Criminology, the Criminal Justice System and Crime Prevention
What it is
Unit II defines criminology, sets it beside the social sciences and criminal justice, and maps India's criminal justice system: law-making, the links between police, prosecution, courts and corrections, and the place of victims and witnesses. It closes with crime prevention. Procedure follows the BNSS and BSA, which replaced the CrPC and Evidence Act on 1 July 2024, as of 2026-10.
Core concepts
Criminology: definition and scope. The term is usually credited to Raffaele Garofalo (Criminologia, 1885). Sutherland defined criminology as the body of knowledge on crime as a social phenomenon, covering the processes of making laws, breaking laws and reacting to their breach, in three divisions: the sociology of law, criminal etiology and penology. Its scope now adds victimology and police science; criminalistics (forensic science) is allied but separate.
Criminology and other social sciences. Criminology borrows from sociology (anomie, labelling), psychology and psychiatry (personality, disorder), biology (Lombroso, heredity), economics (rational choice), law, political science and statistics. Sellin called the criminologist a king without a country, since the field borrows its methods. Criminal law is normative (what ought to be punished); criminology is empirical (why crime occurs and how society responds).
Criminology versus criminal justice. Criminology explains crime; criminal justice studies the agencies and their decisions. It grew as a US academic field after the President's Commission report of 1967. Herbert Packer's two models frame it: the crime control model prizes speed and finality, an assembly line resting on a presumption of guilt; the due process model prizes reliability and limits on state power, an obstacle course resting on the presumption of innocence.
Structure of the criminal justice system in India. Criminal law and criminal procedure sit in the Concurrent List; police, public order and prisons are State subjects. Police: the Police Act 1861 still governs some states; Prakash Singh (2006) ordered a State Security Commission, a two-year minimum tenure for the DGP, separation of investigation from law and order, and Police Complaints Authorities. Prosecution: Public Prosecutors and a Directorate of Prosecution. Courts: under the BNSS, Courts of Session, Judicial Magistrates of the first and second class, and Executive Magistrates; a Chief Judicial Magistrate may impose up to seven years, a first-class magistrate three years and a fine up to ₹50,000. Corrections: prisons, probation (Probation of Offenders Act 1958) and after-care.
Role of the legislature and law-making. On a Concurrent List conflict, Art. 254 lets Union law prevail unless a reserved state law gets the President's assent. Art. 20 bars ex post facto offences and penalties, double jeopardy and compelled self-incrimination; after Maneka Gandhi (1978) procedure under Art. 21 must be fair, just and reasonable. The BNS, BNSS and BSA received assent on 25 December 2023. Sociologically, law reflects moral entrepreneurs (Becker) and power (Chambliss on vagrancy laws, 1964), while Mill's harm principle limits criminalisation.
Coordination among the criminal justice system. Each agency has its own goals and records, so critics call it a non-system: weak investigations fail in court and delays swell undertrial numbers. Reform bodies include the National Police Commission (1977–81) and the Malimath Committee (2003). The Interoperable Criminal Justice System links CCTNS, e-Courts, e-Prisons, e-Forensics and e-Prosecution (as of 2026-10). The BNSS adds e-FIR and zero FIR, video-recorded search and seizure, mandatory forensic visits for offences punishable with seven years or more, and release of a first-time undertrial after one-third of the maximum term.
Victims and witnesses in the process. CrPC amendments in force from 2009, carried into the BNSS, defines the victim to include a guardian or legal heir, lets the victim engage an advocate to assist the prosecution, allows appeal against acquittal, conviction for a lesser offence or inadequate compensation, and creates Victim Compensation Schemes (formerly CrPC s. 357A, now BNSS s. 396). The BNSS requires the police to tell the victim of progress within 90 days. The Supreme Court approved the Witness Protection Scheme 2018 in Mahender Chawla (2018), and the BNSS now requires every State to notify one.
