LAWS2301B 2020 Mid Term Examination Final PDF

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LAWS 2301 B – Fall 2020 – Mid-Term Examination As indicated in your Course Outline, the Mid-Term Examination is a take-home, open book examination that features short-answer (2) and long-answer (2) questions. Please ensure that you read closely and carefully the general instructions for the Mid-Term Exam and the detailed instructions for each individual question. Your Mid-Term Examination will be graded out of a total of 100 and is worth 15% of your final grade. Your Mid-Term must be submitted in the pertinent section of cuLearn by Sunday, November 8 2020 at 11:59 pm (EST). Late Mid-Term Examinations will automatically receive a grade of 0, which cannot be changed unless the student has made a formal request for an extension (and received a confirmation from the Instructor that this request was granted) before the deadline, by using the process outlined in the Policy on Late Assignments described in the Course Outline.

Format: Complete your exam by answering in the text boxes below: - Each short-answer question (2 in total, each worth 20 points for a total of 40 points), and - Each long-answer question (2 in total, each worth 30 points for a total of 60 points). Submission: Before submitting your exam, you must rename this document as follows: YOURLASTNAME_ LAWS2301B_2020_MidTerm_Examination_Final In my case, the file would therefore be renamed HEBERT__LAWS2301B_2020_MidTerm_Examination_Final Submit your exam by uploading and submitting this document in the MID-TERM TAKE-HOME EXAM section of cuLearn. Accepted formats are .doc, .docx, and .pdf. Corrupted files will not be accepted and will automatically receive a grade of 0, so please double-check that your file can be opened without a problem before submitting it. In the unlikely (but not impossible) event that you are unable to submit your exam on cuLearn because of a technical problem, you must submit your exam by emailing this document to me (Prof. Hébert at [email protected]) before the deadline, using your official Carleton email account. Give yourself enough time to submit your exam in cuLearn so that you can still submit your exam on time by email if ever you experience a technical issue that prevents you from submitting in cuLearn. 1

General instructions: 1) Read each question closely and carefully. You must ensure that you actually answer the question and fulfill all of its specific requirements. 2) You must employ proper capitalization, punctuation, sentence structure, and grammar for all of your answers. Please write full sentences and review your entries for typos before submitting. 3) You must ensure that your entries for each individual short-answer question are no less than 100 words and no more than 200 words. You must ensure that your entries for each long-answer question are no less than 350 words and no more than 500 words. Students will be penalized for going 10 words below or above the word limits. Be concise and precise! 4) When asked to define, describe, explain, or summarize concepts, terms, or other elements from the course, you must do so in your own words. Put differently, it is not sufficient to copy and paste contents from your textbook, Lecture Videos, or other course materials. You must instead demonstrate that you are capable of defining, describing, explaining, or summarizing course content in your own words. 5) When asked to select examples or pieces of evidence from various course materials, you must do so in your own words to the extent possible. If you decide to pull a direct quote from course materials (the textbook, Lecture Video scripts, external readings, etc.), you should properly put the quote in quotation marks and cite the author(s) as follows, using APA style: (Smith, 2019, p.3). You can use another citation style (e.g. Chicago) if you prefer, as long as you are consistent. However, given the word limit on the questions, it is strongly advised for you to paraphrase as much as possible and to keep any direct quotes to a short length.

Grading Rubric for Short-Answer and Long-Answer Questions: A range (80% and above): The entry is well-written and conveys the student’s strong grasp of course materials. The student has a solid understanding of course concepts and is using pertinent information from course Modules to work their way through concepts. The student has definitely digested the materials in the Modules and is applying them to real-world issues. B range (70% and above): The entry conveys an adequate consideration of the course materials, shows a satisfactory understanding of course concepts, and demonstrates a decent capacity to link concepts to information from course Modules. C range (60% and above): Though much of the entry is a recap of one or more aspects of the course Modules, the entry represents a mostly superficial attempt to think about the implications of this information for real-world issues. D range (50% and above): The entry is simply a recap of information presented in course Modules and does not indicate that the student grasps the overall significance of this information. F range (less than 50%): No entry was submitted; the entry is so generic in its content that it is difficult to tell if the student has properly engaged with course materials; the writing or content of the entry is difficult to understand.

