UNDERSTANDING THE INFLUENCE OF VICTIM GENDER IN DEATH PENALTY CASES: THE IMPORTANCE OF VICTIM RACE,SEX‐RELATED VICTIMIZATION,AND JURY DECISION MAKING*

Using data from the Baldus, Woodworth, and Pulaski (1990) study of Georgia's death penalty system, we examine the influence of victim gender in death penalty cases. Furthermore, to improve our understanding of the meaning of victim gender, we consider 1) the joint effects of victim gender and victim race, 2) victimization characteristics that might explain victim gender effects, and 3) the impact of victim gender at different decision‐making stages in the death penalty case process. We find that both victim gender and race are associated with death sentencing outcomes and that an examination of the joint effects of victim gender and race reveals considerable differences in the likelihood of receiving a death sentence between the most disparate victim race–gender groups. In particular, it seems that black male victim cases are set apart from all others in terms of leniency afforded to defendants. We also show that the effect of victim gender is explained largely by gender differences in the sexual nature of some homicides. An examination of prosecutorial and jury decision making reveals that although victim gender has little impact on prosecutorial decisions, it has a meaningful impact on jury decisions.     

DETERRENCE, BRUTALIZATION, AND THE DEATH PENALTY: ANOTHER EXAMINATION OF OKLAHOMA'S RETURN TO CAPITAL PUNISHMENT

A replication and extension of a weekly ARZMA analysis (1989–1991) by Cochran et al. (1994), which appeared in Criminology, confirms that Oklahoma's return to capital punishment in 1990, after a 25-year moratorium, was followed by a significant increase in killings involving strangers. Moreover, a multivariate autoregressive analysis, which includes measures of the frequency of executions, the level of print media attention devoted to executions, and selected sociodemographic variables, produced results consistent with the brutalization hypothesis for total homicides, as well as a variety of different types of killing involving both strangers and nonstrangers. No prior study has shown such strong support for the capital punishment and brutalization argument. However, there is also a suggestion of a possible lagged deterrent effect for the level of media coverage of executions for nonfelony murders involving strangers. The analysis indicates that the impact of capital punishment in Oklahoma during the 1989–1991 period was much more extensive than suggested by the earlier study. Recommendations are made for further research examining additional jurisdictions and time periods to determine the generalizability of the patterns found for Oklahoma.     

SELF-ESTEEM AND DEVIANCE: THE EFFECTS OF RACE AND GENDER*

Provision of occupational and educational opportunities has been the accepted means of reintegrating offenders into society because, with assumption of conventional roles, they are believed to experience improved economic conditions and renewed feelings of respectability. However, given the limited legal options available to them, offender self-esteem may continue to depend on immersion in deviant subcultures. To examine the effects of subcultural and conventional life-styles on offender self-esteem, a sample of 372 heroin addicts in treatment was surveyed. Employment had a positive effect on the self-esteem of white male addicts only; the self-evaluations of black male, black female, and white female addicts were unaffected by employment because these users were subjected to less stable working conditions. Subcultural integration had no impact or negative impact on the self-esteem of black male, black female, and white female addicts while subcultural involvement was associated with higher self-esteem in white males. The fact that white male addicts experienced favorable self-evaluations with involvement in both conventional and deviant life-styles is inconsistent with research which suggests an antagonism between crime and work: rather, these data seem to indicate that the join pursuit of legal and illegal professions may be more common.     

POPULATION DIVERSITY AND CROSS-NATIONAL HOMICIDE: THE EFFECTS OF INEQUALITY AND HETEROGENEITY*

This study examines the impact of income inequality and ethnic heterogeneity on homicide rates for a sample of 32 nations. The results of the analyses indicate that vertical social direrentiation, as measured by income inequality, and horizontal differentiation, as indexed by ethnic heterogeneity, have signijicant main effects on cross-national homicide. Additionally, evidence is presented suggesting an interaction effect on inequaliry and heterogeneity on homicide. It appears that increased ethnic heterogeneity exacerbates the impact of income inequality on homicide rates.     