Neighbourhood involvement and levels of prevention. Brantingham and Faust (1976) borrowed the public-health model: primary prevention alters general conditions (design, lighting, watch schemes); secondary targets at-risk people and places; tertiary deals with known offenders to stop reoffending. Neighbourhood involvement covers neighbourhood watch and community policing such as Kerala's Janamaithri Suraksha. Its theory is informal social control and collective efficacy, cohesion plus willingness to intervene (Sampson, Raudenbush and Earls, 1997).
Situational crime prevention. Ronald Clarke's SCP (1980) cuts opportunity at specific places rather than reforming offenders. It assumes a reasoning offender (Cornish and Clarke's rational choice perspective, 1986) and draws on routine activity theory (Cohen and Felson, 1979): a motivated offender meets a suitable target without a capable guardian. Cornish and Clarke (2003) list 25 techniques under five aims: increase the effort, increase the risks, reduce the rewards, reduce provocations and remove excuses. Reppetto (1976) typed displacement as temporal, territorial, tactical, target and functional; evaluations often find a diffusion of benefits instead (Clarke and Weisburd, 1994).
Crime prevention through environmental design (CPTED). C. Ray Jeffery coined the term in his 1971 book; Oscar Newman's Defensible Space (1972) studied public housing, after Jane Jacobs (1961) on watched streets. Principles: natural surveillance, natural access control, territorial reinforcement, and maintenance or image (the broken windows logic of Wilson and Kelling, 1982). Newman's elements were territoriality, natural surveillance, image and milieu.
Electronic monitoring. EM supervises offenders in the community by a tag, usually on the ankle. The Schwitzgebel brothers built a prototype at Harvard in the 1960s; Judge Jack Love of New Mexico ordered the first court-sanctioned tagging in 1983. Radio-frequency tags confirm presence at home during curfew; GPS tags track location. Uses: bail, probation, parole and home detention. Concerns: net-widening (Stanley Cohen, Visions of Social Control, 1985), privacy and cost. The Model Prisons and Correctional Services Act 2023 allows electronic tracking of prisoners on leave (as of 2026-10).
Worked example
Situational prevention at a hot spot. A station's two-wheeler parking lot records 40 thefts in six months, mostly from 8 pm to midnight; offenders walk in, break handle locks and ride out unchecked.
Step 1, crime triangle: motivated offenders who sell to parts dealers, suitable targets (handle locks only) and no capable guardian at the dark rear.
Step 2, choose and classify interventions:
| Intervention | Cornish–Clarke aim | Technique |
|---|---|---|
| Wheel locks and fixed chain bars | Increase the effort | Target harden |
| One gate with a token checked on exit | Increase the effort | Screen exits |
| Bright lighting and clear sightlines | Increase the risks | Assist natural surveillance |
| CCTV watched by the attendant | Increase the risks | Strengthen formal surveillance |
| Police checks on second-hand parts dealers | Reduce the rewards | Disrupt markets |
| Signs: "Vehicle theft is a crime" | Remove excuses | Alert conscience |
Step 3, CPTED: lighting is natural surveillance, the single gate access control, quick lamp repair maintenance. Step 4, level: primary prevention, aimed at the setting. Step 5, evaluate: thefts fall from 40 to 12, a cut of (40 − 12) ÷ 40 = 28 ÷ 40 = 70 per cent. A nearby lot rises from 10 to 14, which suggests spatial displacement. Net change across both lots: (40 + 10) − (12 + 14) = 50 − 26 = 24, a net cut of 24 ÷ 50 = 48 per cent. Had the nearby lot also fallen, that would be a diffusion of benefits.
Common traps
- Adding victimology to Sutherland's three divisions: they are the sociology of law, criminal etiology and penology.
- Calling police a Union or Concurrent subject: police and prisons are State subjects; criminal law and procedure are Concurrent.
- Crediting CPTED to Newman: Jeffery coined it (1971); Newman wrote Defensible Space (1972).
- Reading tertiary prevention as victim support: in Brantingham and Faust it targets known offenders.
Speed technique
- SCP aims in order: effort, risks, rewards, provocations, excuses; five techniques each.
