LibGuides: We Need To Talk : Criminal Justice

Police Reform, & Mass Incarceration

What are groups of people protesting, marching, and uniting for anyway? Are they an example of a civically engaged citizenry or are they just out causing trouble? There are many strong opinions and lots of rhetoric out there right now, but this week's panel will address the overarching subject of criminal justice, policing, mass incarceration, and the very real consequences of not paying attention in these areas.

Just what exactly do terms like reform, policing, mass incarceration, police brutality and the prison-industrial complex mean?

Terms That Teach

Policing involves organized order maintenance, peace keeping, rule or law enforcement, crime investigation and prevention, and other forms of investigation and associated information brokering, which may involve the conscious exercise of coercive power.
Mass Incarceration refers to the imprisonment of a large proportion of a population (used in particular with reference to the significant increase in the rate of incarceration in the US in the late 20th century).
Police Brutality refers to excessive, unjustified, or undue use of force by law enforcement can be legally defined as a civil rights violation, where law enforcement officers exercise undue or excessive force against a subject.
The Prison Industrial Complex refers to the economic interrelation between prisons and the various public and private job sectors that have become dependent on the expansion of the prison system. A partial list of these sectors includes construction, pharmaceuticals, and law enforcement, including probation and parole. The prison-industrial complex also provides a cheap labor force for various corporationsThe growth of the prison-industrial complex in the United States has come at the expense of predominantly black and Latino communities.
Reform refers to the idea that the institution of policing can be improved continually, as to an aspirational state of perfection.
All term definitions can be found in the Credo Reference Academic Core database.

Podcasts About Policing

How to Citizen with Baratunde: Keeping Us Safe, Beyond Policing (with Dr. Phil Goff and Zach Norris)
Baratunde speaks with two esteemed guests, Dr. Phil Goff, who works directly with police departments around the country, and Zach Norris, who works with communities, about ways we can reclaim public safety that don’t always need to involve the police.
Reframing History: Mass Incarceration
The United States imprisons more people than any other country in the world, and a disproportionate number of those prisoners are Black. What are the origins of the U.S. criminal justice system and how did racism shape it? From the creation of the first penitentiaries in the 1800s, to the "tough-on-crime" prosecutors of the 1990s, how America created a culture of mass incarceration.

UNLV Student Dissertations Highlighting the Las Vegas MPD

Team policing revisited: A quasi-experimental evaluation in Las Vegas, Nevada
The implementation of community-oriented policing, which promotes various organizational changes and the use of problem-focused strategies, has changed police departments in recent years and in many ways that complement the use of team policing, thus allowing it a better chance to succeed. In March 2012, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department implemented its own version of team policing, which incorporates community-oriented, problem-oriented, and hot spots policing strategies in an effort to reduce crime and disorder in a local neighborhood. This study evaluates the impact of team policing in that neighborhood and provides suggestions for future research on team policing.
Citizen Perceptions: A Test of Hot Spot Policing in Las Vegas
In this dissertation, I explore whether the use of motorized police saturation patrol in high crime neighborhoods negatively impacts citizen perceptions of police activity, opinions about the police, and perceived safety level. This research focuses on evaluating whether or not any backfire effects were attributed to the use of the hot spot policing tactic.

Criminal Justice News Across Diasporic Identities

Seeing Is Believing

Books To Binge

Policing Las Vegas by Dennis N. Griffin
ISBN: 0929712234
Publication Date: 2005-05-01
After being established in 1905 as a railroad town, most of Las Vegas' population was made up of tough railroaders, ranchers, and miners who worked, drank, and fought hard. Sam Gay, the first police chief, as well as the first elected county sheriff, broke up the numerous scuffles by grabbing the combatants by the scruff of their necks and banging their heads together--it was the beginning of a long legacy of law and order in America's most explosive boomtown. Law-enforcement efforts have had to adapt accordingly. Policing Las Vegas follows the evolution of law enforcement in Las Vegas and Clark County from the days of night watchmen and cops who carted drunks to jail on horseback to today's acclaimed Metropolitan Police Department. The transition wasn't always smooth. There were plenty of power struggles, political battles, and rogue cops. But there were also many acts of valor and heroism, and a number of officers made the ultimate sacrifice.
Charged : the new movement to transform American prosecution and end mass incarceration
Call Number: E-Book
ISBN: 9780399590023
Publication Date: 2010-07-01
Highlights from this book include:
The Prosecutorial Process
How Courts make decisions
Prosecutorial misconduct
Public prosecutors
Sentences (Criminal procedure)
Imprisonment
The Insidious Momentum of American Mass Incarceration by Franklin E. Zimring
Call Number: E-Book
ISBN: 9780197513170
Publication Date: 2020-10-01
The phenomenal growth of penal confinement in the United States in the last quarter of the twentieth century is still a public policy mystery. While there is unanimous condemnation of the practice, there is no consensus on the causes nor any persuasive analysis of what is likely to happen in the coming decades. In The Insidious Momentum of American Mass Incarceration, Franklin E. Zimring seeks a comprehensive understanding of when, how, and why the United States became the world leader in incarceration to further determine how the use of confinement can realistically be reduced.

We Need To Talk : Criminal Justice

Our Panelists