PERSONAL
APPLICATION OF CRIMINOLOGYÂ
                                 Criminology
CJA/323
         You are the parent of a 16-year old
boy. You come home unexpectedly and find your door ajar. Inside you discover
your son’s friend looking through a kitchen drawer. The boy says he is looking
for a paper and a pencil so he can leave your son a note. On the counter next
to him is a lock- pick and some of your jewelry and he smells of marijuana. You
tell the boy to leave immediately and he does. Grateful that he has gone, the
next move is to call the police. Although he is a friend, this kid is high and
in possession of jewelry from the home as well as a lock-pick. At that moment,
the roles had forever changed. He has become a criminal and your family has
become victims of his crime. He does not deserve consideration like calling his
parents. Upon finding a perpetrator in your home, you do not call his momma you
call the police. This is what victims of crime do, and the tool in his possession
suggests that this is not his first break-in. Excusing; or ignoring this
incident without receiving consequences for his action is giving him permission
to continue this undesirable behavior or allowing it to escalate into something
larger.
   Â
     Jason Layeyre has written an
article that is a prime example of how ignoring or excusing small crime has the
potential to escalate into something enormous. His article The Serial Killer
the Cops Ignored is an ultimate example of what can happen when ….      Â
