The topics of crime and violence are very broad and difficult to define. Society often defines crime from a strictly legal point of view as the commission of any act prohibited by criminal law or the omission of any action required by it. Violence is the unlawful exercise of physical force, usually causing or intending to cause injury. Definitions of criminal behavior, the seriousness attributed to it and the punishment considered appropriate differ widely among nations. Such definitions are determined less at times by objective indicators of the degree of injury or damage than by cultural values and power relationships. The same act of violence against a woman, for example, including such crimes as dowry burnings or honor killings, may be viewed very differently by a Western researcher than by some local communities in the developing world. Such differences make comparative generalizations risky.
Violence can generally be divided into three broad categories: political violence (e.g., guerrilla conflict, paramilitary conflict, political assassinations, armed conflict between political parties); economic violence (e.g., street crime, carjacking, robbery/theft, drug trafficking, kidnapping, trafficking in humans); and social violence (e.g., interpersonal violence such as spouse and child abuse, sexual assault of women and children)--each identified in terms of the type of motivation that consciously or unconsciously uses violence to gain or maintain power. Of course, the categories are not mutually exclusive, as the kidnapping of an executive, for example, may be a political statement or a means of raising money.
Domestic terrorism poses perhaps the greatest challenge ever faced by American criminal justice. The Sept. 11th terrorist attacks introduced a new era in. criminal justice in this country and around the world. Today, every criminal justice official whether at the federal, state or local level must be prepared to deal with terrorism and its various manifestations......
