Family Violence and Criminal Justice: A Life-Course Approach

The historical context of family violence is explored, as well as the various forms of violence, their prevalence in specific stages of life, and responses to it made by the criminal justice system and other agencies. The linkage among child abuse, partner violence and elder abuse is scrutinized, and the usefulness of the life-course approach is couched in terms of its potential effect on policy implications; research methods that recognize the importance of life stages, trajectories, and transitions; and crime causation theories that can be enhanced by it.

Brian K. Payne is Vice Provost for Graduate and Undergraduate Academic Programs at Old Dominion University, where he is tenured in the Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice. Payne is the author or co-author of more than 160 journal articles and seven books, including Family Violence and Criminal Justice (Anderson Publishing/Elsevier, with Randy Gainey). He is a former editor of the American Journal of Criminal Justice and past president of the Southern Criminal Justice Association, and is 2014-2015 President of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences.

Randy R. Gainey received his Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Washington in 1995. He is a professor in the Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice at Old Dominion University. He has published more than 60 articles in scholarly journals covering a broad number of areas, including sentencing practices, the use of alternative sanctions, the fear of crime, and substance use and abuse. In addition to Family Violence and Criminal Justice: A Life-Course Approach (with Brian Payne) for Anderson Publishing, he has co-authored Drugs and Policing (with Brian Payne) and Deviance and Social Control: A Sociological Perspective (with Michelle Inderbitzen and Kristen Bates).