Sample essay on introduction to crime and causes

Introduction to Crime and Causes

Introduction to Crime and Causes
An article by Richard Winton on February 28th, 2014 in the Los Angeles Times explains how a jury in a Santa Monica court awarded a woman, who works as a news producer, $5. 42 million. A 43-year-old woman was sexually assaulted in a restroom of a West Hollywood club at night by one of the club workers, Mr. Victor Cruz. The trial took fifteen days, and the findings were that there was negligence by the evening club which became a substantial factor in the sexual assault by Cruz. The club had a stated policy whereby guards were to be present at all times at the bathrooms but on that day they were absent when the attack on the lady took place. The night club also did not take action on the sexual activities that took place in the restroom. A defense that this was not an assault but a consensual act by Cruz and the lady was rejected by the Jurors and that the guards had done their circulation in the restroom (Winton, 2014). The woman had been taken to Santa Monica Center for Rape Treatment where DNA samples were collected from her clothes and body that matched Cruz`s DNA from a former crime he had committed.
Bestowing to this article and its findings, the criminal justice is portrayed to favor the lady. The article lacked any substantial evidence that Cruz was questioned by the police about the incident and that only the DNA evidence was used to convict Mr. Cruz. That proved that an important component in the investigative process for example police questioning was often disregarded despite it being a valid means to establishing guilt (Winton, 2014). The lady was intoxicated and alone and still went to the club and yet no blame was placed on her, but the club and Cruz took it all. The amount of money awarded to her was the largest thus being unfair to the club.
Alternative article by Alejandro Alba on December 2, 2014 in the NEW YORK DAILY NEWS explains how a man was convicted to a jail term of one year over a new state revenge porn statute in California. Noe Iniguez will be the first person to be convicted under the new law after he posted his ex-girlfriend`s nude pictures on the Facebook page of her employer. He posted this photo in December 2013 that contained derogatory words. The law is a valuable tool that helps prosecutors in protecting victims whose reputations and lives were upended by people who were in their lives before and whom they trusted (Alba, 2014).
Other than the one-year jail sentence, Iniguez was also given probation for 36 months, and a must attend domestic violence program in counseling. The city Attorney hoped the public would be warned of such malicious behavior by people will no longer tolerated. The ex-girlfriend had filed restraining order violations, twice against Iniguez earlier. Thus he was guilty of three different criminal counts. The revenge porn law restrains people from posting in the social media photos with the intention of harming others emotionally. Cyber bullying is one of the major crimes in social media, and it has to be dealt with by the criminal justice system. Although the criminal justice system in the state through this law is curbing cyber bullying, in my opinion it restricts rights to free speech in states like Florida. People have the right to speak out what they want and express themselves (Alba, 2014). The criminal justice system is also being biased since some of these laws do not apply evenly across all states.
Psychological theories that explain these two crimes and violent behaviors in the articles could represented in different psychological perspectives. In the first article, the psychodynamic perspective and behavioral theory can explain the crimes. Developed by Freud, the psychodynamic perspective reveals that violent behaviors may be caused by childhood experiences. For instance, neglect, violence and sexual abuse which may end up being a fetish and be expressed in later stages of life.
Conferring to Freud, aggression is a fundamental human impulse represented in people, however if not controlled, it may cause random acts of violence thus Cruz may be affected by these. With respect to behavioral theories, human behavior is learned through interaction with the social environment.
Cruz may have learned this behavior of sexual abuse from his place of work that no action was taken when it happened in the club. For the second article, the cognitive theory explains that people engage in an intricate thought process that ends up in using information incorrectly in decision making thus committing acts like that of cyber bullying. Personality may also explain the crime perpetrated by an individual since traits such as egoism, jealousy and lack of empathy may lead to violent behaviors like the one perpetrated by Iniguez.

References

Alba, Alejandro, (2014). Los Angeles man fight in jail under California’s revenge porn law. Retrieved on 3rd December 2014; from http://www. nydailynews. com/news/crime/la-man-jail-california-revenge-porn-law-article-1. 2030524
Winton, Richard, (2014). Woman Awarded $5. 42 million in rape at W. Hollywood club. Retrieved on 3rd December 2014; from http://articles. latimes. com/2014/feb/28/local/la-me-sex-assault-award-20140301