Book picks similar to
A Sociology of Crime by Stephen K. Hester


criminal-justice
criminology
philosophy
urbanism

We Believe the Children: The Story of a Moral Panic


Richard Beck - 2015
    These crimes, social workers and prosecutors said, had gone undetected for years, and they consisted of a brutality and sadism that defied all imagining. Children across the country painted a nightmarish picture of their abuse, some claiming they had been taken to graveyards, sometimes to kill animals, and sometimes to dig up bodies, which were removed from their coffins and stabbed. In some cases, investigators said that the abusers were filming the crimes on behalf of international child pornography rings. The dangers of babysitting services and day care centers became a national news media fixation, and legislatures took action to fend off the new threats facing the country's children. Of the many hundreds of people who were investigated in connection with day care and ritual abuse cases around the country, some 190 were formally charged with crimes, leading to more than 80 convictions.But, none of it happened. It was a decade-long outbreak of collective hysteria—on a par with the Salem witch trials.Using extensive archival research conducted in Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Minneapolis, and elsewhere, and drawing on dozens of interviews conducted with the hysteria's major figures, n+1 editor Richard Beck shows how a group of legislators, doctors, lawyers, and parents, most working with the best of intentions, set the stage for a cultural disaster. Psychiatrists and talk therapists turned dubious theories of trauma and recovered memory into a destructive new kind of psychotherapy. Social workers and detectives employed coercive interviewing techniques that led children to tell them what they wanted to hear. Local and national journalists fanned the flames by promoting the story's salacious aspects, while aggressive prosecutors sought to make their careers by unearthing an unspeakable evil where parents feared it most. Beck tracks the panic all the way to its decline at the end of the decade, as parents and prosecutors were finally forced to reckon with the total lack of physical evidence underpinning the story. Yet at the heart of We Believe the Children is the idea that the conditions that made this frenzy of accusations possible were very specific to their moment in American history. The climate of fear that surrounded these cases influenced a whole series of arguments about women, children, and sex that had been intensifying for some twenty years. At the root of these accusations were competing visions of society and what it was that threatened it most.

Without a Trace: Unsolved Disappearances and Mysterious Vanishings


Troy Taylor - 2020
    Such strange and chilling tales run the gamut of the terrifying and the bizarre and include crime victims, lost explorers, ships vanished at sea, outdoor disappearances, and supernatural mysteries that defy all explanation. Among these pages you’ll find accounts of America’s Lost Colony, history’s most famous ghost ships, famous figures who vanished into the unknown, the unknown fate of America’s first kidnapping for ransom, a vanished heiress, lighthouse keepers who impossibly disappeared, the killer who escaped the noose – permanently, the Grand Canyon adventurers who were never seen again, the Prohibition lawman’s nephew who was never found, the Ohio sorority girl who never made it home, the abducted housewife who disappeared, the Hollywood starlet who left her family behind, a missing West Point cadet, the babysitter who vanished on Halloween, the missing Texas couple who may have been Russian spies, the little boy who walked away for good in the Smoky Mountains, a missing heiress to a candy empire, a missing TV news reporter, a long distance runner whose run never ended, plus infamous vanishings of figures like Theodosia Burr, Amelia Earhart, Glenn Miller, Judge Crater, Jimmy Hoffa, and far too many more! Just remember as you turn the pages, that if these people so easily vanished from the face of the earth, then it means it could happen to anyone – perhaps even you. You may want to read this one with the lights on.

From Crime to Crime: Harold Shipman to Operation Midland - 17 cases that shocked the world


Richard Henriques - 2020
    

Policing the Black Man: Arrest, Prosecution, and Imprisonment


Angela J. Davis - 2017
    Contributing authors include Bryan Stevenson (Director of the Equal Justice Institute, NYU Law Professor, and author of New York Times bestseller Just Mercy), Sherrilyn Ifill (President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund), Jeremy Travis (President of John Jay College of Criminal Justice), and many others. Policing the Black Man explores and critiques the many ways the criminal justice system impacts the lives of African American boys and men at every stage of the criminal process from arrest through sentencing. Essays range from an explication of the historical roots of racism in the criminal justice system to an examination of modern-day police killings of unarmed black men. The co-authors discuss and explain racial profiling, the power and discretion of police and prosecutors, the role of implicit bias, the racial impact of police and prosecutorial decisions, the disproportionate imprisonment of black men, the collateral consequences of mass incarceration, and the Supreme Court's failure to provide meaningful remedies for the injustices in the criminal justice system. Policing the Black Man is an enlightening must-read for anyone interested in the critical issues of race and justice in America.

The Cocaine Kids: The Inside Story of a Teenage Drug Ring


Terry Williams - 1989
    The picture he creates in The Cocaine Kids is the story behind the headlines. The lives of these young dealers in the fast lane of the underground economy emerge in depth and color on the pages of this book.

McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld


Misha Glenny - 2008
    No one would foresee that the greatest success story to arise from these events would be the globalization of organized crime. "McMafia" is a fearless, encompassing, wholly authoritative investigation of the now proven ability of organized crime worldwide to find and service markets driven by a seemingly insatiable demand for illegal wares. Whether discussing the Russian mafia, Colombian drug cartels, or Chinese labor smugglers, Misha Glenny makes clear how organized crime feeds off the poverty of the developing world, how it exploits new technology in the forms of cybercrime and identity theft, and how both global crime and terror are fueled by an identical source: the triumphant material affluence of the West. To trace the disparate strands of this hydra-like story, Glenny talked to police, victims, politicians, and members of the global underworld in eastern Europe, North and South America, Africa, the Middle East, China, Japan, and India. The story of organized crime's phenomenal, often shocking growth is truly the central political story of our time. "McMafia "will change the way we look at the world.

No Matter How Loud I Shout: A Year in the Life of Juvenile Court


Edward Humes - 1996
    Granted unprecedented access to the Los Angeles Juvenile Court, including the judges, the probation officers, and the children themselves, This book provides evidence of the system's inability to slow juvenile crime or to make even a reasonable stab at rehabilitating troubled young offenders. Humes draws a portrait of a judicial system in disarray.

From Jailer to Jailed: My Journey from Correction and Police Commissioner to Inmate #84888-054


Bernard B. Kerik - 2015
    His résumé as a public servant is long and storied, and includes honors from President Ronald Reagan, Queen Elizabeth II, and the NYPD’s Medal for Valor for saving his partner in a gun battle. In 2004, Kerik was nominated by President George W. Bush to head the US Department of Homeland Security. Now, he is a former Federal Prison Inmate known as #84888-054. Convicted of tax fraud and false statements in 2007, Kerik was sentenced to four years in federal prison. Now for the first time, in this hard-hitting, raw and oftentimes politically incorrect memoir, he talks candidly about his time on the inside: the torture of solitary confinement, the abuse of power, the mental and physical torment of being locked up in a cage, the powerlessness. With his newfound perspective, Kerik makes a plea for change and illuminates why our punishment system doesn’t always fit the crime. In this extraordinary memoir, Kerik offers a riveting, one-of-a-kind perspective on the American penal system as he details life on the inside with the experience of an acclaimed Correction Commissioner from the outside. With astonishing candor, bravery, and insider’s intelligence, Bernard Kerik shares his fall from grace to incarceration, and turns it into an impassioned and singularly insightful rallying cry for criminal justice reform in a nation that he devoted his life to serving and protecting.

Inside the Mind of a Teen Killer


Phil Chalmers - 2009
    Why? In Inside the Mind of a Teen Killer, Chalmers, who has been interviewing teen murderers and serial killers for over a decade, recounts Woodham's gripping and horrifying story, plumbing his motives, and peering into the killer's mind. Chalmers also weaves into the narrative his reasearch about teen culture, including comparisons with other teen killers, to analyze the disturbing ascent of teen violence and offer ways that we, as individuals, leaders, and communities, can help defuse this alarming trend. Inside the Mind of a Teen Killer is a culmination of Phil Chalmers' fifteen-year study on teen murder and school violence.? This is an anti-violence project aimed at teens, parents, youth workers, teachers, and law enforcement. The most unique part of the book is the words of the killers themselves, explaining why they committed the crimes, what led them to murder, and how we could have helped them. The goal of this book is to educate America and the world on the growing problem of teen murder and school violence, and hopefully stop teen murder and save innocent lives. Phil interviewed nearly 200 teen killers and school shooters for this book, and it's sure to change the way America and the world thinks about the growing trend of juvenile homicide. Book release date to coincide with the 10-year anniversary of Columbine, April 20, 2009."Phil Chalmers has interviewed the killers. He has corresponded with them extensively. He has exhaustively researched their crimes

The Unknown Darkness: Profiling the Predators Among Us


Gregg O. McCrary - 2003
    A former Supervisory Special Agent in the FBI's Behavioral Science Unit, Gregg McCrary takes us deep into the minds of the nation's shrewdest and most sinister predators. In The Unknown Darkness, he digs beneath the crime scene to examine in raw first-person detail the lethal competition between the country's deviously dangerous killers and the dedicated professionals who are determined to get them off the streets.In the basement offices of the FBI Academy at Quantico, Virginia -- now familiar from the books and films The Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal -- McCrary served in one of the most elite forces for criminal investigation in the world, profiling criminals for over twenty-five years in more than a thousand cases involving homicide, serial murder, kidnapping, and sexual assault. He takes us inside his process on some of his most fascinating cases, including:The Sam Sheppard case -- In revisiting this classic case, what new material did McCrary's analysis discover?The Poet's Shadow -- The strange story of Jack Unterweger and the hunt for an international serial killer that had a bizarre twist.The Buddhist Temple Massacre -- What did the crime scene reveal about the shocking evil that resulted in the deaths of nine gentle people?The Unknown Darkness also explores the strengths and pitfalls of modern criminal investigation and offers vivid details about what happens at a crime scene, what is actually involved in bringing a killer to justice, and finally what kind of a person is able to devote his or her life to grappling with the predators among us. Daring to relive the often harrowing experiences of his time with the FBI, McCrary has put together an eye-opening account of ten of America's most frightening and riveting manhunts. He has also written an engrossing narrative on our justice system -- from the perspective of someone who has lived it day to day.

