Date of Graduation
12-2022
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts in Sociology (MA)
Degree Level
Graduate
Department
Sociology and Criminal Justice
Advisor/Mentor
Jeffrey Gruenewald
Committee Member
Grant Drawve
Second Committee Member
Christopher Shields
Keywords
Terrorism, American Terrorism
Abstract
The purpose of the current study is to investigate the effects of legislation changes on how terrorists are adjudicated in American federal courts. The overarching question is: how have prosecutorial and sentencing outcomes changed in response to homeland security policy shifts over the last few decades? The project examines the impact of policy on changes to terrorists’ sentencing in three time periods, marked by three major events: The 1993 World Trade Center Attack, the 1995 Oklahoma City Bombing, and the attack on the Twin Towers (9/11/2001). In addition to terrorists’ demographic and background attributes (i.e., gender, age, terrorism category), the following sentencing variables were examined: USC Chapter codes, sentence length, count resolution and case resolution. Data were retrieved from the American Terrorism Study (ATS) and used to explore potential changes. The results support expectations that there has been a change to the prosecution and sentencing of terrorism across the last several decades.
Citation
Bettis, G. G. (2022). Exploring Change and Stability in Counterterrorism Policy, Prosecution, and Sentencing of Terrorists in America Over the Last Three Decades in the United States. Graduate Theses and Dissertations Retrieved from https://scholarworks.uark.edu/etd/4694
Included in
Criminology and Criminal Justice Commons, Defense and Security Studies Commons, Terrorism Studies Commons