Criminology & Criminal Justice Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2758
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Item Judges and the Compan(ies) they Keep: An Analysis of Judicial Campaign Contributions Situated within an Original Problem-Solving Framework(2019) Foriest, Whytnee; McIntosh, Wayne; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation addresses the problem of citizens’ dissatisfaction with a sitting judge, stemming from the #FreeMeekMill controversy. It introduces an original analytical problem-solving model, Transformative Framework to solve this problem and proposes that citizens form a political action committee (PAC) to remove the judge at the center of this controversy. In addition to its problem-solving focus, this project informs the judicial campaign contribution literature by examining whether trial courts are susceptible to the “new style” judicial elections, characterized by high levels of spending from special interests. It is the first statewide, judge-level analysis of interest group participation in trial judge elections. Judicial campaign contributions are discussed so that residents, who are encouraged here to form their own interest group, are made aware of the current judicial fundraising landscape before launching their own fundraising efforts. Results demonstrate that interest groups are not major contributors to trial judges’ campaigns and that the “new style” of campaigning has yet to reach local judicial elections. This suggests that if residents were to mobilize effectively, it should not be as expensive to unseat a Pennsylvania trial judge as it would be to unseat a state supreme court judge. It also suggests that interest groups are not as influential in local court elections so grassroots fundraising may suffice to unseat an unpopular judge. Future research will examine the effectiveness of Transformative Framework as a problem-solving model in real-life settings and the role of trial judges’ campaign contributions on decision-making.Item The Moderating Role of Negative Emotionality, Positive Emotionality, and Low Constraint on the Relationship between Strain and Criminal Behavior(2013) Foriest, Whytnee; Gottfredson, Denise C; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)General strain theory (GST) posits that strain causes crime (Agnew et al., 1992). Individuals who fail to achieve positively valued goals, lose positively valued stimuli, or are presented with negative stimuli are more likely to engage in criminal behavior. GST, however, acknowledges that individuals vary in their responses to strain and not all strained individuals turn to crime. Agnew et al. (2002) proposed a number of factors that may increase the likelihood of a criminogenic response to strain. Of these, he considers personality traits to be among the most important (Agnew, 2006). This study examines the moderating role of negative emotionality, low constraint, and positive emotionality on the relationship between strain and criminal behavior. Findings reveal a direct, positive association between strain and crime, but there was no support for the conditioning hypotheses proposed in this study.