LooseLeaf for CJ: Realities and Challenges

CJ: Realities and Challenges, 4e empowers students to think critically about the daily realities and challenges of the criminal justice system. Using the text's framework of “Observe > Investigate > Understand, students learn to recognize the myths of the U.S. criminal justice system and gain a greater comprehension of its complexities. The program brings together the insights of an expert author team of practitioners and scholars to present a contemporary and realistic perspective on a vital U.S. institution. There are many updated statistics, figures and features throughout this edition that reflect the most current criminal justice issues thereby providing the students with the most relevant material.

Lori Beth Way is an Associate Professor and Coordinator of the Criminal Justice program at California State University, Chico. Her research areas are primarily in the subfields of policing and courts. Dr. Way is also Project Director for a federally funded grant that works to reduce the crimes of sexual assault, intimate partner violence, and stalking in the campus community. Besides teaching at CSU, Chico, she is also an instructor at the local police academy.

Phyllis B. Gerstenfeld is Professor and Chair of Criminal Justice at California State University, Stanislaus, where she has taught since 1993. She received a Ph.D. in Psychology and a J.D. from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Her research interests include hate crimes, juvenile justice, and law and psychology. She is author of several books and book chapters, including a textbook on hate crimes, and she has co-edited a hate crimes reader as well.

Ruth E. Masters is currently the Chair of the Department of Criminology at California State University, Fresno where she has been teaching since 1972. She received her Ed.D. from the University of Southern California in 1978. A former parole agent, she was the sole author and lead author of two criminology textbooks. She was selected in 1999 for the Author of the Year Award by the National Association of Forensic Counselors for her book Counseling Criminal Justice Offenders. Her special interests include corrections, addiction, criminological theory, and cross-cultural administration of justice. She has conducted criminal justice programs in Amsterdam, France, Italy, Scotland, Greece, Belgium, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Brazil, Hong Kong, The Czech Republic, Peru, China, Turkey, Ireland, New Zealand, and Thailand.

Michael Hooper is the Bureau Chief of California Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST). He began his involvement with the criminal justice system as a member of the Los Angeles Police Department. His 23 years of LAPD experience encompassed positions as a patrol officer, field supervisor, and watch commander. This was followed by five years of service on the Criminal Justice Program faculty at Penn State University's Capitol Campus. He currently manages POST's Center for Leadership Development, which provides core leadership training for all of California's peace officers promoted to supervisory, management, and executive positions.

Candice A. Skrapec is a professor in the Department of Criminology at California State University, Fresno. She is a psychologist and criminologist. For the past 20 years she has maintained her research focus on serial murder (particularly in terms of underlying biological and psychological factors) and continues her interviews of incarcerated serial murderers in different countries. Her professional works and academic research result in regular calls from the media, movie and documentary producers, as well as authors of fact and fiction books in the areas of serial murder to investigate profiling. With over 20 years of experience in the law enforcement field working with officers and agencies in Canada, the United States, and Mexico, she is also frequently consulted by police around the world to assist in the investigation of homicide cases. She has taught a wide range of criminology courses since 1988 and has trained police and correctional officers in different countries in the areas related to her academic research and professional experience.