, gang identity, and social change in post-industrial Glasgow, challenging the perceptions of gangs as a novel, universal, or pathological phenomenon. Though territorial gangs have been reported in Glasgow for over a century, with striking continuities over this time, there are similarities with street-based groups elsewhere. Using this similarity as the foundation, the book goes on to argue that Glaswegian gangs have a specific historical trajectory that is particular to the city. Drawing on four years of varied ethnographic fieldwork in Langview, a deindustrialised working-class community, the book spotlights the everyday experiences and understandings of gangs for young people growing up in the area, reasoning that – for some – gang identification represents a root of identity and a route to masculinity, in a post-industrial city that has little space for them.” From Publisher’s Website.

Vandalism and Anti-Social Behavior, by Matt Long and Roger Hopkins Burke. Basingstoke, UK; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. 268p.

“There has been a lack of theorisation and conceptualisation of vandalism and anti-social behaviour in criminology in the decades following Cohen’s seminal typology of vandalism in the 1970s. This important book forwards a new typology of vandalism, one that addresses the various challenges of the late modern world, rather than the older industrial world Cohen addressed.

Matt Long and Roger Hopkins Burke analyse the various types of vandalism and anti-social behaviour conducted by individuals. However, they highlight that individuals are not always the locus of blame – the state also has the capacity to act in a profoundly anti-social way. Crucially, Long and Hopkins Burke argue that in order to fully understand vandalism and anti-social behaviour, a culturally criminological perspective should be fostered. This is a perspective which accounts for both the emotional and experiential aspects of crime as well as its broader social and political contexts.” From Publisher’s Website.

Victims: Trauma, Testimony and Justice, by Ross McGarry and Sandra Walklate. Abingdon, Oxon, UK: New York: Routledge, 2015. 182p.

”The study of victims of crime is a central concern for criminologists around the world. In recent years, some victimologists have become increasingly engaged in positivist debates on the differences between victims and non-victims, how these differences can be measured and what could be done to improve the victims’ experience of the criminal justice system. Written by experts in the field, this book embraces a much wider understanding of social harms and asks which victims’ voices are heard and why.
McGarry and Walklate break new ground with this innovative and accessible book; it offers a broad discussion of social harms, the role of the victim in society and the inter-relationship between trauma, testimony and justice and asks:

  • how has harm been understood and under what circumstances have those harms been recognised?
  • how and under what circumstances are those harms articulated?
  • how and under what circumstances are the voices of those who have been harmed listened to?

Each chapter draws on case studies and a range of questions designed to assist in reflection and critical engagement. This book is perfect reading for students taking courses on victimology, victims and society, victims’ rights and criminal justice.” From Publisher’s Website.

Video Surveillance and Social Control in a Comparative Perspective, edited by Fredrika Björkland and Ola Svenonius. Abingdon, Oxon, UK; New York: Routledge, 2013. 218p.

“This edited collection reports the results of a comparative study of video surveillance/CCTV in Germany, Poland, and Sweden. It investigates how video surveillance as technologically mediated social control is affected by national characteristics, with a specific concern for recent political history. The book is motivated by asking what makes video surveillance “tick” in three very different cultural settings, two of which (Poland and Sweden) are virtually unexplored in the literature on surveillance. The selection of countries is motivated by an interest in societies with recent experiences of authoritarianism, and how they respond to the global trend towards intensified technical means of control. With thorough empirical studies, the book constitutes an important contribution to security studies, surveillance studies, and post-communist area studies.” From Publsiher’s website.

Violence at the Urban Margins, edited by Javier Auyero, Philippe Bourgois, and Nancy Scheper-Hughes. New York; Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2015. 352p.

“In the Americas, debates around issues of citizen’s public safety–from debates that erupt after highly publicized events, such as the shootings of Jordan Davis and Trayvon Martin, to those that recurrently dominate the airwaves in Latin America–are dominated by members of the middle and upper-middle classes. However, a cursory count of the victims of urban violence in the Americas reveals that the people suffering the most from violence live, and die, at the lowest of the socio-symbolic order, at the margins of urban societies.

The inhabitants of the urban margins are hardly ever heard in discussions about public safety. They live in danger but the discourse about violence and risk belongs to, is manufactured and manipulated by, others–others who are prone to view violence at the urban margins as evidence of a cultural, or racial, defect, rather than question violence’s relationship to economic and political marginalization. As a result, the experience of interpersonal violence among the urban poor becomes something unspeakable, and the everyday fear and trauma lived in relegated territories is constantly muted and denied.

This edited volume seeks to counteract this pernicious tendency by putting under the ethnographic microscope–and making public–the way in which violence is lived and acted upon in the urban peripheries. It features cutting-edge ethnographic research on the role of violence in the lives of the urban poor in South, Central, and North America, and sheds light on the suffering that violence produces and perpetuates, as well as the individual and collective responses that violence generates, among those living at the urban margins of the Americas.” From Publisher’s Website.

Whose Child Am I? Unaccompanied, Undocumented Children in U.S. Immigration Custody, by Susan J. Terrio. Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2015. 280p.

“In 2014, the arrest and detention of thousands of desperate young migrants at the southwest border of the United States exposed the U.S. government’s shadowy juvenile detention system, which had escaped public scrutiny for years. This book tells the story of six Central American and Mexican children who are driven from their homes by violence and deprivation, and who embark alone, risking their lives, on the perilous journey north. They suffer coercive arrests at the U.S. border, then land in detention, only to be caught up in the battle to obtain legal status. Whose Child Am I? looks inside a vast, labyrinthine system by documenting in detail the experiences of these youths, beginning with their arrest by immigration authorities, their subsequent placement in federal detention, followed by their appearance in deportation proceedings and release from custody, and, finally, ending with their struggle to build new lives in the United States. This book shows how the U.S. government got into the business of detaining children and what we can learn from this troubled history.” From Publisher’s Website.

Young People’s Understandings of Men’s Violence Against Women, by Nancy Lombard. Farnham, Surrey, UK; Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing, 2015. 228p.

“Globally, nationally and locally men’s violence against women is an endemic social problem and an enduring human rights issue. Unlike men who are most likely to be victims of stranger assaults and violence, official data shows that women are most likely to be attacked, beaten, raped and killed by men known to them – either partners or family members.

Research has maintained that to challenge and prevent men’s violence against women, changing the attitudes and behaviour of young people is essential. This ground-breaking book presents the first investigation into what younger people think about men’s violence against women. It does this by locating their constructions and understandings within the temporal and spatial location of childhood.

Through challenging the perception that young people are too young to ‘know’ about violence or to offer opinions on it, Nancy Lombard demonstrates the ways to talk to younger people about men’s violence. Through confronting preconceptions of younger people’s existing knowledge, capabilities and understanding, she demonstrates that this is a subject which young people can confidently discuss.” From Publisher’s Website.

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