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An examination of the treatment of serious violence by men against women in nineteenth-century England. During Victoria's reign the criminal law came to punish such violence more systematically and heavily, while propagating a new, more pacific ideal of manliness. Yet this apparently progressive legal development called forth strong resistance, not only from violent men themselves but, from others who drew upon discourses of democracy, humanitarianism and patriarchy to establish sympathy with 'men of blood'. In exploring this development and the contest it generated, Professor Wiener analyzes the cultural logic underlying shifting practices in nineteenth-century courts and Whitehall, and locates competing cultural discourses in the everyday life of criminal justice. The tensions and dilemmas this book highlights are more than simply 'Victorian' ones; to an important degree they remain with us. Consequently this work speaks not only to historians and to students of gender but also to criminologists and legal theorists

Cover -- Half Title -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Dedication -- Table of Contents -- List of tables -- List of contributors -- Abbreviations -- Acknowledgements -- Foreword -- Introduction: Contextualising cases in which women kill following domestic abuse -- 1. Diminished responsibility or justifiable homicide?: The case of Sally Challen -- 2. Labelling her mad: Diminished responsibility and medicalised responses to women who kill their abusers -- 3. Critical perspectives on the partial defence of loss of control: Justice for women? -- 4. 'Fit for purpose in today's society?': Reflecting on provocation pleas in modern Scot -- 5. Women who kill their abusers and self-defence -- 6. Legally male: The householder defence, duress and the continuing exclusion of women -- 7. A gender and human rights analysis of Scotland's response to women who kill their abusers -- 8. Domestic abuse education in Scottish law schools: Developments and paths forward -- 9. A practitioners' guide to representing women who kill following domestic abuse -- Index.

This article discusses recent Virginia cases and legislative developments in the area of criminal law and procedure. The article discusses cases from April of 1995 to July of 1996 and legislative changes effective July 1, 1996. This article does not discuss federal developments. Nor does the article discuss death penalty issues, as that area of the law is sufficiently particularized that, for purposes of manageability, it falls outside the scope of this discussion.

The American criminal justice system is currently suffering from a dramatic increase in mass incarceration and staggering rates of racial disproportionalities and disparities. Many facially neutral laws, policies, and practices within the criminal justice system have disproportionate impacts on minorities. Racial impact statements provide one potential method of addressing such disproportionalities. These proactive tools measure the projected impacts that new criminal justice laws and policies may have upon minorities, and provide this information to legislators before they decide whether to enact the law. Four states currently conduct racial impact statements, and other states are considering adopting their own versions. The triggering circumstances and methods of collecting racial impact data differ among states, resulting in a great variety of racial impact statements that are actually completed. This Comment reviews current racial impact statements and suggests three improvements for states that are considering adopting them. First, racial impact statements should attach automatically to legislation without the prompting of legislators' votes. Second, states should consider developing more thorough data collection standards. Finally, more effective racial impact legislation should ensure that lawmakers address racial disproportionalities by requiring legislators to follow additional procedures when disproportionate racial impacts are projected.

Criminology and the Criminal Justice System is a book for everyone interested in the historical development of the ideas on crime and punishment and their impact on the criminal justice system and the fight against crime more widely. It is as much a book for students, researchers and policy makers, as it is for lawyers, magistrates, police officers, public prosecutors and social workers. It is also a book for a wider readership curious about the origins of the current approach to issues of crime and criminal justice. Never before has an introduction to criminology systematically dealt with its history from the sixteenth century up to the present day, as well as the institutions of the criminal justice system: the police, the judiciary, the prison system, rehabilitation and youth protection. This is the first published study not only to discuss the development of criminology and the criminal justice systems of Western Europe (Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, France, Great Britain and Italy) but also to delve into the interplay with the evolution of the system in the United States from the end of the eighteenth century up to this day. In addition, the extensive bibliography and numerous illustrations make this textbook ideal for further study and more in-depth research as well as a pleasure to read

There are good reasons to be initially hesitant about shaping criminal law rules to track the justice judgments of ordinary people. People seem to disagree about many criminal law issues. Their judgments, at least as reflected in many aspects of current law such as three strikes and high penalties for drug offenses, seem harsh to many. Effective crime control would seem to require the expertise of trained experts and scholars who understand the complexities of general deterrence and the identification and incapacitation of the dangerous. But this brief Essay, which reviews some previous studies and analyses, argues that distributing criminal liability and punishment according to the shared judgments of the community—so-called "empirical desert"—does not have the failings that many assume, such as those described above, and indeed ought to be preferred by both moral philosophers and crime-control utilitarians. It represents the best practical approximation of deontological desert. And it offers the greatest potential for effective crime control because, by tracking community views, the criminal law can build its moral credibility with the community and thereby harness the potentially enormous powers of social influence and internalized norms.

This paper provides a commentary on the evolution and position of petty offence law in the Polish legal system. For the sake of order, it should be noted that the nature of petty offences is ambiguous and not one-dimensional. Their status and role depend on the assumptions of the legislator, who may emphasise their various aspects. A petty offence may be an element of criminal law in the broad sense, as a "small crime" or an administrative tort. More-over, the development of Polish petty offence law and the arguments supporting the choice of specific legal solutions are presented. The probable future of Polish petty offence law was also indicated, aiming at the conclusion that the most serious petty offences would become crimes, and the rest would become administrative torts.