INTRODUCTION TO CRIMINOLOGY AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE.

Running head: INTRODUCTION TO CRIMINOLOGY AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE
Introduction to Criminology and Criminal Justice
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1INTRODUCTION TO CRIMINOLOGY AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE
Introduction
There has been a considerable increase in the number of Close Circuit Television
(CCTV) in public places in order to prevent the occurrence of crime and other security
breaching situations around Australia. CCTV has been one of the most common
technological mode of surveillance to check crime or at least to identify the offenders who
commit the crimes. Not only government authorities, private concerns have been vigilant to
secure the safety of the common people and hence are indulging in fixing CCTV systems in
Banks, Shopping malls, Car parking, Public transports, and individual shops (Australian
Institute of Criminology 2019). This paper strives to include the attempts that the private
sectors as well as the law enforcements are taking as a measure to prevent crime. The paper
also discusses the impacts of the use of CCTV on privacy, civil liberties, social justice and
human rights. In this course, the paper would come across the different challenges, be it
social, political or legal.
An Attempt to Prevent Crime
A significant investment has been made on CCTV system as a part of crime
prevention program under the state, territory and Commonwealth government. CCTV
installations have become a part of the growing proportion of the community fund available
to the local councils. The initial 33 open Street CCTVs in Australia which were installed in in
Central business district of metropolitan centres observed that there was an increasing trend
of installing CCTV in rural and regional centres along with Suburban locations (Willis et al
2017). A Research was conducted in 2005 pertaining to the use of CCTVs by the local
councils in Australia which reported that 1 out of 10 councils had a CCTV system installed
(Australian Bureau of Statistics 2014). Carr (2016) examined that 18 local councils were
funded by the Australian government that were CCTV and the police found it more reliant in

2INTRODUCTION TO CRIMINOLOGY AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE
terms of identifying offenders and diminishing criminal offences with no additional cost to
the council. In later years it has been found that half of every count in in New South Wales
used CCTV in public places, where the urban councils were using the system twice more than
the rural councils. A significant change in police investigation has been noticed to have been
using CCTV footage from the surveillance cameras found to have been installed in the crime
sites. The police investigators have been positively vocal about the effectiveness of the
CCTV system in solving crimes for they capture and record the crime incidents and help
being a valuable evidence for criminal trial (Australian Institute of Criminology 2019). The
CCTV system acts as deterrence the commission of crime and aids investigation of the police
eventually when the crime is committed. The surveillance cameras are made how to use to
keep surveillance around residential places and various public spaces that it runs 24*7
capturing all that happens around it. The footage helps to identify the suspect as well as the
surrounding witnesses that may have been involved in a particular crime. Most often police
uses the recorded footage as a clue to inspect the behaviour of the suspects involved in the
commission of a crime and the footage is often used for forensic evidences. The recordings of
the CCTV help investigators to frame a timeline of an incident or a crime. CCTV helps police
officer monitor activities of people in certain areas which are more prone to criminal
activities. The CCTV footages acts as an evidence of a crime that at most of the time speaks
for the guilty plea of a suspect thereby reducing the time and cost of the trails. Surveillance
footages open help to prove allegations against the offender who otherwise tries to escape the
law by presenting strong counsel for the trial. The video footages often help to trace a
reported missing person (Australian Institute of Criminology 2019).
Impact
As argued by various consultants India report that CCTV cameras has been found to
have played a significant role to detect crime and the police have been using it as a ‘frontline