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The awarding of numerical grades within letter ranges will be about the quality of the contribution and of the writing more generally. SHORT-ANSWER QUESTIONS (2) Short-answer question #1 (100-200 words – worth 20 points) Question: In recent years, a growing number of specialized problem-solving courts have been created in Canada. How does the concept of “task environment” help explain why such courts have emerged in various parts of the country? To answer this question, please write a short and concise entry that includes the following elements (please structure/order the following elements in a way that makes argumentative sense): 1) In one sentence or two (maximum), you must explain in your own words what problemsolving courts are. It is not sufficient to copy and paste contents from your textbook or Lecture Videos – please use your own words. 2) In the rest of your post, you must provide a possible explanation for why such courts have emerged in various parts of Canada in recent years by employing the concept of “task environment.” To do so, you must specifically: - Ensure that you define what “task environment” means in your own words. - Determine if the concept of “task environment” is useful for explaining why problem-solving courts have been created in various parts of Canada. This should involve describing at least one (1) type of Canadian specialized problem-solving court.

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Short-answer question #2 (100-200 words – worth 20 points) Question: What is the difference between police “authority” and police “legitimacy”? To answer this question, please write a short and concise entry that includes the following elements (please structure/order the following elements in a way that makes argumentative sense): 1) In one sentence or two (maximum), you must define police “authority” in your own words. 2) In one sentence or two (maximum), you must define police “legitimacy” in your own words. 3) In the rest of your entry, you must explain how these two concepts are different. To do so, you must specifically: - Ensure that you clearly indicate what differentiates police “authority” from police “legitimacy.” - Select and describe one (1) situation, phenomena, or problem in Canada’s criminal justice system that exemplifies how police “authority” and police “legitimacy” are not the same. Tip: In selecting your example, ask yourself the following question: Throughout Course Modules, have you learned about any situation, phenomena, or problem where the police has the authority to do a particular thing but where its legitimacy to do this particular thing is put in question (at least by some people)?

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LONG-ANSWER QUESTIONS (2) Long-answer question #1 (350-500 words – worth 30 points) Question: What are some of the protections that the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms offers against infringements by the police and criminal courts? To answer this question, please write a concise entry (think of it as a mini-essay) that includes the following elements: 1) You must explain in your own words what the Charter is and what role it can play in protecting citizens against infringements by criminal justice institutions and actors. -Tip: Ensure that you have strong, clear argumentative statements about the Charter at the beginning and at the end of your entry. Such statements are respectively called a thesis statement and a concluding statement. 2) In the rest of your post, you must select two separate Sections of the Charter and explain how they respectively protect Canadians against infringements by the police and criminal courts. To do so, you must specifically: - Select one (1) Section of the Charter that relates to policing and describe the protection(s) offered by this Section in your own words. Please indicate the number of the Section you select but do not copy and paste the entire Section. - Identify one (1) of the “police powers” among the powers we discussed in the course that this Section pertains to and explain how the Section impacts this power. - Select one (1) Section of the Charter that relates to criminal courts. Describe the protection(s) offered by this Section in your own words. Please indicate the number of the Section you select but do not copy and paste the entire Section. - Explain how the Section impacts one (1) aspect of the operations of criminal courts, as discussed in the course so far.

