Introduction To Criminal Justice

Although this text covers the traditional topics of police, courts, and corrections, it is distinctive in its coverage of plea bargaining, legal and ethical values, and capital punishment. This text is unique in its critical thinking approach: student as decision maker, student as problem solver, student as working professional. Pat Anderson examines the system from the point of view of the men and women who run it; from the cop on the beat to the prison warden to the Supreme Court justice. The reader steps into their shoes to weigh the ethical ramifications and often contradictory issues that surround the choices they make.

Pat Anderson is Professor and Chair of the Department of Sociology and Criminology at Florida Southern College and has taught at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, Florida Junior College in Jacksonville and the Northeast Florida Criminal Justice Training and Education Center. Professor Anderson has a unique background with additional degrees in English literature, philosophy, and theology and has worked as a jail officer, juvenile probation case worker and supervisor, police and corrections trainer and an expert witness. The past few years he has consulted with police departments in Eastern Europe, including Romania.