Criminal Justice DSST Flashcards

Acquittal

The judgement of a court that the defender is not guilty.

Adjucation

Determination of guilt or innocence -- a judgement concerning criminal charges.

Adult

A person considered a criminal, not a juvenile delinquent, because his or her age was above a standard limit, usually 16 or 17.

Alternative Facility

A place of limited confinement for certain types of offenders, including minimum-security facilities for communities or treatment locations for those with drug problems. Less secure, but more stimulating.

Appeal

A request by either defense or prosecution (called the appellant) that a case be bumped up to a higher court.

Arraignment

When someone appears in court, is informed of the accusations against him or her, and offers a plea.

Assault

Unlawfully and intentionally causing or threatening harm to another person. Aggravated means it causes or threatens serious injury, maybe with a deadly weapon; simple is less than serious injuries without deadly weapons.

Backlog

The number of cases that go over the court's capacity, and can't be dealt with because the court is busy.

Booking

The police record an arrest and identify who, where, when, who did the arresting, and why.

CCH

Computerized criminal history

Community Facility

A correctional facility people can come and go from regularly to use communal resources like schools, or to get a job.

Complaint

A formal written accusation made by anyone, usually a prosecutor who's granted it, and filed in court, alleging that a specific person has committed a specific offense. A prosecutor can deny it and not seek indictment, or it can be requested by the police.

Confinement Facility

A correctional facility which the inmates can't leave regularly.

Folkways

Informal norms or everyday customs that may be violated without serious consequences within a particular culture

Friedensgeld

The practice of paying restitution for crime to both the victim and the Crown.

Mores

Norms that are widely observed and have great moral significance

Lex Talionis

Law of retribution; "an eye for an eye."

Lex Eterna

One of the major terms describing eternal law, intended for the common good. It cannot be changed by humans.

Lex Naturalis

Legal theory that there are laws that occur naturally and across cultures.

Lex Humana

Laws that are enacted by human beings

Lex Salica

Also known as wergild, a fine that was paid by a wrongdoer to the family of the person he had injured or killed. Was class-dependent.

Cesare Beccaria

(1738-1794) One of the first scholars to develop a systematic understanding of why people committed crime.

Bridewell

A workhouse created for the employment and housing of London's unemployed or underemployed working classes.

Walnut Street Jail

The first public institution to specifically use imprisonment as the primary method of reforming offenders. Created by Quakers.

Hospice of San Michele

A corrections facility designed for incorrigible boys and youth, and included silence, large work areas, and separate sleeping cells. Both expiation and reform were intended goals.

Pennsylvania System

A system of prison administration in which inmates lived in solitary confinement, total silence, and religious penitence as the way to prevent future criminal behavior.

Irish System

A prison management scheme with multiple stages of control, allowing the inmate to earn higher stages until released when penitence was achieved; release was on a revocable "ticket of leave" or conditional pardon.

Lockstep

A manner of marching in file in which each person's leg moves with and behind the corresponding leg of the person ahead.

Auburn System

Prison reform in 1790, based on concept that solitary confinement would induce meditation and moral reform; actually led to many mental breakdowns; Auburn system, 1816, allowed congregation of prisoners during the day.

Ashurst-Sumners Act

Federal legislation of 1935 that effectively ended the industrial prison era by restricting interstate commerce in prison-made goods.

Hawes-Cooper Act

This act required that prison products were subject to the laws of any state to which they were shipped

Lock Psychosis

Term denoting overconcentration of prison administrators with security and community protection. to be accomplished through extensive use of locks, head counts, and internal control of inmates.

Ideologies of Justice

• Correctional

• Punishment

• Treatment

• Prevention

• Deterrence

• Disablement/Incapacitation

Models of Corrections

• Medical

• Treatment

• Reintegration

• Restoration

• Paramilitary

Plea Bargain

A negotiation in which the defendant agrees to enter a plea of guilty to a lesser charge and the prosecutor agrees to drop a more serious charge.

Presumptive Sentencing

A predetermined range of a minimum, average, and maximum term for a specific crime for a "typical" offender, with allowances for mitigating and aggravating circumstances to be considered.

Remand

t=The act of sending an accused person back into custody to await trial (or the continuation of the trial).

