Criminology For The Police

This book offers an applied approach to criminology suitable for prospective police officers. It covers the fundamentals of criminological knowledge, theory and research, and their relevance to policing. The book is split into two parts, the first introducing the basics of criminology, and the second connecting criminological research to police practice. It focuses on the principles of evidence-based practice and encourages students to think critically about the issues covered. Core content includes the following: A history of policing in England and Wales, through a criminological lens. An overview of the literature on police culture, bias and discretion. A review of the challenges of applying criminological insights to policing, and the impact of the College of Policing code of ethics on police practice. An exploration of the challenges of contemporary policing, including complex crime, transnational investigation, digital and organised crime. A critical overview of evidence, and public sources of evidence. An examination of the contested definitions and perspectives on Evidence-Based Policing. An introduction to criminological research, including quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods. A review of problem solving in policing, including SARA and Atlas models. This book is essential reading for all students studying degrees in Professional Policing, as well as students of criminology engaged in criminal justice knowledge and practice.

Criminology Explains Police Violence offers a concise and targeted overview of criminological theory applied to the phenomenon of police violence. In this engaging and accessible book, Philip M. Stinson, Sr. highlights the similarities and differences among criminological theories, and provides linkages across explanatory levels and across time and geography to explain police violence. This book is appropriate as a resource in criminology, policing, and criminal justice special topic courses, as well as a variety of violence and police courses such as policing, policing administration, police-community relations, police misconduct, and violence in society. Stinson uses examples from his own research to explore police violence, acknowledging the difficulty in studying the topic because violence is often seen as a normal part of policing.

This book examines the structures that support the policing organisation internally and externally, including its partners within the criminal justice system. It has been written for students of policing, especially those undertaking qualifications under the new Police Education Qualifications Framework (PEQF), undergraduates who study the police as part of a criminology or criminal justice degree or similar, and those with a general interest in the police organisation in England and Wales. It includes chapters on: The historical context of police structure. Accountability, governance, and control in the police. Local, national, and international police structures. The partnership between the police and the criminal justice system. The future structure of policing. Throughout the chapters are ‘important point boxes’ which emphasise the key parts of each topic. At the end of each chapter are reflective questions, useful websites, and a further reading list, all of which reinforces students’ knowledge and furthers their professional development. Written in clear and direct style, this book will appeal to students of policing, criminology, criminal justice, cultural studies, and law. It is essential reading for students taking a degree in Professional Policing.

This book explores how predictive policing transforms police work. Police departments around the world have started to use data-driven applications to produce crime forecasts and intervene into the future through targeted prevention measures. Based on three years of field research in Germany and Switzerland, this book provides a theoretically sophisticated and empirically detailed account of how the police produce and act upon criminal futures as part of their everyday work practices. The authors argue that predictive policing must not be analyzed as an isolated technological artifact, but as part of a larger sociotechnical system that is embedded in organizational structures and occupational cultures. The book highlights how, for crime prediction software to come to matter and play a role in more efficient and targeted police work, several translation processes are needed to align human and nonhuman actors across different divisions of police work. Police work is a key function for the production and maintenance of public order, but it can also discriminate, exclude, and violate civil liberties and human rights. When criminal futures come into being in the form of algorithmically produced risk estimates, this can have wide-ranging consequences. Building on empirical findings, the book presents a number of practical recommendations for the prudent use of algorithmic analysis tools in police work that will speak to the protection of civil liberties and human rights as much as they will speak to the professional needs of police organizations. An accessible and compelling read, this book will appeal to students and scholars of criminology, sociology, and cultural studies as well as to police practitioners and civil liberties advocates, in addition to all those who are interested in how to implement reasonable forms of data-driven policing.

Basic Concepts in Criminology is an introduction to criminology. It is intended to serve as resource material for prospective students of criminology and particularly for law enforcement officers in training and in the field. Criminology as a social science discipline is structured from a combination of concepts of sociology, psychology, and law--all relevant subjects to the law enforcement profession. Remarkably, criminology is not very popular as a stand-alone subject among disciplines of choice for undergraduate students or even for those going in for graduate studies. Instead, what we notice in most universities' curricula are related disciplines, like criminal justice, criminal investigation, crime scene investigation, forensic, law enforcement, and so forth. Material contained in this book will be particularly useful to law enforcement officers; the Police, Corrections, and Security officers. In this book, I have attempted to approach and make this subject much easier and interesting to prospective students of Criminology in general and to law enforcement officers in particular, to whom knowledge of this subject is an important professional asset. I hope it will stir and arouse their interest and that of prospective students of Criminology in general.

A concise and up to date introduction to criminology for those undertaking degrees and foundation degrees in policing, police studies and related subjects. It provides an introduction to criminological perspectives on the development of the police service over the last 200 years alongside an overview of contemporary themes. Key topics include the changing role of policing, police governance and accountability, policing philosophies and strategies and the globalisation of policing. The book also examines the role criminology has played in the modernisation agenda and police reform, the shift to evidence-led policing, and the relationship between criminological theory and police practice.

This brief addresses the question of the various ways in which mental health-related issues have become police responsibility. It provides a detailed understanding of the myriad of ways in which police are often called upon to be the primary responder to mental health-related issues, well beyond the standard media images of individuals in extreme crisis. Drawing upon the results of two separate ethnographies of police practices in Canada, this volume examines how public policing has become entangled in cases of persons with mental illness (PMI). It examines two aspects of the police role and mandate that brings police officers into contact with individuals dealing with mental health disorders: public safety, and crime prevention and response. It explores police perceptions towards the roles they play in the lives of PMI, and police demands in these types of calls for service that have transformed aspects of public policing. Appropriate for policing researchers, law enforcement and public policymakers, this book presents the argument that tackling this matter requires knowledge of police involvement in situations with PMI, as well as a set of evidence-based policy options that will not generate additional resource or other strains.

Criminology Explains Police Violence offers a concise and targeted overview of criminological theory applied to the phenomenon of police violence. In this engaging and accessible book, Philip M. Stinson, Sr. highlights the similarities and differences among criminological theories, and provides linkages across explanatory levels and across time and geography to explain police violence. This book is appropriate as a resource in criminology, policing, and criminal justice special topic courses, as well as a variety of violence and police courses such as policing, policing administration, police-community relations, police misconduct, and violence in society. Stinson uses examples from his own research to explore police violence, acknowledging the difficulty in studying the topic because violence is often seen as a normal part of policing.