Liamcrime

It has been all over the news that Boris Johnson has put £3.6 Billion into the funding of 20,000 new police officers and has ‘created’ 10,000 more prison spaces. ( https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-49318400 ). This blog aims to critically examine the portrayal of violence with its causations and solutions through the Neo- conservative lens and its distorted realities as well as methods of Conservative retention of power through these right realist approaches concerning crime and justice. It can be argued that this right realist approach is deeply flawed and problematic. Firstly this policy simply is a case of exploring the issue of a rise in violent crime as being an issue to tackle with punitive measures. The individual is to blame entirely and rational choice is where we must lie our societal blame. However it is apparent that structural issues and social harms fuelled through consumer capitalism and Neoliberal social policy is not considered here. Since the Conservatives have come...

Day after day, the wider media issue reports on violent crimes, with a heavy focus on knife crime. It can be argued that the way in which violent crime is reported in the media focuses on pointing the blame on race, age, gender and the local communities in which they are immersed into. This blog aims to explore these narratives and to point out that the representation of violent crime, in the media is often misguided and does not truly reflect the reality as well as exploring central social structures and political philosophies which need to be held to account as well. On Monday April 1 st , 2019, BBC News published a headline on their website titled, - ‘Schools and NHS could be held accountable over Youth Crime’. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-477686 3 1 The article discussed the ways in which schools and the NHS have ‘failed’ to prevent youth groups falling into violent crime. First, this article is blatant evidence that the wider media are not willing to accept that the Pol...

Jack the Ripper strikes again in Whitechapel.  Picture this: an unknown assailant, prowls the dark, smoggy and dingy streets of Whitechapel in a top hat and leather apron. His victims? Vulnerable, desperate, and easily accessible women. Murdered, mutilated and dismembered in the most inhumane, degrading and violent way.  You would be forgiven for thinking that we have gone back in time to Whitechapel 1888, but the scene described above is in fact, the backdrop to the ITV Crime thriller series ‘Whitechapel’ set in 2008 onwards. It depicts violent crime focusing on spree killings and gangland crimes. By drawing upon the rich pool of folklore, history and genuine criminal history research, a copycat killer emerges in every episode. In this series, a copycat Ripper. This blog will be exploring Whitechapel’s media portrayal of crime, as a fascinating collusion between the key facets of policing practises, both past and present, when solving a murder case. The characterisation o...

Ross Kemp is best known as playing the role of Grant Mitchell in EastEnders, more recently however he has become a world known journalist and political investigator. Ross Kemp has been to the most dangerous parts of the world, he has been to war torn Syria to interview active ISIS fighters, as well as travelling to the world’s most dangerous regions which are torn apart by deadly gang rivalries and political instability. Ross Kemp has shown time and time again that it is possible to gain access to these communities. There is a clear need to investigate and hear the stories of those living in these communities whose lives have been turned upside down by the brutal mechanisms of gang culture. It is apparent to me, that the gang members, who agreed to be interviewed wanted to be heard. When Ross visited Moscow, he interviewed members of a far-right Neo Nazi group.   They appeared only too happy to be interviewed, which would have given them a vocal platform and a sense of recog...

David Canter is Emeritus Professor of Applied social psychology at the university of Liverpool. He was also the creator of Investigative psychology. David Canter specialises in Environmental psychology, offender profiling and Forensic Psychology. After having read- Forensic psychology, a very short introduction, I was introduced to new concepts and a much clearer understanding of the role that forensic psychologists play in murder investigations. The book details, the court procedures in gaining a conviction for murder cases, additionally it also establishes the fundamental role of forensics, which arguably is to collect scientific evidence and to establish what is and isn’t there to either prove someone’s guilt or innocence in the context of the courtroom. Chapter two titled ‘how to make a criminal’   details physical and biological traits which have been used to construct a psychopath and murderer, this is for forensic psychologists to use as a stepping ladder to streng...

Geoffroy Wansell is a leading playwright and political author. He taught British Politics at the University of Sheffield. In 2011, he published ‘the bus stop killer’ this book is all about Levi Bellfield now identified as Yusuf Rahim. The book details a heavy focus upon his victims, their personalities and characteristics which made them targeted to be battered, raped and murdered by Levi Bellfield. The context is very verbally graphic, detailed and emotive. Throughout reading the book, I became disturbed by what I was reading on the account of what Bellfield did to his numerous victims. The stalking, the verbal sexual confrontation of young girls, his fascination of young school girls, and the ‘image’ of a school girl. Arguably he is a paedophile. Not only this, details of how he treated his numerous sexual and committed relationships which were evidently controlling, toxic and abusive. Many thoughts ran through my head as to why the women in question stayed by his side. Was it...

Murderous Minds by Dean A Haycock- A book review.  Dean A Haycock is an author who I highly recommend for anyone studying Criminology, Psychology, anthropology, and Neuroscience. He specialises in Science and Medicine. This is shown through his PhD research in Neuroscience from the Brown University in Rhode Island. I thoroughly enjoyed reading his book ‘murderous minds’. It is important to note that the research displayed in the book does acknowledge the separation between psychopathy and violence.   This book does explore the minds of a subsection of psychopaths. They have been classified as ‘criminal psychopaths’. This is the distinction between those who have ‘successful psychopathic tendencies’ such as struggling to comprehend and adapt to social situations, reading body language and emotional cues, but do not act on these lacking abilities in a criminalising manner. Encompassing the ‘criminal psychopath’ Dean explains that there are characteristics which could m...