STRUCTURAL FACTORS AND BLACK INTERRACIAL HOMICIDE: A NEW EXAMINATION OF THE CAUSAL PROCESS*

This study evaluates the assumption that deprivation among African Americans and racial inequality lead to black interracial homicide due to racial conflict and antagonism. Using refined race‐adjusted Supplemental Homicide Report data, Uniform Crime Report data and census data, we test an alternative hypothesis that draws on the macrostructural opportunity theory to assess and more accurately specify the relationship between structural characteristics and black interracial homicide. We find that first, the relationship between economic factors and black interracial homicide can be explained in large part by high rates of financially motivated crime such as robbery, and second, that economic factors are associated with financially motivated but not expressive black interracial killings. Analyses of black intraracial killings are performed for comparison purposes. Collectively, the findings suggest that conflict‐based explanations rooted in racial antagonism and frustration aggression may be premature.     

RACE,ETHNICITY, THREAT AND THE LABELING OF CONVICTED FELONS*

Florida law allows judges to withhold adjudication of guilt for persons who have either pled guilty or been found guilty of a felony. This provision may apply only to persons who will be sentenced to probation, and it allows such individuals to retain all civil rights and to truthfully assert they had not been convicted of a felony. This paper examines the effects of race and Hispanic ethnicity on the withholding of adjudication for 91,477 males sentenced to probation in Florida between 1999 and 2002. Hierarchical Generalized Linear Modeling is used to assess the direct effects of defendant attributes as well as the cross‐level interactions between race, ethnicity and community level indicators of threat, such as percentage black and Hispanic and concentrated disadvantage. Our results show that Hispanics and blacks are significantly less likely to have adjudication withheld when other individual and community level factors are controlled. This effect is especially pronounced for blacks and for drug offenders. Cross‐level interactions show that concentrated disadvantage has a substantial effect on the adjudication withheld outcome for both black and Hispanic defendants. The implications of these results for the conceptualization of racial/ethnic threat at the individual, situational and social levels are discussed.     

HOMICIDE,STRUCTURAL FACTORS,AND THE RACIAL INVARIANCE ASSUMPTION*

Structural theories in criminology generally assume that the effects of structural conditions on homicide are the same for all race-groups. However, previous homicide research testing this assumption contains methodological shortcomings and has produced inconsistent findings. Therefore, the validity of the “racial invariance assumption” remains highly questionable. Using 1990 data for 125 U.S. cities, this study addresses some of the limitations of previous research in an effort to provide a more definitive examination of race differences in the effects of important structural factors on homicide rates. Contrary to the expectations of the structural perspective, the results from this study reveal substantial and statistically significant race differences. Specifically, the associations between homicide and several measures of socio-economic deprivation (e.g., poverty, unemployment, income inequality, female-headed households, deprivation index) are found to be stronger among whites than blacks. A primary implication of these results is that the current versions of many structural theories need revision in order to account for observed race differences in the effects of structural factors and to explain fully the black-white gap in homicide rates.     

HOMICIDE AGAINST THE ELDERLY: A RESEARCH NOTE*

By virtue of the type of data generally used (victim surveys), previous research on the victimization of the elderly is limited in two respects. Not only is the crime of homicide outside the domain of victimization data, but sample surveys uncover too few incidents of victimization of the elderly to permit in-depth analyses. Using the supplementary homicide reports from 1976–1985, we compared patterns and rates of homicide among the elderly and younger populations. Our results suggest that the elderly are in fact the least at risk for homicide generally, as has been reported for other crimes. When examining specific subtypes of homicide, however, the elderly are actually at greater risk than their younger counterparts for homicide committed during a robbery.     

THE DETERRENT EFFECT OF PERCEIVED CERTAINTY AND SEVERITY OF PUNISHMENT REVISITED*

This paper synthesizes and extends recent criticisms of cross-sectional and panel studies of perceptual deterrence and then uses those criticisms to design a better cross-sectional study. A series of scenarios involving the noncompliance of a hypothetical plumber were posed to a sample of predominantly middle-aged administrators. The respondents were asked to estimate the probability that the noncompliance would be detected and, if detected, the probability that it would result in criminal prosecution. Respondents were also asked to project their own behavior if in the plumber's position. The results contrast sharply with prior findings, especially of the panel studies. Not only do perceptions of detection risk play an important role in deterring tax noncompliance, but fear of criminal prosecution appears to be a powerful deterrent.     

