Deck 16: Criminal Justice: Cops and Corrections

Question 1

Juries are the only way a defendant can be declared guilty in which type of cases?

A)White collar crime
B)Capital (murder)
C)Identity theft
D)Extortion and bribery

Answer 1

B

Question 2

Approximately what percent of African American men comprise the male prison population?

A)10 percent
B)30 percent
C)40 percent
D)50 percent

Answer 2

C

Question 3

What are the common rationales for the widespread adoption of surveillance systems in large- and mid-sized cities?

A)To control the law abiding public and as a hiring program for police officers
B)Reduce crime rates while offsetting the need for more uniformed officers
C)Reduce crime rates while providing a way for police departments to expand the number of uniformed officers.
D)To increase costs associated with technology

Answer 3

B

Question 4

States and localities exercise jurisdiction over more than __________ of all crime that occurs in the United States.

A)10 percent
B)25 percent
C)50 percent
D)95 percent

Question 5

Prescribing a minor penalty for involvement in illegal activities as an alternative to prison sentences or major penalties, is called

A)recriminalization.
B)decriminalization.
C)legalizataion.
D)broken windows policing.

Question 6

Traditionally, courts have assumed

A)a hands-off approach to offenders once they were behind prison walls.
B)a hands-on approach to offenders once they were behind prison walls.
C)that prisoners would need constant supervision and thus frequent court interactions with prisoners is the norm.
D)that all prisoners need is rehabilitation during their incarceration.

Question 7

Many approaches to deal with the problem of recidivism have been tried, including counseling, vocational training and basic education. Which of the following statements is most accurate regarding these approaches?

A)All have consistently been able to overcome the criminalizing environment of state prisons.
B)None have consistently been able to overcome the criminalizing environment of state prisons.
C)Only basic education has consistently been able to overcome the criminalizing environment of state prisons.
D)Both basic education and vocational training have consistently been able to overcome the criminalizing environment of state prisons.

Question 8

An example of criminal activity that in many states would not qualify as victimless crime is

A)prostitution.
B)gambling.
C)bank robbery.
D)music pirating.

Question 9

The U.S. Supreme Court said that police are required to inform anyone suspected of a crime of the right to remain silent because of which of the following decisions?

A)Furman v. Georgia (1972)
B)Escobedo v. Illinois (1964)
C)Miranda v. Arizona (1966)
D)Gideon v. Wainwright (1963)

Question 10

In Mapp v. Ohio (1961), the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that

A)illegally seized evidence cannot be used in court, but that ruling has recently been interpreted in more permissive ways.
B)all accused persons have a constitutional right to counsel.
C)the state of Ohio's death penalty statute was unconstitutional.
D)the death penalty did not constitute cruel and unusual punishment.

Question 11

Which of the following factors is not associated with higher police arrest rates and lower crime rates?

A)Attitude of police officers
B)Technology tools of police officers
C)Salaries of police officers
D)Tactical deployment of police officers

Question 12

The legislatures play a major policy role in criminal justice by

A)selecting the states' judges in many states.
B)enacting the criminal sentencing laws.
C)appropriating the funds to run the courts and law enforcement programs.
D)All of these choices.

Question 13

The variables associated with higher arrest rates and perhaps lower crime rates are

A)increased expenditures on personnel and police equipment.
B)aggressive and active police work that involves responsiveness to citizen calls, follow-up investigations, increased patrolling by shifting from two-person patrols to one-person patrols, and community policing.
C)related to the educational levels and pay scales of the police force and the personal qualifications of the police chief or sheriff.
D)related solely to a promising new strategy called community policing.

Question 14

The FBI's annual crime index is derived from

A)victimization surveys.
B)the Uniform Crime Report on both violent and property crime.
C)data provided by the U.S. Bureau of the Census.
D)a summary of state police crime reports.

Question 15

Three classic goals of correctional policy are to

A)punish, gain retribution, and deter crime.
B)rehabilitate; deter; and produce productive, law-abiding citizens.
C)punish, rehabilitate, and physically separate dangerous criminals from society.
D)get criminals off the street, break drug habits, and destroy unhealthy neighborhood associations.

Question 16

While the causes of crime are complex, in general, which of the following would be most likely to commit a crime and serve time by their mid-thirties?

A)Male, unemployed, high school graduate from a low income family background in an urban setting
B)Male, employed, high school dropout from a low income family background in an urban setting
C)Male, unemployed, high school dropout from a low income family background in an urban setting
D)Female, unemployed, high school dropout from a low income family background in an urban setting

Question 17

The law enforcement function in most states is formally headed by

A)county sheriffs.
B)the Governor.
C)the Secretary of State.
D)the State Attorney General.

Question 18

Victimization surveys are

A)scientific polls, which are more accurate than the Uniform Crime Reports because they include crimes that are not reported by victims to authorities.
B)prepared from statistics gathered by the AFT and FBI.
C)scientific polls that gather data only on reported crimes.
D)prepared by the U.S. Bureau of the Census and show that the FBI crime index is quite accurate.

Question 19

With only 5 percent of the earth's population, one out of every _________ American adults is in prison or under adult court supervision.

A)56
B)112
C)31
D)243

Question 20

The contributory causes of white-collar crime are

A)definitively known to be economic deprivation, age, and neighborhood.
B)basically related to age.
C)basically unknown but frequently related to greed.
D)proven to be related to genetic defects.

Question 21

A new prison brings approximately how many jobs for each 1000 inmates?

