This is the capstone course for the Criminal Justice Studies Program. The purpose of this course is to integrate all academic criminal justice learning, knowledge, and skills in order to provide a total understanding of the criminal justice system and how it applies to the future of the students. Students will demonstrate their abilities to conduct scholarly academic research, employ critical thinking skills, use deductive reasoning. Students will address current issues in criminal justice using analytical skills to frame problems and suggest solutions will be stressed. Oral and written presentations in class will emphasize problem solving techniques and analysis. Ethical, political and social issues that impact criminal justice research will also be examined.
This course provides an overall view of the techniques involved in investigating crimes, basic interviewing of victims and witnesses, identifying and questioning suspects, organizing investigations. Specific topics covered are crime scene procedures, searches, surveillance, sources of information, use of scientific aids, recognition of evidence, and ethics in criminal investigations. The course is designed to provide a foundation of criminal investigation procedures and techniques. Emphasis is on a logical scientific approach to crime scene investigations since investigation is in large part a science. Through discussion and hands-on exercises the student practices the application of the scientific method to criminal investigations. Students will be exposed to actual criminal investigations and processes through lectures, slides, videos, and reviews of actual past cases.
Lab component of Forensic Science
This course provides an extensive overview of the principles and concepts of victimology, an analysis of victimization patterns and trends, and theoretical reasoning and responses to criminal victimization. In addition, this course explores the role of victimology in the criminal justice system, examining the consequences of victimization and the various remedies now available for victims. Additionally, the societal problem of domestic violence will be studied. The history of domestic violence in modern America and the societal and legal response to this problem will be examined, as well as the history and current status of the various available Victim Witness Services.
This course provides an overview of the American criminal justice system, emphasizing the three system components; the police, the courts, and corrections. Topics will include the role of police in a democratic society, the relationship of the various courts within the system, the processes of punishment and rehabilitation, and the roles and interactions of the Federal and State systems of criminal justice.