INTEGRATING RACE,PLACE AND MOTIVE IN SOCIAL DISORGANIZATION THEORY: LESSONS FROM A COMPARISON OF BLACK AND LATINO HOMICIDE TYPES IN TWO IMMIGRANT DESTINATION CITIES*

In this paper, we examine and compare the impact of social disorganization, including recent immigration, and other predictors on community counts of black and Latino motive‐specific homicides in Miami and San Diego. Homicides for 1985 to 1995 are disaggregated into escalation, intimate, robbery and drug‐related motives. Negative binomial regression models with corrections for spatial autocorrelation demonstrate that there are similarities and differences in effects of social disorganization and other predictors by motive‐specific outcomes, as well as for outcomes across ethnic groups within cities and within ethnic groups across cities. Recent immigration is negatively or not associated with most outcomes. Overall, the study shows the importance of disaggregating homicide data by race/ethnicity and motive and demonstrates that predictions based on existing theories are qualified on local conditions.     

THE ROLE OF RACE AND ETHNICITY IN PAROLE DECISIONS*

The parole board plays an integral part in the reentry of offenders into the community from prison in most states; yet, little is known about the decision‐making practices of this group. In particular, few studies have used quantitative data to examine parole among a large group of offenders, and less is known about the direct and joint effects of race and ethnicity on this decision point. We extend previous work by considering variation in parole timing among a sample of young, serious offenders incarcerated in one state. Results from a series of proportional hazard models reveal substantial variation in parole timing. Consistent with the existing theoretical research on parole, parole actors are most concerned with community protection and heavily weigh measures of the current offense, institutional behavior, and the official parole guidelines score. The direct effects of race and ethnicity were also revealed. Black offenders spent a longer time in prison awaiting parole compared with white offenders, and the racial and ethnic differences are maintained net of legal and individual demographic and community characteristics. These findings provide important insight into the parole process and augment the existing theoretical work on disparities in decision making.     

GANG HOMICIDE,DELINQUENCY, AND COMMUNITY*

Analysis of community-level data on community areas in Chicago substantiates two conceptual differences: the first. between gang crime and delinquency as community-level phenomena; and the second, between theoretical associations of each of the former to community-area patterns of social disorganization and poverty. One pattern is more common in Chicago's Hispanic communities; the other, in Chicago's black communities. Five measures of the quality of community life used are gang homicide rate, delinquency rate, unemployment rate, percentage living below the poverty level, and mortgage investment per dwelling. Identifying communities as white, black, Hispanic, or mixed and applying discriminant analysis reveal the racial-ethnic communities as distinct social worlds. Regression analyses of gang homicide and delinquency rates show that the two measures display very different patterns of association with other community characteristics. An analysis of the residual change score for gang homicide rate over two time periods indicates the relative stability of community patterns with poverty measures explaining much of the change in patterns. It is concluded that gang homicide rates and delinquency rates are ecologically distinct community problems. The distribution of gang homicide rates conforms to classic theories of social disorganization and poverty, and the distribution of delinquency rates is more generally associated with poverty.     

DISENTANGLING THE EFFECTS OF GENDER AND INTIMACY ON VICTIM PRECIPITATION IN HOMICIDE*

Research indicates that incidents in which women kill their husbands are more likely to involve victim precipitation than incidents in which men kill their wives. Formulating a causal interpretation of this finding, however, is complicated because the observed pattern may reflect gender differences in violence rather than any special dynamics between husbands and wives. In this research, we introduce and illustrate a framework for disentangling the effects of intimacy and gender on violence. We examine the additive and multiplicative effects of the gender of the offender, the gender of the victim, and the relationship between the offender and victim on victim precipitation. For the most part, the pattern of victim precipitation in homicide reflects the fact that males tend to be more violent than females. However, we find some evidence of special dynamics for intimate partner homicides: Men who are killed by their partners tend to have more violent records than men who are killed in other circumstances.     

