Fire and suicide: a three-year study of self-immolation deaths.

Thirty-two self-immolation deaths by fire, representing about 1% of suicides, occurred in the province of Ontario (population 9 million), Canada, from 1986 through 1988. The victims, mostly male (male/female ratio, 26:6), were between 21 and 71 years old (mean age, 38 years). Although the scene of self-immolation was usually familiar to the deceased, some chose remote locations. Eleven were found dead in motor vehicles. An accelerant, usually gasoline, was used in most cases. Many of these individuals had, at some time, indicated their intent to commit suicide, a few by self-immolation, but only about half had a diagnosed psychiatric illness. Most of the victims had a reason to kill themselves, but the factors that motivated them to chose self-immolation by fire were uncertain. Fourteen individuals died in hospitals from severe burn complications. The remainder were found dead at the scene. The postmortem findings of soot in the airway and elevated carbon monoxide in the blood of most of these victims [the carboxyhemoglobin (COHb) concentration was in one case less than 10%, in ten cases greater than or equal to 10 to 50%, and in seven cases greater than 50%] were helpful in determining that the individuals were not only alive at the time of the fire but also that a significant number died from smoke inhalation and carbon monoxide poisoning. The highest levels of carbon monoxide were observed in victims discovered in motor vehicles.     

The Prevalence of Mental Illness Among Inmates in a Rural State

A limited number of recent empirical studies suggest that inmates suffer from high rates of serious mental illness. Different explanations are offered depending on the type of institution: jail or prison. The literature is based largely on urban samples and does not offer comparisons of rates across types of institution within a single study. The present study examined a random sample of 213 jail and prison inmates in a rural state using the Diagnostic Interview Schedule (III-R). Among jail inmates there was little evidence of high rates of serious mental illness, suggesting the criminalization of mental illness may not be as evident in rural settings as urban areas. Among prison inmates, however, high rates of mental disorders were found, supporting previous findings in urban and rural jurisdictions. Implications of the findings are discussed in the context of a consolidated correctional system.     

SOME NEW EVIDENCE ON THE SERIOUSNESS OF CRIME*

Previous studies of the seriousness of crime have attempted to elicit information from public surveys. This paper reports on an alternative method of ranking the severity of crime. Actual victim injury rates are combined with jury awards in personal injury accident cases to estimate pain, suffering, and fear. Crime-related death rates are combined with estimates of the value of life to arrive at monetary values for the risk of death. These estimates are combined with out-of-pocket costs (such as medical costs and lost wages) to arrive at total dollar estimates of the cost of individual crimes to victims. These dollar estimates are then used to rank the seriousness of crimes. Although these two approaches yield surprisingly similar rankings, the monetary estimates indicate that violent crimes are relatively more costly to victims than survey results might imply.     

Prosecutorial discretion to defer criminalization: The effects of defendant's ascribed and achieved status characteristics

This research contributes to a further understanding of prosecutorial discretion by exploring tenets of casual attribution theory and etiology of bias theory as each informs an uncertainty avoidance perspective on the prosecutor's decision to divert felony drug defendants from criminal prosecution and into a treatment program. The sociolegal consequences of the exercise of this early screening decision are expressed by both conflict theorists and labeling theorists. Our analysis involves estimating main effects and interaction effects of defendant ascribed status and achieved status on the likelihood of diversion. The findings indicate partial support for hypotheses derived, from the theoretical perspectives pursued. In addition these findings point to a more complex model of the subjective nature of the exercise of prosecutorial discretion, a model that benefits from understanding the salience of minimizing uncertainty in the decision to criminals.     

POVERTY, URBANIZATION, AND CRIME

In an effort to evaluate the situational determinants of crime, principal components analysis was used to reduce 59 demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of 840 American cities to six independent factors: affluence, stage in life cycle, economic specialization, expenditures policy, poverty, and urbanization. When regressed upon crime rates two of these six factors, urbanization and poverty, were found to be the more important criminogenic forces. The exception to this generalization was the South, where stage in life cycle was more important than poverty in explaining crime. One reason for this exception may be that the South, though having a lower standard of living than other regions of the country, does not have the “culture of poverty” usually associated with lower income. Contrary to the assumption upon which most ecology of crime studies are based, larger cities (over 100,000 in population) are not representative of all cities. Greater association between socioeconomic variables and crime was found in larger than in smaller cities.