Essay on Intersectionality in the Criminal Justice System Example For Students

Essay on Intersectionality in the Criminal Justice System The criminal justice system is dynamic and has changed rapidly since the works of Cesare Beccaria and Cesare Lombroso during Enlightenment Period and this reflects in the issue of intersectionality with the changing approaches taken towards concepts of gender, race and class. Sexual assault will be a predominate study used throughout the essay to examine the different approaches and issues between traditional and non-traditional justices. This essay will first establish where are these intersectionalities found in terms of sexual assault cases and the challenges victims face in the legal process with traditional approaches then followed by a comparison to the transition towards non-traditional alternative justice system has responded with a deeper insight into restorative justices and its effects on resolving these challenges. The role of alternative justice and the key challenges in disproportionate crimes are also important aspects of intersectionality in Australia as they aim to r esolve challenges women and the mentally disabled encounter during processing through court in the criminal justice system. Gender is predominating in the criminal justice system and sexual assault exemplifies the contrast found between the traditional and non-traditional justice systems employed over time. Sexual assault poses a social threat to all aspects of community, spreading insecurity in 43400 victims across Australia and 13300 victims in NSW alone as indicated in the recent Australian Bureau of Statistics Crime Victimisation Report. (ABS 2011, p. 40) There has also been an increase of sexual assault by 51% since 1995 with an average of 4% every year. (ABS 2010) Another major issue within the boundaries of sexual assault is that it holds one of the lowest prosecution rates with only 1 in 10 incidents able to prosecute the offender as guilty. (Fitzgerald 2006, Pg. 1) Sexual assault perpetrators adhere to this as they act towards their victims, women in particular to gain a sense of control especially from low socio-economic backgrounds compared to the middle and upper class. (Fitzgerald 2006) The a bundance of statistics and reports conducted all imply that sexual assault is still a predominate issue with disproportionation of not only in gender of the victim but also in age and social class within the criminal justice system. Beyond the victimisation of women in the criminal justice system there is an abundance of research indicating that intersectionality is evident in policing and judicial roles. With 63.1% of female officers compared to the 14.2% of male officers reporting to have been exposed to sexual violence during service. (Prenzler, 1995) The US has a long track record of male dominating roles in the judicial system since there has been only 4 female compared to 108 male Associate Justices in the Supreme Court and half of them were only recently introduced under the Obama administration. The policing and judicial roles in the criminal justice system are imbalanced in gender with high social backgrounds that does not reflect the demographics of sexual assault victims thus the intersectionality is widened with the contrast in understanding. As seen with the issue of intersectionality in sexual assault cases, age is just as vital as gender in the criminal justice system. The victimisation rate of all sexually assaulted victims between ages 10 to 14 being 4 times greater than all the other age groups. (ABS 2010) These children similarly to women have several reasons for not approaching or not being approached by the criminal justice system. The fear of their identity becoming exposed to public knowledge, personal shame and embarrassment and reprisal from the offender especially in rural or isolated regions, victims prefer to disclose sexual assault incidents. (Borzycki 2007) With this it is estimated that only 30% of all sexual assault incidents are reported to police and only 20% of those reported incidents are investigated and undergo criminal proceedings. (AIC 2007) In response to the injustice of sexual assault, the traditional approaches of the criminal justice system has performed minimal or negative impact in reducing this intersectionality. Labelling the offender through their gender during proceeding in the courtroom to the public and on the media would affect their behaviour and this reflected in sexual assault cases. Deviants who were previous offenders and become labelled by society as ‘rapists’ risk sexual assault in correctional facilities, loss of their housing, occupation and thus encourage deviancy amplification and recidivism in the process of identity transformation. (Lemert 2000) Sexual offenses