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“I remember Mattingburg’s most famous case: the case of the bloody knife. A man was found next to a murdered body, he had the knife in his hand, thirteen witnesses that seen him stab the victim, when the police arrived he said, “I’m glad I killed the bastard.” Mattingburg [...]

In the A2 Crime module we study Morality and Crime and study if morality is innate or something that is learned from those around us. Some psychologists (Kohlberg) have also developed theories of moral development which predict that we will progress through, and become more moral as we grow older in a linear fashion [...]

The practice of jury selection, choosing those people who are going to be the ‘representative’ group of peers that are there to judge the defendant. Is this process becoming more of a dark art or is it a science based on the lawyers previous experience?
“Despite all the reforms of the latter half of the [...]

In the Crime module in psychology of the courtroom we look at what factors influence juries decisions and one of the studies that I use is the Castello et al. study which looks at how the attractiveness of a defendant in relation to that of the plaintiff may be a variable in a guilty verdict [...]

From a recent Guardian article (24/03): “Every child to be screened for risk of turning criminal under Blair criminal justice plan“. Is this the nanny state gone mad - should we soon be expecting double-speak and the ministry of truth?
“A new-style “11-plus” to assess the risk every child in Britain runs of turning to [...]

We look at eye witness testimony in the first year looking at Loftus and Palmer and investigate the reliability of witnesses and what can effect witness recall in the Crime module of the second year. Many studies have investigated the reliability of children as witnesses and this is even a sub-topic in the course; [...]