Tagged: Germany

Race & Ethnicity Studies / Sociology of Law, Crime and Deviance

Racially Profiling the Victims of Murder. Colorblindness, Racism and the Selective Silence on Race in the US and Germany

Germany is currently witnessing one of its most anticipated criminal cases in recent history, as Beate Zschäpe, the sole surviving member of the three-person white supremacist group National Socialist Underground (NSU), is being tried for membership in a terrorist cell and conspiracy to commit ten murders. In addition to highlighting the continued danger of white supremacist groups, this case and its handling by the police and the media not only speaks to the lingering racism in Germany but also to...

Science & Technology / Sociology of Law, Crime and Deviance

“Free” Heroin on the NHS

by paulabowles The links between illegal drug use and crime, particularly acquisitive, have long been recognised as problematic. Recent statistics published in The Independent suggest that as few as ten percent of addicts commit 75 percent of all acquisitive crime. In spite of these consistently dispiriting figures, the familiar approach is one of punishment, with some attempt at rehabilitation. Moreover, all of these programmes have at their foundations an aim to ensure their clients maintain complete desistance from drug use....

Social Psychology & Lifecourse / Sociology of Law, Crime and Deviance

Typification of School Shootings

by socanonymous A recent school shooting in Winnenden, Germany by a 17 year old teen (Tim Kretschmer) left 15 people dead and many others shaken.  Initial media reports focused on the teen’s psychological depression, use of violent computer games, and access to handguns as possible explanations.  Investigators prematurely categorized Kretschmer as “a classic case of a conflicted young man who wreaked havoc in real life after savoring imaginary violence in the digital world.” The chief of police, Erwin Hetger of...