No abstract

Recent work on homicide and the media has focused on the United States. This study considers the British context and examines the coverage of homicide by a leading British newspaper (The Times) over a period of 23 years (1977 to 1999 inclusive). The focus is on the newspaper coverage of the top cases each year and over the whole period. This approach allows for an exploration of the hierarchy within 'media-homicides' that are distinguished in terms of 'mega-cases ', 'mezzo-cases' and 'routine cases'. Hence, this issue is shown to be a more complex social and cultural phenomenon than is usually understood through the traditional binary 'reported-non reported' approach. The importance of unusualness and cultural context is emphasised in fully understanding how homicides become, particularly, mega-cases.

This paper replicates a 1973 study of the criminal careers of arsonists (Soothill and Pope, 1973). It compares the original series of those convicted at the high court of arson in England and Wales in 1951 (n=74) with three new series of all those convicted in any court in England and Wales in 1963-5 (n=1352), in 1980-1 (n=5584) and in 2000-1 (n=3335). The profile of convicted arsonists has significantly shifted over the years, with an increasing proportion of females and a rise in the average age of both males and females. Previous convictions for violence and criminal damage (including arson) are much more evident in the later series. The proportion of medical disposals has declined, while the 1:2 ratio for custodial/non-custodial sentences has remained constant. With a 20-year follow-up the proportion reconvicted for arson has more than doubled--from 4.5% in the 1951 series to 10.7% for the 1980-1 series. The indications are that the situation in relation to arson has deteriorated significantly over the past forty years.

No abstract

This paper focuses on the offending behaviour of different generations. It considers the convictions of six cohorts involving 57,000 young adults aged 16-20 in the early 1970s, the late 1970s, the early 1980s, the late 1980s, the early 1990s and the late 1990s. Using latent class analysis, 16 offence clusters for males and 5 offence clusters for females were identified. For both males and females, the proportions of the population convicted in the 16-20 age group have declined. Among the males, 'versatile' clusters are increasing and 'specialist' clusters, with some exceptions, are rapidly declining. Among females, the proportions in the versatile cluster have increased appreciably, while the two specialist clusters-relating to violence and shoplifting-have moved in opposite directions.