1301 CRIJ Ch 1 & 2 Study Guide

About ________ of criminal defendants plead guilty to the charges against them, in an arrangement called plea bargaining.

95%

Defendants can appeal their convictions on legal grounds. Which of the following is NOT one of the legal grounds described in your textbook?

illegal search and seizure

Like the family, schools, organized religion, the media, and the law, criminal justice is a(n)

institution of social control.

Perhaps the greatest and most important difference between the NIBRS and the UCR is that the NIBRS

contains more data on each crime, making it possible to examine crimes in much more detail.

Any record of crimes—such as offenses known to the police, arrests, convictions, or commitments to prison—can be considered a ________, or an estimate of crimes committed.

crime index

Most legal excuses for criminal responsibility are based on the belief that certain offenders lack the capacity or competence or have diminished capacity or competence to form

mens rea.

Which of the following crimes is NOT a uniform crime reports Part I offense?

motor vehicle theft WRONG aggravated assault WRONG fraud CORRECT arson WRONG

A(n) ________ is an act that is illegal for a juvenile but would not be a crime if committed by an adult, such as truancy or running away from home.

status offense.

Which of the following tests for insanity is the oldest?

the M'Naghten rule

Crimes that are NOT officially recorded by the police are called

the dark figure of crime.

Which of the following tests of insanity did attorneys for Lorena Bobbitt, who sliced off her husband's penis with a kitchen knife while he was sleeping, successfully employ in a 1994 Virginia trial?

the irresistible impulse or control test

For many crime victims, ________ is/are the most burdensome and lasting consequence of their victimization.

fear.

Due process advocates recognize that there can be no equal justice where the kind of trial a person gets, or whether he or she gets a trial at all, depends substantially on

how much money that person has.

Herbert Packer characterizes the due process model as

"obstacle-course justice."

Approximately how many agencies of federal, state, and local governments comprise criminal justice in the United States?

50,000

What are the three types of charging documents described in your text?

a grand jury indictment a complaint an information

Because there is considerable conflict and confusion between different agencies of criminal justice, an accurate way of defining American criminal justice may be to call it

a nonsystem.

The term jurisdiction, as used in your text, means

a politically defined geographical area.

According to your textbook, which of the following defensive measures against crime has been chosen by the largest percentage of Americans?

avoiding going to certain places or neighborhoods that they might otherwise have wanted to go to

What is the meaning of the word "crime"?

accusation or fault ? an offense against the state WRONG harmful behavior WRONG an offense against an individual ?

The term ________ refers to criminal conduct—specifically, intentional or criminally negligent action or inaction that causes harm.

actus reus

The primary purpose of the ________ is to hear the formal information or indictment and to allow the defendant to enter a plea.

arraignment

Cases that are not resolved through plea bargaining or by a jury trial are decided by a judge in a

bench trial.

After an arrest has been made, the suspect is brought to the police station to be

booked.

A suspect becomes a defendant after

charges have been filed.

Which of the following offenses accounted for the largest number of arrests made by the police in 2011?

drug abuse violations

What was the index crime for which women were most frequently arrested in 2011?

larceny theft

On which of the following doctrines is the due process model based?

legal guilt

What is the Latin term for crimes that are "wrong in themselves"—crimes characterized by universality and timelessness?

mala in se

One problem with finding an appropriate definition of crime is that

many dangerous and harmful behaviors are not defined as crimes, while many less dangerous and less harmful behaviors are.

Which of the following are used to increase efficiency—meaning speed and finality—in the crime control model?

plea bargains

The purpose of the ________ is for a judge to determine whether there is probable cause to believe that the defendant committed the crime or crimes with which he or she is charged.

preliminary hearing

Critics of the American media argue that the news media have a dual obligation to

present news that reflects a more balanced picture of the overall crime problem and reduce their presentation of sensational crimes.

A study by the National Institute of Justice determined which crimes have the highest annual victim costs. Which of the following does NOT belong among those crimes?

rape WRONG assault WRONG arson ? murder ?

To date, most self-report crime surveys conducted in the United States have been administered to

school children.

A typical ________ definition of crime is "behavior that violates the norms or mores of society."

social.

The practice of counting only the most serious offense in a multiple-crime event is a feature of

the uniform crime reports (UCR).

Often, an arrest supported by ________ and ________ is sufficient to close a case, especially with a less serious crime.

witness statements; crime scene evidence