Media, Crime, and Criminal Justice: Images and Realities (A volume in the Wadsworth Contemporary Issues in Crime and Justice Series)

Early on, Surette suggests that this work will be a success if the reader will never again sit through a crime show or crime newscast without a thoughtful reaction. With the medias role in reporting crime and using crime as entertainment gaining increasing influence and attention, the importance of the interplay between the mass media news and entertainment systems and the criminal justice system may be greater today than ever before. Surette comprehensively explores this interplay. His four major goals are:..1) to provide a bridge for criminal justice students and personnel between relevant mass media .research findings and criminal justice practice;.2) to highlight common misconceptions regarding the mass medias effects on crime and justice;.3) to aid the reader in becoming a critical media consumer; and.4) to provide researchers with a broader context for their specific studies and access to wider .literature...In accomplishing these goals, Surette offers a scientific treatment of the subject not available elsewhere, with a well-researched review of the empirical and legal data on the criminal justice system, the medias influence on attitudes, the medias impact on crime, and media-designed programs to reduce crime. The basic premise of the text is that people use knowledge obtained from the media to build a picture of the world and then base their actions on this constructed image. This social construction of reality is a particularly important concept in regard to how issues are shaped and policies are determined..