Role Of Crime In Victorian England

Since the 19th century, law enforcement and punishment has developed rapidly into the justice system we rely on today. Obscure laws that had become irrelevant in an industrial and post-industrial era were fast being replaced, and despite its lack of existence at the beginning of the 1800’s, policing standards are, today, high. The necessity for this drastic change in approach to crime has stemmed from the needs of industrial Britain, and the increased awareness of the public, and government, and their perception of crime and punishment. Rather than individual cases having a direct impact on these changes, in general they provide an insight as to the reactions of the public at the time, and along with the myriad of other cases, allow us

It is to a large extent that Marxism is a useful theory in explaining the causes of crime. This is because it highlights the inequalities in society and how the ruling class owns the means of production. This fails to show reasons why not everyone is facing status frustration and lower income turn to crime.

The 1920s are usually characterized as a time of care-free, social rebellion against the restricting ideals of the post WWI world, but it has a darker side than this. Prisons populations and crime rates rose to an all time high from where they were pre-Prohibition. Gangsters soon became the richest, most powerful men in the country and all due to the bootlegging of liquor. In New York and Chicago especially, the gangs were as diverse as the people living there, all fighting to control their areas, causing insane amounts of violence and death. Although Prohibition's aim was to decrease drunkenness and crime, it would ultimately cause more harm than good with the emergence of speakeasies which kept people drunk and gangs who increased crime

Compare to patterns of criminal activity and violence in England during this period. Explain their effect on the development of constitutional law and political freedom in England. Finally, explain how English Common Law influenced the American criminal justice system. Provide an example.

Criminal activity during the 1920s played a major role throughout the entirety of the decade, as it related to the newfound culture the Roaring Twenties entailed. As the nation strove to achieve the American Dream, parties, money and social representation became a main contribute to an individual’s persona. As these factors were sought to be obtained, many criminal engagements were enacted. These crimes included but were not limited to, bootlegging, organized crime, scandals and murder, which were set by the infamous Al Capone and the Mafia, with contribution to the corruption of the FBI, the KKK and their racial and religious prejudice, Leopold and Loeb, and Warren G. Harding, in relation to the Teapot Dome Scandal. All of these acts are relative to modern society as they paved way for greater emphasis on civil and political issues in the following decades, as society began to regard national security and pushed toward a movement to enact stricter laws and regulations towards individual matters.

Elizabethan England was split into two classes - the Upper Class, the nobility, and everyone else. Punishment would usually be seen to vary in severity according to class. The Upper class were well educated, wealthy and associated with Royalty or high members of the clergy. They would often become involved in Political arguments and religious matters. The nobility could therefore become involved in crime to do with these things. The most common crimes of the Nobility included things such as High Treason (the crime of betraying one's country, especially by attempting to kill or overthrow the sovereign or government), Blasphemy (the action or offence of speaking sacrilegiously about God or sacred things; profane talk), Sedition (conduct or speech inciting people to rebel against the authority of a state or monarch), Spying, Rebellion, Murder, Witchcraft and Alchemy (a philosophical and protoscientific tradition practiced throughout Europe, Egypt and Asia. It aimed to purify, mature, and perfect certain objects).

The general public, readers, and historians have sensationalized the Victorian Underworld for years. The rise of crime and what came to be known as the criminal class in Victorian London emerged as a result of various impacts of the fast-paced industrialization that took place in the 19th century. Economic changes during the industrialization of Victorian London created opportunities for costers to make a living hawking goods in the streets. However, they were often removed by the police for blocking the flow of traffic and being a general annoyance. Costers and the police force developed a hostile association that often led to violence amongst the opposing groups, which cemented the costers as a part of the criminal class in the eyes of the middle and upper classes of London. The booming population amongst the lower classes, which led to overcrowded living space, offered a breeding ground for generations of criminals. The children of the rookeries and paddingkens were at the centre of the criminal class because they allowed the criminal trades to transcend generations and to further establish a class of individuals who made their livelihoods through unlawful means. These children were the most vulnerable to effects of the meagre socio-economic factors and were forced into criminality in order to survive. The prominence of the criminal class in Victorian London during the 19th century was a result of the reduced socio-economic conditions the lower classes were forced to live

Many people are attractive to Queen Creek for a place to live because of the benefits it has to offer. Queen Creek still has the small town feel with many acres of farming, with good schools and a good neighbor feeling. Queen Creek is very clean and the roads are well taken care of with many improvements, but it’s not exempt from crime. The most prominent crime here is theft, for example shoplifting, next is burglary, like when perpetrators break into a home, and finally moving violations, such as speeding or red-light runners.