A)50
B)100
C)300
D)600

Question 22

The Federal Government provides about $1 million to help state and local governments fight crime.

Question 23

Among the back-door strategies used to alleviate prison overcrowding are

A)electronic house arrest and the creation of regional restitution centers.
B)vocational programs to reduce sentences and creative sentencing by judges.
C)early release and electronic house detention.
D)early release and use of boot camps.

Question 24

Privatization of prison systems

A)has been proposed to enhance capacity, but no private firms have been willing to step forward and take on such an immense, complex, and dangerous job.
B)has not yet been tried; no state has yet experimented with privatized prisons.
C)raises a number of constitutional questions about delegation of such authority, and the majority of studies indicate that operating cost savings have been marginal or nonexistent.
D)has been inconclusive because experiments in Pennsylvania, Florida, Louisiana, and Tennessee have found that privatization of correctional facilities actually increases the costs of housing inmates by 37 percent.

Question 25

Crime data collected through the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports and various victimization surveys showed a reduction in crime in the United States during the 1990s. Over the past ten years, both reported and estimated crime rates have steadily declined.

Question 26

A criminal has about a one out of one-hundred chance of getting arrested and punished for a crime.

Question 27

In Escobedo v. Illinois (1964), the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the accused must be informed of the right to remain silent at the time of their arrest.

Question 28

Currently, the national violent crime rate has fallen to its lowest level in decades, and property crime has dropped nearly as dramatically.

Question 29

Two-thirds of the arrests for violent crimes do not result in a conviction or in any sort of punishment for the offender.

Question 30

The chief law enforcement officer in most states is the head of the state police.

Question 31

More police officers on the streets, aggressive community policing programs, and high-tech policing are some of the effective items in the law enforcement toolkit.

Question 32

Instead of incarceration, __________ permits minor offenders to remain in the community under supervision.

A)parole
B)pseudo-incarceration
C)probation
D)vocational programs

Question 33

In Miranda v. Arizona (1966), the U.S. Supreme Court held that accused persons have the right to remain silent and of being informed that anything they say could be used against them.

Question 34

Federal crimes are handled by state and local government authorities, and vice versa.

Question 35

Intensive probation supervision, regional restitution centers, and creative sentencing are all considered __________ to bring and keep inmate populations in line with institutional capacity.

A)back-door strategies
B)front-door strategies
C)capacity enhancement
D)community-based policing

Question 36

High poverty rates, dysfunctional families, free-flowing illegal drug markets, and violent gangs are all factors invariably associated with high crime rates.

Question 37

Research suggests that many crimes are underreported or not reported at all.

Question 38

The vast proportion of dollars spent on law enforcement comes from states and localities.

Question 39

​Municipal and county police and sheriff's departments bear much of the burden of law enforcement.

Question 40

The national government's resources are spent mostly on homeland security and counter-terrorism operations.

Question 41

Three broad policy alternatives or strategies are being followed by states and localities to solve the problems of prison overcrowding. Identify all three of them, discuss the pros and cons associated with one of those alternatives, and identify several options by which that alternative might be carried out.

Question 42

Black men and other minorities are much more frequently apprehended, arrested, and prosecuted than white men. Many African-Americans and Hispanics frequently accuse law enforcement of conducting racial profiling, particularly with traffic enforcement. Yet, law enforcement often claims that selective aggressive enforcement often is successful in curtailing or preventing crime and that it provides local residents with a sense of comfort. How does one balance one's rights with appropriate patrolling and enforcement techniques?

Question 43

Since 1977, when the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment, Missouri has carried out more executions per capita under the state's death penalty laws than any other state.

Question 44

In Mapp v. Ohio (1966), the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that evidence obtained illegally by police could not be used in court; this rule is also known as the exclusionary rule.

Question 45

Cities are increasingly using technology and video surveillance in their law enforcement efforts. Describe some of the new technology that these cities are using. What are the benefits and drawbacks of the use of such technology in the fight against crime?

Question 46

Victimless crimes are illegal acts that, in theory, do no one any harm.

Question 47

Privatization of state and local prisons has been debated for years and implemented in several states with mixed success.

Question 48

In Furman v. Georgia (1972), the U.S. Supreme Court held that the death penalty had been applied in a cruel, arbitrary, and racist manner by the states.

Question 49

America spends more per capita than any other nation on prisons and spends about $29,000 per year per inmate housed in a state or county prison. This is in addition to any special medical costs that must be provided to an inmate. This compares with about $9,000 per year spent per child in the public schools. Is this ratio appropriate? Why or why not?

Question 50

The average daily cost of housing a young, generally healthy prisoner is up to $100.

Question 51

Ten states have death penalty laws in place, although many states have not actually used them in many years.

Question 52

Southern states tend to be toughest on crime; they are more than twice as likely as other states to convict people arrested on felony charges, and their sentences are more severe than those in other regions.

Question 53

Research indicates that treatment is much less effective in reducing the consumption of cocaine than attacking the drug's supply channels.

Question 54

Every time a violent or tragic crime is committed against an innocent person, renewed calls are made that the person who committed that crime should be subject to the death penalty. The text devotes considerable space to the death penalty. Does the death penalty work? How often has it been utilized? How much does it cost a state to prosecute an individual under the death penalty? Would it be cheaper long term to sentence that person to life in prison without parole, to avoid the litigation costs over a death sentence?

Question 55

Research consistently shows that state imprisonment rates are not significantly related to crime rates.