Youth Crime
- Submitted by: gurpsamra
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- Category: Politics: Crime and Drugs
- Date Submitted: 10/20/2010 07:36 PM
- Pages: 3
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1. Sprott, Jane B. (1996). “Understanding public views of youth crime and the youth justice system”. Canadian Journal of Criminology 38: 271-290.
2. In the need to promote the newspapers, the media provides the public with an incomplete knowledge about the youth crime and the Young Offenders Act (YOA). A news reporter chooses, shapes, and then defines the real story.
3. The news media forms public’s perceptive on the world and the features of the society; however the image that media constructs is not always the reality. When selling is an asset, journalists transform reality and tell stories rather than conveying the truth or assembling the stories. The interpreted news is misleading but “newsworthy” and the focus concludes which facts are mentioned and how they are portrayed to the public. The media undergoes certain processes before publishing a crime related report. Firstly, the media selects the story which will be reported; mostly the crimes represented are serious violent crimes. As a result, the public misjudges the crime rate in the society. Secondly, the crime reports published by the media might eliminate significant information such as the charge, the disposition, or the characteristics of the offender; which the public might use to assess a disposition. The Young Offenders Service by Bala and Lillies (1994) presents summaries of cases that mainly refer to factors used by the youth justice system when deciding dispositions. A survey questionnaire was developed in order to help examine the public views and attitudes on the youth crime and the youth justice system. The respondents that thought the sentences were too lenient do not support custodial sentences for the minor offences. Those who believed the youth sentences were too lenient also believed that adult sentences were too lenient, they overestimated the increase in violent adult crime, and believed that violence has increased in the past 5 years. 88% of the respondents believed that the YOA...
2. In the need to promote the newspapers, the media provides the public with an incomplete knowledge about the youth crime and the Young Offenders Act (YOA). A news reporter chooses, shapes, and then defines the real story.
3. The news media forms public’s perceptive on the world and the features of the society; however the image that media constructs is not always the reality. When selling is an asset, journalists transform reality and tell stories rather than conveying the truth or assembling the stories. The interpreted news is misleading but “newsworthy” and the focus concludes which facts are mentioned and how they are portrayed to the public. The media undergoes certain processes before publishing a crime related report. Firstly, the media selects the story which will be reported; mostly the crimes represented are serious violent crimes. As a result, the public misjudges the crime rate in the society. Secondly, the crime reports published by the media might eliminate significant information such as the charge, the disposition, or the characteristics of the offender; which the public might use to assess a disposition. The Young Offenders Service by Bala and Lillies (1994) presents summaries of cases that mainly refer to factors used by the youth justice system when deciding dispositions. A survey questionnaire was developed in order to help examine the public views and attitudes on the youth crime and the youth justice system. The respondents that thought the sentences were too lenient do not support custodial sentences for the minor offences. Those who believed the youth sentences were too lenient also believed that adult sentences were too lenient, they overestimated the increase in violent adult crime, and believed that violence has increased in the past 5 years. 88% of the respondents believed that the YOA...