The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison by Jeffrey Reiman

The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison by Jeffrey Reiman Jeffrey Reiman, author of The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison, first published his book in 1979; it is now in its sixth edition, and he has continued to revise it as he keeps up on criminal justice statistics and other trends in the system. Reiman originally wrote his book after teaching for seven years at the School of Justice (formerly the Center for the Administration of Justice), which is a multidisciplinary, criminal justice education program at American University in Washington, D.C. He drew heavily from what he had learned from his colleagues at that university. Reiman is the William Fraser McDowell Professor of Philosophy at American University, where he has†¦show more content†¦The system that emerges is what we have today. In the chapter, Crime Control in America, Reiman suggests that the system has been designed to fail. Imprisoning drug offenders, for instance, does nothing to reduce the number of drug offenders in society because they are immediately replaced. The decline in violent crime is more attributable to demographic changes than to enforcement efforts. Most of the decline in crime results from forces beyond the control of the criminal justice systems. Reiman also feels that we could reduce crime if we wanted to do so, and that our excuses are not really answers to the problem, but merely excuses to explain why the system fails. We know the causes of crimeÂâ€"poverty, prison, and drugsÂâ€"yet we do nothing to change how these things operate, such as banning guns and decriminalizing drugs. In the chapter, A Crime by Any Other Name . . . , Reiman considers how language is used to identify some actions, and he argues that such things as workplace-related deaths that could be prevented should be considered crimes, as well. As far as the criminal justice system is concerned, the face of crime is young, male, poor, and black. Reiman believes that the criminal justice system helps create this reality, projecting a particular image of crime and hiding the larger reality of social injustice and even white-collar crime. They identify crime as a direct, personal assault and ignore manyShow MoreRelatedAnalysis of The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison by Jeffrey H Reiman1506 Words   |  6 Pagesï » ¿Introduction The book The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison by Jeffrey H. Reiman provides a very interesting account of how the rich are being treated by the criminal justice system in a more favorable than the poorer and nonviolent criminals who are generally mistreated. Reiman started his book by stating that the recently noted decline in crime rate is skewed. This is clear in the 12th page of his book when he stated that After more than 20 years of telling us that crime was growing outRead MoreThe Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison Essay example1238 Words   |  5 PagesJeffrey Reiman, author of The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison, first published his book in 1979; it is now in its sixth edition, and he has continued to revise it as he keeps up on criminal justice statistics and other trends in the system. Reiman originally wrote his book after teaching for seven years at the School of Justice (formerly the Center for the Administration of Justice), which is a multidiscipl inary, criminal justice education program at American University in Washington, DRead MoreJeffrey Reiman, He Is The Author Of The Book The Richer930 Words   |  4 PagesJeffrey Reiman, he is the author of the book the richer get s rich and the poor get prison. He has also written many of the good book, some of his works are critical moral liberalism. The main reason of the book can be identified by its title itself, and this is due to our recent economy system. This book is about the criminal justice system, and the main idea of the book is about the failure in the criminal justice system. Also this book tells how bias is accompanied with a general refusal to remedyRead More Radical Criminology Essay2456 Words   |  10 PagesCriminal law involves prosecution by the state of a person for an act that has been classified as a crime (Criminal law, 2010). But who gets to decide what acts are criminal? It should be no surprise that the individuals with the most power do. For radical c riminologists, the problem arises in capitalist societies because it is in these societies where the means of production are owned privately by a small number of people. Based on the writings of Karl Marx, radical criminologists argue that theRead MoreWhite Collar Street Crime Essay1198 Words   |  5 Pagesthey not turned to crime. There is no way to determine this cost because there is no way to know what the criminals would have produced. Jeffrey Reiman (1998), in â€Å"The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison: Ideology, Class and Criminal Justice†, opined that white-collar crime is much more costly to society than street crime. According to Mr. Reiman, some of the greatest misery and suffering perpetrated on people isn’t even called crime. People are programmed to think of certain acts as crimeRead MoreCrime is a Social Construct.1751 Words   |  8 PagesDeprivation, the more likely they are to commit deviant acts. (Cookson and Persill 1985) Furthermore, the elite have more legitimate opportunities than the poor worker to commit crime i.e. A banker will have better opportunities to defraud customers for instance, and because of his status, the crime is less likely to be detected, whereas the poor worker would probably have to resort to robbing the bank, a much more visible crime. Furthermore, the powerful are subjected to weaker social control. TheyRead MoreAn Essay About My Life1722 Words   |  7 Pagesthe works, and what I’ll never pick up again. Maybe you’ll find a new favorite book on this list. You never know. Finishes for school: The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison by Jeffrey Reiman and Paul Leighton – A textbook-type read, very well-cited and well-researched. This is a good read if you’re interested in learning more about the American Prison system and some of the ways that poverty leads to jail. I especially enjoyed reading historical examples of events in this country where peopleRead MoreEssay on The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison12486 Words   |  50 PagesThe Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison JEFFREY H. REIMAN American University or the same criminal behavior, the poor are more likely to be arrested; if arrested, they are more likely to be charged; if charged, more likely to be convicted; if convicted, more likely to be sentenced to prison; and if sentenced, more likely to be given longer prison terms than members of the middle and upper classes.1 In other words, the image of the criminal population one sees in our nation’s jails and prisonsRead MoreSpeech on Capital Punishment Should Not Be Abolished2506 Words   |  11 PagesAngela Y. Davis Are Prisons Obsolete? New York: Open Media, 2003. Kevin Davis Defending the Damned: Inside Chicagos Cook County Public Defenders Office. New York: Atria, 2007. Rolando V. del Carmen and Chad R. Trulson Juvenile Justice: The System, Process and Law. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2005. Jack L. Goldsmith The Terror Presidency: Law and Judgment Inside the Bush Administration. New York: Norton, 2007. Tara Herivel and Paul Wright Prison Nation: The Warehousing of Americas Poor. New York: Routledge