Richard A. Ball

Electronic Monitoring of the Drunk Driver: A Seven-Year Study of the Home Confinement Alternative

This article evaluates the success of a program using electronic monitoring (EM) as the “front end” of a probation term for drunk drivers during three different program phases lasting over 7 years. The data indicate that EM was implemented with few equipment problems or client complaints and was very cost-effective, with nearly all the clients completing their EM period successfully. There was no evidence of any “add-on” effect, nor was there much evidence of selection bias by gender, age, race, or socioeconomic status. Probation success declined, however, during the post-EM probation period.

The Menace of Margarine: The Rise and Fall of a Social Problem

This paper examines the rise and fall of legislation controlling margarine in the United States in an effort to understand the development of definitions of the substance as a social problem. While instrumental maneuvering by interest groups such as dairy farmers had much to do with the evolution of the problem, the definition of margarine was also affected by expressive, symbolic connotations. These forces were in turn influenced by economic circumstances including business cycles, and by two world wars. Margarine gained in popularity as it found political allies and as nutritionists and home economists, supported by advertising, began to portray it differently. Restrictive legislation was repealed in 1950 after both the Second World War and shifts in the respectability of margarine consumers produced a crisis leading to federal redefinition.

The Potential Use of Home Incarceration for Drunken Drivers

The development of “slammer laws,” which require mandatory jail terms for drivers convicted on charges of drinking-and-driving, represents an emotional response to a serious but misunderstood problem. As an alternative to this and other unsuccessful policies now in use, we suggest that consideration be given to the potential utilization of some form of Home Incarceration. An examination of some prevalent myths about the “drunken driver” is followed by a review of recent research that has provided a different picture of the problem. Theoretical considerations are outlined and special attention is given to the obstacles impeding enforcement of various alternate sentences. Home Incarceration is then examined in terms of potential advantages and disadvantages as a sanction for “drunken drivers.”

Home Incarceration: An International Alternative to Institutional Incarceration

This work undertakes to examine the potential use of home incarceration as an alternative sentence. Beginning with a theoretical consideration of the purposes of sentencing, it proceeds to an examination of home incarceration in terms of both advantages and disadvantages. Advantages include a good degree of fit with other alternatives, potential for use at various stages of the sentencing process, ease of initiation by either offender or official, reasonable expectation of adoption, and a history of latent use. Problems include both legal questions and administrative issues. Close examination indicates that home incarceration is well worth investigating as a viable sentencing alternative.

Prison Conditions at the Extreme Legal and Political Issues in the Closing of West Virginia's Prisons for Men and Women

This article examines the prison conditions in West Virginia leading to the closing of both the Womens Prison and the Penitentiary. It focuses on the Crain v. Bordenkircher case surrounding conditions at the Penitentiary, tracing the struggle over prison conditions from the inmate lawsuit of 1981 to the opening of a new penitentiary in the mid-1990s. Theoretical issues surrounding judicial intervention are also examined.

Communications Reply to Professor Mark Hamm's review of House Arrest and Correctional Policy: Doing Time at Home

A communication may take one of two forms. The first relates to correspondence about an article that has appeared in the Review. In this instance the editor will determine whether the initial correspondence from a reader is worthy of publication. In the event that it is, the author of the article in question will have an opportunity to respond to the readers comment. Both communications will appear unedited. The second type of communication relates to book reviews. It is assumed that this type of communication will be initiated by authors of books who believe that their work has been criticized unfairly. In this instance the editor will not determine whether the communication should be published. Instead, it is our intention to allow the reviewer of the book in question to respond to the authors communication and then to permit the author of the book a final rejoinder to the reviewers communication. All of this correspondence will be published unedited. This policy is designed to assure the essential integrity and purpose of the Review.A communication may take one of two forms. The first relates to correspondence about an article that has appeared in the Review. In this instance the editor will determine whether the initial correspondence from a reader is worthy of publication. In the event that it is, the author of the article in question will have an opportunity to respond to the readers comment. Both communications will appear unedited. The second type of communication relates to book reviews. It is assumed that this type of communication will be initiated by authors of books who believe that their work has been criticized unfairly. In this instance the editor will not determine whether the communication should be published. Instead, it is our intention to allow the reviewer of the book in question to respond to the authors communication and then to permit the author of the book a final rejoinder to the reviewers communication. All of this correspondence will be published unedited. This policy is designed to assure the essential i...

Communications: Rejoinder to Professor Hamm

A communication may take one of two forms. The first relates to correspondence about an article that has appeared in the Review. In this instance the editor will determine whether the initial correspondence from a reader is worthy of publication. In the event that it is, the author of the article in question will have an opportunity to respond to the readers comment. Both communications will appear unedited. The second type of communication relates to book reviews. It is assumed that this type of communication will be initiated by authors of books who believe that their work has been criticized unfairly. In this instance the editor will not determine whether the communication should be published. Instead, it is our intention to allow the reviewer of the book in question to respond to the authors communication and then to permit the author of the book a final rejoinder to the reviewers communication. All of this correspondence will be published unedited. This policy is designed to assure the essential integrity and purpose of the Review.

Toward a synthesis of criminal justice planning and evaluation

Abstract The traditional social engineering approach to planning is essentially an allocative planning based on the distribution of limited means among a number of established users. We need instead a transactive planning strategy based on substantive rationality. Such a strategy involves innovative planning which avoids narrow objectivism through a perspec‐tivistic approach. Evaluation is regarded as strategy for system learning. Both planning and evaluation are to be seen within a general systems framework. In this framework, evaluation is applied not only at the outcome stage but also at the stage of problem definition, in the various phases of policy development, and during policy implementation.

Challenges to situated morality: Maintaining respectability in a sexual rendezvous

A clandestine motel operation is described, concentrating upon the staff and patrons as they attempt to maintain respectability within a context of situated morality that is shifting, challenging previously negotiated realities. The staff members tend toward a refulgent respectability, using vocabularies of denial to maintain respectability. Patrons, categorized as regular customers, special customers, careful people and problem people, may seek respectability within this narrow context or challenge the background expectancies in several basic ways, most especially by threatening the security or property of the motel. Such challenges are themselves a threat to the respectability of the motel, its staff, and the other patrons, a respectability which depends not upon conformity to conventional preachments, but upon conformity to the special understandings operating within the limited context.