Search results

1 – 10 of over 7000
Book part
Publication date: 6 September 2018

Melissa J. Tetzlaff-Bemiller

Purpose – This chapter aims to present an overview of what constitutes child murder, including definitions, history, prevalence, risk factors, offender motivations, and…

Abstract

Purpose – This chapter aims to present an overview of what constitutes child murder, including definitions, history, prevalence, risk factors, offender motivations, and theoretical understanding.

Design/methodology/approach – The author uses secondary data from the National Incident-Based Reporting System, Uniformed Crime Reports, and Vital Statistics to show comparisons with previously conducted research. This allows for an overview of child murder.

Findings – There are numerous inconsistencies due to methodological issues. It is hard to find studies where a large sample was used. Definitions of child vary between studies, as does the age categories used. In addition, child homicide is predicted to be grossly underrepresented due to lack of communication between agencies, lack of formalized training, lack of a formalized classification system, and lack of reporting.

Originality/value – Research on child homicide can be instrumental in many areas including policy creation, implementation, and evaluation. It can serve as a benefit for those attempting to provide preventative measures. It may also help law enforcement with investigation. It is only through continued analysis of these types of cases and vigilant research, policy, and practice that society can more effectively protect young children from exposure to potentially murderous outcomes.

Details

Homicide and Violent Crime
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78714-876-5

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 5 January 2018

Matthew C. Podlogar, Anna R. Gai, Matthew Schneider, Christopher R. Hagan and Thomas E. Joiner

The phenomenon of murder-suicide (aka. homicide-suicide) makes a sizeable impact on current public perceptions and policies regarding mental illness and risk for violence…

Abstract

Purpose

The phenomenon of murder-suicide (aka. homicide-suicide) makes a sizeable impact on current public perceptions and policies regarding mental illness and risk for violence. However, within the past 25 years, our understanding of murder-suicide has remained relatively stable, and so has our relative inability to reliably predict and prevent it. The purpose of this paper is to propose pathways for furthering a cogent understanding of murder-suicide that may inform specific predictive and preventative practices.

Design/methodology/approach

Research literature regarding empirical and theoretical positions in the fields of murder-suicide, homicide, and suicide are reviewed and discussed.

Findings

While murder-suicide has many similarities to both homicide and suicide, no current theories of either alone have been successful in fully incorporating the phenomenon of murder-suicide. Theories specific to murder-suicide as a unique form of violence are in need of further research.

Originality/value

Developing and empirically testing theories of murder-suicide may lead to a vast and needed improvement of our understanding, prediction, and prevention of these tragedies.

Details

Journal of Aggression, Conflict and Peace Research, vol. 10 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1759-6599

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 13 July 2015

Christopher Ryan Hagan, Matthew C Podlogar and Thomas E Joiner

The purpose of this paper is to review the existing literature on mass murder and amok, and the relationship of these phenomena to murder-suicide as well as to determine future…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to review the existing literature on mass murder and amok, and the relationship of these phenomena to murder-suicide as well as to determine future research directions.

Design/methodology/approach

Research literature on mass murder, amok, and murder-suicide was reviewed in the context of recent developments in the understanding of suicide, aggressive behavior, and psychiatric diagnostics.

Findings

Amok, typically viewed as a culture-bound disorder, occurs throughout the world and is best characterized as mass murder, similar to school shootings. Additionally, the phenomenon of mass murder may be best understood as a form of murder-suicide, related to the phenomenon of suicide-by-cop.

Originality/value

This paper provides a review of the literature on murder-suicide, mass murder, and amok spanning over 110 years in the context of modern psychological research, new insights into the possible motivations of those who “run amok” and commit mass murder and provides future research directions for this important phenomenon.

Details

Journal of Aggression, Conflict and Peace Research, vol. 7 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1759-6599

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 29 May 2018

Katherine Pratt Ewing

Purpose – This chapter examines the problem of belonging for Muslims in the United States in a political environment where Muslims are increasingly represented as a threatening…

Abstract

Purpose – This chapter examines the problem of belonging for Muslims in the United States in a political environment where Muslims are increasingly represented as a threatening ‘other’ by conservative politicians and right-wing media. The goal is to demonstrate how an emotionally charged event, the murder of three middle class Muslim students in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, in 2015, was taken up by the media in ways that reflected sharply contested political agendas and constituted divergent stories and biographies of belonging and stigmatization for the victims, their families and the broader Muslim community.

Approach – The research draws on a wide range of media representations of the murder, including local, national and international news sources and social networking sites. The analysis is based on close readings of this range of stories.

Social Implications – The analysis demonstrates that this murder drew widespread attention in the Muslim community because these particular victims readily became representative of a Muslim ‘model minority’. Despite the ambivalence associated with belonging on such terms, the families and Muslim community used the stories of these murder victims to speak out against negative stereotypes and to remind the American public of the dangers of inflammatory rhetoric.

Originality – The chapter takes an original approach to the problem of belonging by tracing in detail how a single event can generate divergent stories that mark their narrators as belonging in ways that are contested by others, vividly demonstrating the process of différance articulated by Derrida.

