Crime Classification Manual Part I Chapter 4 17

 Crime Classification Manual Part I Chapter 4 17

A STANDARD SYSTEM FOR INVESTIGATING AND CLASSIFYING VIOLENT CRIMES

SECOND EDITION

John E. Douglas, Ann W. Burgess, Allen G. Burgess, and Robert K. Ressler, Editors

Given this challenge, the Depravity Standard methodology committed to accomplish the following in order to establish a standard that would unfailingly contribute to justice:

•    Can the Depravity Standard be inclusive, to be applicable to the range of all possible crimes?

•    Can the Standard emphasize evidence over impressionism? 

•    Can its items ensure that such determinations are color, diagnosis, race, religion, nationality, and socioeconomically blind?

•    Can its items control for cultural distinctions?

•    Can the Standard be neither pro-prosecution nor pro-defense?

•    Can its items incorporate the range of values of a free society?

•    Can items bridge society’s judgments with psychiatry’s? 

•    Can the items incorporate established diagnostic understandings of the worst of behavior? 

•    Can this be done in a way that does not disproportionally target those labeled undesirable?

•    Can the standard ensure fairness rather than arbitrariness?

•    Can science contribute to the standard without stifling the law?

•    Can the standard be measurable in order to enable comparison?

•    Can it be applied in a way that is not cumbersome? 

•    Can it distinguish a narrow class of offenders within categories of offenses?

•    Can it be protected from abuse?

•    Can it assist jurors without replacing their decision making?

•    Can it be used in a way that ensures consistent application to justice?