RACE,CODE OF THE STREET,AND VIOLENT DELINQUENCY: A MULTILEVEL INVESTIGATION OF NEIGHBORHOOD STREET CULTURE AND INDIVIDUAL NORMS OF VIOLENCE*

The study outlined in this article drew on Elijah Anderson's (1999) code of the street perspective to examine the impact of neighborhood street culture on violent delinquency. Using data from more than 700 African American adolescents, we examined 1) whether neighborhood street culture predicts adolescent violence above and beyond an adolescent's own street code values and 2) whether neighborhood street culture moderates individual-level street code values on adolescent violence. Consistent with Anderson's hypotheses, neighborhood street culture significantly predicts violent delinquency independent of individual-level street code effects. Additionally, neighborhood street culture moderates individual-level street code values on violence in neighborhoods where the street culture is widespread. In particular, the effect of street code values on violence is enhanced in neighborhoods where the street culture is endorsed widely.     

THE JUVENILE PENALTY: A COMPARISON OF JUVENILE AND YOUNG ADULT SENTENCING OUTCOMES IN CRIMINAL COURT*

This study uses criminal court data from the Pennsylvania Commission on Sentencing (PCS) to investigate the sentencing of juvenile offenders processed in adult criminal court by comparing their sentencing outcomes to those of young adult offenders in similar situations. Because the expanded juvenile exclusion and transfer policies of the 1990s have led to an increase in the number of juveniles convicted in adult courts, we argue that it is critical to better understand the judicial decision making processes involved. We introduce competitive hypotheses on the relative leniency or severity of sentencing outcomes for transferred juveniles and interpret our results with the focal concerns theoretical perspective on sentencing. Our findings indicate that juvenile offenders in adult court are sentenced more severely than their young adult counterparts. Moreover, findings suggest that juvenile status interacts with and conditions the effects of other important sentencing factors including offense type, offense severity and prior criminal record. We discuss these results as they relate to immediate outcomes for transferred juveniles, criminal court processes in general and the broader social implications for juvenile justice policy concerning the transfer of juveniles to criminal court.     

A METHODOLOGICAL ADDITION TO THE CROSS‐NATIONAL EMPIRICAL LITERATURE ON SOCIAL STRUCTURE AND HOMICIDE: A FIRST TEST OF THE POVERTY‐HOMICIDE THESIS*

Dozens of cross‐national studies of homicide have been published in the last three decades. Although nearly all these studies test for an association between inequality and homicide, no studies test for a poverty—homicide association. This absence is disconcerting given that poverty is one of the most consistent predictors of area homicide rates in the abundant empirical literature on social structure and homicide in the United States. Using a sample that coincides closely with similar recent studies, applying a proxy for poverty (infant mortality) that is commonly employed in noncriminological cross‐national research, and controlling for several common covariates (including inequality), this study provides the first test of the poverty—homicide hypothesis at the cross‐national level. The results reveal a positive and significant association between a nation's level of poverty and its homicide rate. The findings also suggest that we may need to reassess the strong conclusions about an inequality—homicide association drawn from prior studies, as this relationship disappears when poverty is included in the model.     

THE STRUCTURAL COVARIATES OF URBAN HOMICIDE: REASSESSING THE IMPACT OF INCOME INEQUALITY AND POVERTY IN THE POST-REAGAN ERA*

Numerous studies have explored the relationship between rates of homicide and income inequality and poverty. However, a general consensus on the theoretical and empirical connections among these variables has yet to be reached. This article reports the findings of a city-level analysis of this relationship, using 1990 data for the 190 largest cities in the United States. In order to address several methodological and theoretical concerns in prior literature, three separate measures of inequality and three categories of disaggregated homicide rates are analyzed. The results suggest that both inequality and poverty have significant and independent positive effects on rates of homicide in U.S. cities following the largest increase in the economic gap between rich and poor in our nation's history.     

INTIMACY AND HOMICIDE: COMPENSATING FOR MISSING DATA IN THE SHR*

The Supplementary Homicide Report (SHR) of the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting Program remains the most accessible and widely used database on lethal violence in the United States. However, researchers using this database must address the problem of missing data, which typically is the result of the failure to file, inconsistent filing of reports to the FBI by local police agencies, or incomplete records about the characteristics of specific incidents of homicide (particularly, missing information about perpetrators), even when reports are filed. Williams and Flewelling (1987) proposed methods of compensating for missing information, and this paper revisits their assessment by again determining the extent of the problem and the consequences of adjusting for it. Alternative methods are proposed and analyzed, with a focus on relationship‐specific rates (i.e., rates of family, intimate nonfamily, acquaintance, and stranger homicide). The implications of the results for further use of the SHR are discussed.