Unwanted Advances: Sexual Paranoia Comes to Campus


Laura Kipnis - 2017
    Next she was brought up on Title IX complaints for creating a "hostile environment." Defying confidentiality strictures, she wrote a whistleblowing essay about the ensuing seventy-two-day investigation, which propelled her to the center of national debates over free speech, "safe spaces," and the vast federal overreach of Title IX.In the process she uncovered an astonishing netherworld of accused professors and students, campus witch hunts, rigged investigations, and Title IX officers run amuck. Drawing on interviews and internal documents, Unwanted Advances demonstrates the chilling effect of this new sexual McCarthyism on intellectual freedom. Without minimizing the seriousness of campus assault, Kipnis argues for more honesty about the sexual realities and ambivalences hidden behind the notion of "rape culture." Instead, regulation is replacing education, and women’s hard-won right to be treated as consenting adults is being repealed by well-meaning bureaucrats.Unwanted Advances is a risk-taking, often darkly funny interrogation of feminist paternalism, the covert sexual conservatism of hook-up culture, and the institutionalized backlash of holding men alone responsible for mutually drunken sex. It’s not just compulsively readable, it will change the national conversation.

The Tourist Gaze: Leisure And Travel In Contemporary Societies


John Urry - 1990
    Urry develops this analysis through various levels - historical, economic, social, cultural and visual.Mass tourism is charted from its origins in the English seaside resorts to its development as a global industry. The economic impact and complex social relations involved in international tourism are explored. Changing patterns of tourism are shown to be connected to the broader cultural changes of postmodernism and related to the role of the service and middle classes. The author argues that we

The Black Hand: The Bloody Rise and Redemption of "Boxer" Enriquez, a Mexican Mob Killer


Chris Blatchford - 2008
    Award-winning investigative journalist and author Chris Blatchford tells the never-before-told true story of the most powerful gang in America—and one of the most brutal and ruthless criminal organizations in the world—who control the California underworld and wave the flag of The Black Hand.

The Murderer Next Door: Why the Mind Is Designed to Kill


David M. Buss - 2005
    The Murderer Next Door is a riveting look into the dark underworld of the human psyche, an exploration of when and why we kill and what might push any one of us over the edge. A leader in the innovative field of evolutionary psychology, David Buss conducted an unprecedented set of studies investigating the underlying motives and circumstances of murders, from the bizarre outlier cases of serial killers to those of the friendly next-door neighbor who one day kills his wife.Reporting on findings that are often startling and counter-intuitive, he puts forth a bold new general theory of homicide, arguing that the human psyche has evolved specialized adaptations whose function is to kill. Taking readers through the surprising twists and turns of the evolutionary logic of murder, he explains exactly when each of us is most at risk, both of being murdered and of becoming a murderer. Featuring gripping storytelling about specific murder cases, The Murderer Next Door will be necessary reading for those fascinated by books on profiling, lovers of true crime and murder mysteries, and readers intrigued by the inner workings of the human mind.

Chasing Gideon: The Elusive Quest for Poor People's Justice


Karen Houppert - 2013
    Supreme Court unanimously ruled in Gideon v. Wainwright that all defendants charged with a crime punishable by imprisonment of more than a year have the constitutional right to free legal counsel if they cannot afford their own. In the fifty years since the ruling, including the years of the national War on Drugs, the number of prosecutions in America’s courts has skyrocketed, now totaling approximately 13 million each year. Today, an estimated 80 percent of defendants are served by indigent defense.Chasing Gideon by veteran reporter Karen Houppert examines the legacy of this landmark decision, chronicling the cases of defendants across the country who have relied on Gideon’s promise. Houppert’s investigation takes her from Washington state, where overextended public defenders juggle impossible caseloads; and New Orleans, where systemic flaws are so pervasive at every level of the criminal justice apparatus that it occasionally nears collapse; to Georgia, where an underfunded capital defense program jeopardizes the efficacy of counsel in death penalty cases; and Florida, where revisiting the original Gideon lawsuit challenges basic assumptions about the right to legal counsel for the poor. These compelling narratives illuminate reform efforts as well as the critical problems that plague indigent defense in the United States, helping us to understand how and why it is failing, and what can be done to better fulfill Gideon’s promise.A half-century after Anthony Lewis’ award-winning Gideon’s Trumpet chronicled the story of the court case that changed the American justice system, Chasing Gideon picks up where Lewis’s book left off, bringing renewed attention to an essential aspect of our criminal justice system and offering keen insight into how we might save it.