- Prevention levels: primary for settings, secondary for the at-risk, tertiary for offenders.
- Packer in two words: assembly line versus obstacle course.
- Date ladder: Jacobs 1961, Jeffery 1971, Newman 1972, Cohen–Felson 1979, Clarke 1980, Wilson–Kelling 1982, Love 1983.
Check yourself
- Name Sutherland's three divisions of criminology.
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Sociology of law, criminal etiology and penology — making laws, breaking laws and reacting to their breach. - Who coined CPTED, and when?
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C. Ray Jeffery, 1971 — Newman's Defensible Space followed in 1972. - In which lists of the Seventh Schedule do police and criminal procedure fall?
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Police in the State List; criminal procedure in the Concurrent List — hence state police forces under a central BNSS. - A shop fits ink tags that ruin garments forced off them. Which aim and technique?
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Reduce the rewards, deny benefits — a stolen item becomes worthless. - Which case approved the Witness Protection Scheme 2018?
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Mahender Chawla v Union of India, 2018 — the BNSS now requires each State to notify a scheme.
Try it: Criminology, the Criminal Justice System and Crime Prevention questions
Real questions from the NET Criminology bank on exactly this skill. Pick an answer to see the full solution — the intuition, the worked steps, the faster methods and the traps.
The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam replaced the IPC, the CrPC and the Evidence Act with effect from:
Show the answer and worked solution
Answer: option B
The three laws received presidential assent on 25 December 2023 but were brought into force from a later notified date.
They came into force on 1 July 2024, replacing the Indian Penal Code 1860, the Code of Criminal Procedure 1973 and the Indian Evidence Act 1872.
So the new criminal laws apply from 1 July 2024, option B.
In Cohen and Felson's routine activity theory (1979), a direct-contact predatory crime occurs when a motivated offender and a suitable target converge in time and space in the absence of:
Show the answer and worked solution
Answer: option A
Cohen and Felson argued that crime needs three elements to meet: a motivated offender, a suitable target and the absence of a capable guardian.
A guardian can be a person, such as a neighbour or a guard, or a device, such as a camera, whose presence discourages the offence.
So the missing third element is a capable guardian, option A.
Herbert Packer likened the due process model of the criminal process to:
Show the answer and worked solution
Answer: option C
Packer contrasted the crime control model, which values speed and finality and moves cases like an assembly line on a presumption of guilt, with the due process model.
The due process model values reliability and limits on state power, placing safeguards at each stage like an obstacle course, and rests on the presumption of innocence.
So Packer likened due process to an obstacle course, option C.
Under the BNSS, a Court of a Judicial Magistrate of the first class may pass a sentence of:
Show the answer and worked solution
Answer: option D
Under the BNSS, a Judicial Magistrate of the first class may impose imprisonment up to three years, a fine up to ₹50,000, or both.
The CrPC had set the same court's fine limit at ₹10,000, and the Chief Judicial Magistrate, above it, may impose up to seven years.
So the first-class magistrate's limit is three years or ₹50,000 or both, option D.
Match the measures in List – I with the Cornish–Clarke aims of situational crime prevention they serve in List – II and choose the correct answer from the options. List – I (Measure) | List – II (Aim) --- | --- (a) Steering-column locks fitted to all new cars | (i) Increase the risks (b) Brighter street lighting along a footpath | (ii) Reduce the rewards (c) Marking bicycles with the owner's registration number | (iii) Remove excuses (d) A notice at a shop exit saying "Shoplifting is stealing" | (iv) Increase the effort
Show the answer and worked solution
Answer: option A
Steering-column locks harden the target, increasing the effort (a – iv); better lighting assists natural surveillance, increasing the risks (b – i).
Marking property makes stolen bicycles hard to sell, reducing the rewards (c – ii); a notice that shoplifting is stealing alerts conscience, removing excuses (d – iii).
So matching List I, from "Steering-column locks…", gives a – iv, b – i, c – ii, d – iii, option A.
Answer above — every one shows its working.