Criminal Justice Today & Causes of Crime : Lesson 1

This lesson will give the students the groundwork to move through the remainder of the course by giving them the most basic criminal justice skills such as explaining the major issues in criminal justice today, identifying and listing different types of crime, outlining the 3 levels in law enforcement, and the basic elements of the corrections system. It will also give them in-depth information on the various criminal justice models including: the conflict and consensus model, the “wedding cake” model, the due process and crime control models, and the medical model of addiction and the criminal model of addiction. Lesson 1 will discuss the very important connection between offenders and victims. This lesson will also explain several theories including why classical criminology is based on choice theory, the tree major theories of social structure with their respective explanations of crime, contrast positivism with classical criminology, the chronic offender theory, and finally how life course criminology differs from all the other theories.