crime

So you’re on deadline with breaking news about a crime committed in your community but officials are releasing only basic details: a few facts about the crime and the name and birth date of a person alleged to be involved. Your audience – and your editor – are demanding to know as much about this individual as possible, as quickly as possible. What do you do? How do you report on someone when you have so little information?

More attractive men and those with baby-faced features are less likely to be incarcerated, a new study suggests. Men with facial scars are more likely to receive milder sentences.

As parents and policy-makers look for insights into how to best prepare children for the future, research is focusing on the long-term implications of early development and behavioral patterns. One key factor is children’s degree of self-control, which includes attributes such as the ability to delay gratification, conscientiousness and willpower.

In 2010, the FBI recorded 3,135 racially motivated criminal incidents in the United States, more than the combined number of hate crimes related to religion (1,322) and sexual orientation (1,277).

A lower resting heart rate partially explains why men commit more crime than women, according to a new study led by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania.

According to some estimates, as much as 50% of the U.S. prison population suffers from some form of mental illness. As a consequence, each year thousands of mentally ill offenders are sent to prisons that — because of overcrowding and limited resources — are poorly equipped to treat them. They are placed in solitary confinement, subjected to punishments inappropriate for their conditions and end up serving longer sentences than the general inmate population.