Appearance Bias and Crime

Offers an entirely new way of examining crime, criminal victimization, and crime control, through the lens of appearance bias.

Bonnie Berry (Edited by)

9781108422314, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 11 April 2019

308 pages, 20 b/w illus.
23.5 x 15.5 x 2 cm, 0.57 kg

'A body of original and seminal scholarship comprise of fifteen erudite articles, Appearance Bias and Crime should be considered as an essential, core addition to college and university library Criminology collections and supplemental curriculum lists. It should be noted for the personal reading lists of judicial policy makers, students, academia, social activists, and non-specialist general readers with an interest in the subject that Appearance Bias and Crime is also available in a paperback edition and in a digital book format.' Wisconsin Bookwatch: Midwest Book Review

Relying on experts in criminology and sociology, Appearance Bias and Crime describes the role of bias against citizens based on their physical appearance. From the point of suspicion to the decisions to arrest, convict, sentence, and apply the death penalty, crime control agents are influenced by the appearance of offenders; moreover, victims of crime are held blameworthy depending on their physical appearance. The editor and contributing authors discuss timely topics such as Black Lives Matter, terrorism, LGBTQ appearance, human trafficking, Indigenous appearance, the disabled, and the attractive versus unattractive among us. Demographic traits such as race, gender, age, and social class influence physical appearance and, thus, judgments about criminal involvement and victimization. This volume describes the social movements relevant to appearance bias, recommends legislative and policy changes, offers practical advice to social control agencies on how to reduce appearance bias, and proposes a new sub-discipline of appearance criminology.

Part I. Unattractiveness, Criminality, and Victimization: 1. Appearance and delinquency Robert Agnew
2. 'Ugly' criminals and 'ugly' victims: a quantitative analysis of add health data Brent Teasdale and Bonnie Berry
Part II. Race, Ethnicity, and Nationality as Targeted Identities: 3. Racial profiling and reconciliation: the quest for indigenous justice in Canada Terry Wotherspoon and John Hansen
4. Black Lives Matter: the watchdog for the criminal justice system Lorenzo M. Boyd and Kimberly Conway Dumpson
5. An absence of appearance identifiers: misguided moral crusades in anti-human trafficking Billy James Ulibarrí
Part III. The Process of Social Control as Influenced by Appearance: 6. Becoming and being a woman prisoner: does appearance matter? Brenda Chaney
7. The impact of victim attractiveness on victim blameworthiness and defendant guilt determinations in cases of domestic and sexual assault Jennifer Wareham, Bonnie Berry, Brenda Sims Blackwell and Denise Paquette Boots
8. Do attractive women 'get away' with traffic violations? An observational study of police responses to traffic stops Brent Teasdale, Taylor Gann and Dean Dabney
9. The police 'presence': public service versus intimidation Stephen A. Bishopp
Part IV. Identifying Terrorists, Mistakenly or Not, by Appearance: 10. Dressed to kill: jihadi appearance and its significance in Austria and beyond Daniela Pisoiu
11. Charisma, prisoner radicalization, and terrorism: the role of appearance Mark S. Hamm
Part VI. Very Visible Differences: Orientation, Disability, Freaks, and Clowns and their Relationship to Crime and Victimization: 12. Queer looking: appearance and LGBTQ citizens' victimization and interactions with the criminal justice system Elicka Peterson Sparks and Ian Skinner
13. Visible disabilities and risk of interpersonal victimization Heidi L. Scherer and Bradford W. Reyns
14. Remarkably unique human appearances: scary clowns and freaks Bonnie Berry
15. Appearance criminology: a new approach toward equitable treatment Bonnie Berry
Index.

Subject Areas: Crime & criminology [JKV]