Details

Contested Belonging: Spaces, Practices, Biographies
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78743-206-2

Keywords

Abstract

Details

Danger in Police Culture
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-83753-113-4

Article
Publication date: 23 June 2020

Thomas E. Joiner, Amy Lieberman, Ian H. Stanley and Mark A. Reger

The coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has prompted concerns about an increased risk for psychological distress, broadly and suicide mortality, specifically; it is, as yet…

1377

Abstract

Purpose

The coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has prompted concerns about an increased risk for psychological distress, broadly and suicide mortality, specifically; it is, as yet, unclear if these concerns will be realized, but they are plausible.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors demonstrate why researchers, clinicians, policymakers and other public health stakeholders should be vigilant to the potential increases in murder-suicide in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Findings

During the COVID-19 pandemic, there have been reports of increased gun sales, alcohol sales, intimate partner violence and child neglect/abuse. These factors give one serious pause regarding the potential for murder-suicide, especially in the context of other pandemic-related stressors (e.g. loneliness, economic stress, health anxiety).

Originality/value

This paper highlights pandemic-related factors that might spur increased murder-suicide and encourages murder-suicide prevention efforts to take place alongside other pandemic-related public health interventions.

Details

Journal of Aggression, Conflict and Peace Research, vol. 12 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1759-6599

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 2 October 2017

Viktoria Dalko

The purpose of this paper is to study life-loss risk in some life insurance policies and propose solution to the problem found.

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to study life-loss risk in some life insurance policies and propose solution to the problem found.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper analyzes the expected payout for murder-for-insurance. It presents legal evidence of 179 court cases and conducts criminological analysis. It compares the lack of safety regulation in life insurance with regulatory actions in selected food and automobile safety cases.

Findings

Some life insurance policies create incentives and, therefore, temptation for murder-for-insurance. The insured can face life-loss risk from not only the beneficiary but also the life insurance agent during the term of the policy.

Practical implications

This paper proposes that defective life insurance policies should be recalled.

Social implications

The proposal has a policy implication of eliminating one type of homicide.

Originality/value

This paper is the first study of its kind, as it places the safety of the insurance consumer in the center.

Details

Journal of Financial Crime, vol. 24 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1359-0790

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 30 October 2018

Matt DeLisi, Alan Drury and Michael Elbert

Homicide is the most severe form of crime and one that imposes the greatest societal costs. The purpose of this paper is to introduce the homicide circumplex, a set of traits…

Abstract

Purpose

Homicide is the most severe form of crime and one that imposes the greatest societal costs. The purpose of this paper is to introduce the homicide circumplex, a set of traits, behaviors, psychological and psychiatric features that are associated with greater homicidal ideation, homicidal social cognitive biases, homicide offending and victimization, and psychopathology that is facilitative of homicide.

Design/methodology/approach

Using the data from a near population of federal supervised release offenders from the Midwestern USA, ANOVA, multinomial logistic, Poisson and negative binomial regression models were developed.

Findings

Greater homicidal ideation is associated with homicide offending, attempted homicide offending and attempted homicide victimization and predicted by gang activity, alias usage, antisocial personality disorder and intermittent explosive disorder. These behavioral disorders, more extensive criminal careers, African American status and gang activity also exhibited significant associations with dimensions of the homicide circumplex.

Originality/value

Developing behavioral profiles of offenders that exhibit homicidal ideation and behaviors are critical for identifying clients at greatest risk for lethal violence. The homicide circumplex is an innovation toward the goal that requires additional empirical validation.

Details

Journal of Criminal Psychology, vol. 8 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2009-3829

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 28 May 2021

Francine Tyler

Purpose: One of the objectives of this research was to identify whether “mad”, “bad” and “sad” frames, identified in modern news reporting in other Western nations, are also…

Abstract

Purpose: One of the objectives of this research was to identify whether “mad”, “bad” and “sad” frames, identified in modern news reporting in other Western nations, are also evident in historical newspapers in New Zealand, a nation geographically distant. Methodology/approach: Qualitative content analysis was used to analyze reporting of multiple-child murders in New Zealand between 1870 and 1930. Content was sourced from a digitized newspaper database and identified media frames were analyzed under the categories of “mad”, “bad” and “sad”. Findings: Historical New Zealand media constructed “mad,” “bad,” and “sad” frames for the killers, however, instead of being classified with a single frame many killers were portrayed using a combination of two or even three. In some cases, media ignored facts which could have provided an alternative portrayal of the killers. In other cases, no obvious frames were employed. Research limitations: This research does not include analysis of media frame building in modern news reporting. Originality/value: Media construction of frames for multiple-child killers in historical New Zealand news reporting has not been explored before.

Details

Mass Mediated Representations of Crime and Criminality
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80043-759-3

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 20 December 2000

Morgan Blake Ward Doran and Gray Cavender

Abstract

Details

Sociology of Crime, Law and Deviance
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-84950-889-6

1 – 10 of over 7000