Writ of Habeas Corpus

A court order that requires police to bring a prisoner to court to explain why they are holding the person.

Writ of Mandamus

An extraordinary writ commanding an official to perform a ministerial act that the law recognizes as an absolute duty and not a matter for the official's discretion.

Recognizance

A guarantee that the accused will appear in court when required, under penalty of a fine or up to $500.

Jail

An institution authorized to hold pretrial detainees and sentenced misdemeanants for periods longer than 48 hours, but less than one year.

Prison

An institution for the incarceration of people convicted of serious crimes, usually felonies, for more than one year.

Weekender

a jail inmate who is allowed to live at home during the week (usually to work) and who must report to jail to serve his or her sentence on weekends.

Sursis

A suspended sentence in European countries requiring no future punishment provided the offense remains crime-free during a specific time period.

PSI Report

pre-sentence investigation an investigation and summary report of a convicted offender's background, which helps the judge decide on an appropriate sentence.

Risk and Needs Assessment

Instruments used to determine the probability of recidivism or future criminal behavior.

Intermediate Sanctions

A variety of punishments that are more restrictive than traditional probation but less severe and costly than incarceration. Can be monetary (day fines, restitution), labor-based (community service), treatment-based (drug or addiction programs) or based on location/mobility (electronic monitoring, boot camps, shock incarceration and probation, home detention or day reporting).

Prisonization

The socialization process through which a new inmate learns the accepted norms and values of the prison population.

Sanford Bates

First director of the U.S. Bureau of Prisons.

Security Levels

• Minimum

• Low

• Medium

• Maximum

• Supermax

CCA

Corrections Corporation of America, a Nashville-based private company that the government contracts with for secure corrections facilities. Another similar one is the WCC, Wackenhut Corrections Corporation.

Blue Flu

Substitute for a strike, which is illegal for corrections officers, in which they call in sick en masse to earn concessions from superiors.

Project Newgate

Prison treatment program stressing full-time college work, group counseling, and aftercare following parole.

Backfilled

Management strategy to meet minimum critical staffing by asking corrections officers to work the next tour of duty.

Conjugal Visits

An arrangement whereby inmates are permitted to visit in private with their spouses or significant others to maintain their personal relationship. Also called family visits, may or may not involve intimate relations.

Common Law

A system of law based on precedent and customs.

Status Offender

A juvenile who has been found to have engaged in behavior deemed unacceptable for those under a certain, statutorily determined age.

OJJDP

Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.

Delinquency Prevention Act

Non-justice programs, to prevent the occurrence of delinquent acts.

Juvenile Waiver

A procedure by which a charge(s) against a minor is transferred from a juvenile to circuit court.

Decarceration

Process of releasing offenders from institutional facilities, primarily by closing those facilities

Kent v. United States

(1959) First U.S supreme court case in which it was ruled that juveniles facing waiver to adult court are entitled to some basic due process rights.

In re Gault

In 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court decision gave juveniles accused of crimes the same due process rights as adults.

Ruiz v. Estelle

1980 federal court decision that declared the Texas prison system to be unconstitutional on the grounds of overcrowding, understaffing, and poor conditions and services (such as medical, educational, occupational, and mental health services). This ruling called for a series of reforms to the Texas prison system.

Section 1983

A legal statute which allows a citizen (typically a prison inmate) to sue a state or local government official who has deprived the citizen of some constitutional right or witheld some benefit to which the citizen is entitled.

Estelle v. Gamble

1976 Supreme Court ruling that the deliberate indifference of prison officials or personnel to the serious medical needs of inmates constitutes cruel and unusual punishment proscribed by the 8th Amendment.

Megan's Law

Legislation requiring that communities be alerted to the presence of sex offenders.

Expungement

A legal process that results in the removal of a conviction from official records.

Gregg v. Georgia

The 1976 Supreme Court decision that upheld the constitutionality of the death penalty, stating, "It is an extreme sanction, suitable to the most extreme of crimes."

Furman v. Georgia

1972 Supreme Court ruling which struck down all state laws allowing the death penalty, stating that they allowed for too much discretion on the part of the judge and jury resulting in lack of consistent administration of the penalty.

Malice Aforethought

The state of mind manifesting an intent to kill or conscious disregard of human life.