including sexual assault are the second mostly predominant serious offence committed by men and this gender inequality affects the attitudes of the criminal justice system on victims and offenders. This sense of stereotypical gender labelling creates schemas and promotes power motives for sexual aggression in men (Meyer 2000 ). This stigmatisation of gender which poses aggressive behaviour towards women is indicated through strategies employed to maintain this control by the offender include the isolation of the victim, humiliation and manipulation of the victim or her environment. (Clark Quadara 2010) The labelling of gender roles and criminalising offenders publically does not reduce the occurrence of sexual assault and instead provokes its recidivism and creating this ‘revolving door’ in the criminal justice system to past offenders. Depression And Mental Illness (Crime) EssayOne of the biggest flaws in the criminal justice system in tackling intersectionality is seen in the series of cases of sexual assault. Victims influenced by their gender or mental health are greatly undermined with traditional approaches taken. Non-traditional and alternative justice systems have provided some more benefits in aiding victims with increase in awareness and prevention efforts but the issue is still widely evident today and will continue to shadow the criminal justice system. There has been a movement to simply treating victims as property during the Medieval Period, origins of feminism in movements of the 1970’s, the institution of legislations to increase accountability including the ‘Violence Against Women Act’ in the United States and the ‘Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women’ on an international level to the current focus of criminology in crime prevention. There have been radical changes since the 1940’s victims’ movement that instigated alternative justice which has resolve some but not all of the challenges due to intersectionality faced by women and the mental disabled in the criminal justice system. Bibliography †¢ Australian Bureau of Statistics. 2008. Recorded Crime Victims, Australia. Cat. No. 4510.0. †¢ Australian Bureau of Statistics. 2009. Recorded Crime, Victims 2009, Cat. No. 4500.0. †¢ Australian Bureau of Statistics. 2011. Crime Victimisation, Australia. Cat. No. 4530.0. †¢ Austlii. 2001. New South Wales Law Reform Commission Report 80. Available at: http://www.ipc.nsw.gov.au/lrc.nsf/pages/R80APPENDIXB . †¢ Australian Institute of Criminology. 2004. Strong link revealed between drink spiking and sexual assault, . http://www.aic.gov.au/media/2004/november/20041112.aspx. . †¢ Australian Institute of Criminology. 2007. â€Å"Guilty outcomes in reported sexual assault and related offence incidents†, Crime Facts Info, no. 162. †¢ Australian Institute of Criminology. 2010. Trend in sexual assault, . http://www.aic.gov.au/statistics/violent%20crime/sexual%20assault.aspx. . †¢ White, R. Cunneen, C. 2002. Social Class, Youth Crime and Justice. SAGE Publications, London. †¢ Borzycki, M. 2007. â€Å"Pilot study on sexual assault and related offences in the ACT: stage 3†, Research and Public Policy Series, No. 79, Australian Institute of Criminology. †¢ Clark, H Quadara A. 2010. Insights into sexual assault perpetration: Giving voice to victim/survivors’ knowledge, Australian Institute of Family Studies. †¢ Fitzgerald, J. 2006. The attrition of sexual offences from the New South Wales criminal justice system. Contemporary Issues in Crime and Justice, 92, 1-12. †¢ Lemert, E, Lemert, C, Winter, M. 2000. Crime and Deviance, Rowman Littlefield, Lanham. †¢ Lievore, D .2004. Recidivism of Sexual Assault Offenders: Rates, Risk Factors and Treatment Efficacy, Australian Institute of Criminology. †¢ Lievore, D .2004. ‘Victim credibility in adult sexual assault cases’, Trends and issues in crime and criminal justice, no. 288. Australian Institute of Criminology. †¢ Meyer, J 2000, Brief Summary of the Root Causes of Sexual Assault. Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault, . Available at: http://www.ccasa.org/documents/Root_Causes_Short_Descriptions.pdf, . †¢ Prenzler, T. 1995. Equal employment opportunity and policewomen in Australia. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 28/3, 258-77. †¢ Strang, H. 2002. Repair or Revenge: Victims and Restorative Justice. Clarendon Press, Oxford. †¢ Taylor, N. 2007. ‘Juror attitudes and biases in sexual assault cases’, Trends and issues in crime and criminal justice, no. 344. Australian Institute of Criminology. †¢ Taylor, N Joudo, J. 2005. â€Å"The impact of pre-recorded video and closed circuit television testimony by adult sexual assault complainants on jury decision-making: an experimental study†, Research and Public Policy Series, No. 68, Australian Institute of Criminology.