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Long-answer question #2 (350-500 words – worth 30 points) Question: “Predictive policing” is often seen as a promising new approach for Canadian police services. Nonetheless, some critiques have pointed out that the data driving predictive policing — in particular data on arrests — can be problematic for certain minority groups. What is one of the possible problems that could arise for certain minority groups if data, such as data on arrests, are employed in predictive policing strategies? To answer this question, please write a concise entry (think of it as a mini-essay) that includes the following elements: 1) In one sentence (maximum), you must first identify and summarize in your own words the problem relative to the use of certain data in predictive policing strategies that you have selected to discuss. In the rest of your entry, you will then explain why and how this is a potential problem for certain minority groups. This will involve applying course concepts to selected pieces of evidence. -Tip: Ensure that you have strong, clear argumentative statements about the problem you have selected at the beginning and at the end of your entry. Such statements are respectively called a thesis statement and a concluding statement. 2) In one sentence or two (maximum), you must ensure that you define in your own words what “predictive policing” consists of. 3) In the rest of your entry, you must explain why and how the problem you have identified with “predictive policing” is significant. This will involve applying course concepts to selected pieces of evidence. To do so, you must: - Select and describe two (2) distinct pieces of evidence (such as data, statistics, examples, expert arguments, etc.) that illustrate the problem you have selected. These two pieces of evidence must be drawn from the materials assigned for Module 5 with the exception of the textbook and Lecture Videos. In other words, the pieces of evidence you select cannot come from the textbook or Lecture Videos and must instead come from one or more of the following sources: the research article by Scot Wortley and Akwasi Owusu-Bempah, the TedX Talk by Akwasi OwusuBempah, or the documentary by Lillian Boctor. - To explain the significance of this problem, you must briefly define and apply one concept from the course to each of the two (2) pieces of evidence you have selected (meaning, you must define and apply two (2) concepts in total – one concept per piece of evidence). - You must pick your two concepts from the following list: Criminal Profiling; Discretion; Discrimination; Over-Policing; Prejudice; Quality-of-life-policing; Racial Profiling; Racism; Systemic Inequality or Systemic Racism. You must define each concept in your own words. -Tip: To apply a concept, you must make a link between the concept and the piece of evidence. Ask yourself: In what way(s) does the concept help you make sense of the evidence selected? 8

When put together, how does the concept and the piece of evidence demonstrate that the problem you have selected is significant/serious?

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There are all types of people in a community who strive to educate themselves and move up in society while others are content with how their lives are and are reluctant to make changes in their lives. The people who are reluctant or are not given opportunities to move up in life get involved with illegal activities. These types of groups within a community start making a habit of getting involved with the police, leading to the police services having a biased opinion regarding the whole community. Police services use a method referred to as predictive policing in which they derive data based on various scenarios to identify any potential criminal activities. Data collected by Scot Wortley and Akwasi Owusu-Bempah in a 2011 article talks about how these groups within societies negatively impact others around them in the eyes of the policing services around Canada. The data was collected through randomly selecting and interviewing members of the Black, Chinese, and White community. the data clearly shows people from the Black community are at a substantial-high risk of being stopped and searched by the police on the basis of suspicion alone compared to the members of Chinese and White communities. The same data shows members of the black community are stopped and searched on more counts than of any other community without any explanation on accounts of why they were stopped, which leads them to feel they were stopped on the basis of their racial background alone. Akwasi Owusu-Bempah also talks about how drugs were not illegal throughout history but how they were designed to target minorities like Black, Latino, and Chinese communities despite them using drugs at the same level as members of the White community. Akwasi Owusu-Bempah gives an example of two high school boys caught in possession of weed before it was legalized, one from a well-off middle-class White family while another from a poor hard-working black family. In this situation, the two boys in similar situations had two different outcomes one of them who had just turned 18 got persecuted and charged with possession leaving a permanent record causing his life to fall apart, while the other who was caught trying to sell weed while being underage was let off with a warning by the police on his family’s threat of calling their lawyer led a successful life after college selling newly legalized weed while a latter could not even get a job at a weed dispensary due to his police record. This predictive policing is a failed attempt at controlling and stopping illegal activities within Canada. Actions of a few within a minority community should not have an impact on the rest of the members of the communities.

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