It was suspected during the time period that overcrowding was the cause of the increased crime rate. People saw that the population growth—must like the popularity of gin—coincided with the rise crime. As London became an industrial city it needed a more unskilled workers to power its “textile, iron, metal goods, and pottery production” factories (“Crime and Punishment” par 2). This caused unskilled workers from “small rural towns” and “villages” into the city in hopes of finding work ("Crime and Punishment," par 1). This may seem like a good idea, but unfortunately the population of the city rose quicker than expected and thus hadn’t had an adequate amount of time to adjust to the booming population growth—over 400 percent in just 50 years ("Crime and Punishment," par 1).

After the Age of Enlightenment in the mid 18th century in England, the tension between the social classes intensified even more. A huge gap generated between the aristocrats and the working class, but dozens of new layers of society appeared. While the rich lived to the fullest, the lower class starved and needed to find alternative ways of money making. Prostitution became more and more widespread, which lead to an inequality and social stratification between poor and rich and due to the economical crisis the number of prostitutes grew from year to year. Aristocrats and nobility looked down on the working class with judgement and disgust, and when prostitution became legalized in England after the Contagious Diseases Acts it made a big

Social class and crime and punishment has always been an issue in the UK if not globally. For the elite, the criminal justice system serves a purpose to deter and prevent crime, but the reality is that the poor are punished for crimes they commit more so than those of a upper class who commit the same crime. The question is who is to blame for this image of the poor being criminals and the working class crime phenomenon, is it the moral Panic created by the media to distract from the reality of the white collar corporate crime being carried out by the most powerful of society or is it down to Poverty, Labelling, economic and social positioning which all contribute to deviant behaviour. The aim of this essay is to provide a critical criminological view of the punishment of the poor with a wide range of theories and ideas to contribute to the understanding of the poor being punished from the 18th century to today 's contemporary society. It will aim to develop an understanding how criminals and deviant behaviour were defined and perceived from historical periods to now.

The reaction to crime in the Victorian Era show the effectiveness of law enforcement. One event that displayed the acts of policemen was the Great Exhibition, an event where a variety of manufactured products were displayed. On certain days, tickets costed a shilling, or five pence, attracting an audience. Although there were a lot of policemen, the crime rates were very low. National Archives explains the cause, “The men who policed the Great Exhibition were members of the Metropolitan Police force. This force had been established in 1829 and its police constables were given the nickname 'Peelers' after Sir Robert Peel who was Home Secretary at the time.” http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/victorianbritain/lawless/default.htm

The depiction of crime evolves as time goes on, especially in the 18th and 19th century England. Numerous characteristics of a novel change, including different influences, the time it was written, and the style the author writes in. Although there people can see many changes, there was not a shift to aesthetics in the romantic period because aesthetics are in works before the Romantic period started. This is specifically present in poems, where aesthetics takes a primary role in a work before the 19th century. This essay will serve to argue that the aestheticism of criminality was evident prior to the romantic period.

There is debate whether youth crime is really a problem to society or just an issue that is constructed by society. It is argued that media has influenced society’s views on this matter by categorising young people as ‘folk devils’ (Banks, 2013). Certain groups, episodes and people that pose a threat to society’s values is when a moral panic takes place (Cohen, 1972). For example, this can be seen nowadays when there is no actual threat but old people get intimidated when they see large groups of young people hanging about on streets. These influences led to policy change, increasing the level of social control. This means that youth crime may be perceived as a moral panic rather than an actual problem.

The effects of crime on victim can have a mixed feeling about making a victim impact statement. They may want to tell the judge or parole hearing officer how the crime affected their life and yet they may be anxious because you don't know how to prepare an impact statement or you don't want to bring back bad memories by describing how the crime has hurt you. The victim impact statements may include descriptions of: