Keeping criminal trials fair - Free Essay Example

Sample details Pages: 9 Words: 2813 Downloads: 9 Date added: 2017/06/26 Category Law Essay Type Analytical essay Topics: Crime Essay Criminal Law Essay Did you like this example? Judicial staying of criminal proceedings is an exceptional course for the trial judge to take and usually the trial process itself including appropriate judicial directions to the jury, is adequate to ensure that a criminal trial remains fair at common law and Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights, as given effect to in the Human Rights Act 1998. Critically evaluate this comment in the light of appropriate case law. The fundamental issue being raised is the fairness of criminal trials. The remedies that are used by criminal courts when the judge decides that there has been some unfairness in the proceedings include staying of proceedings, quashing of indictments and excluding evidence. Don’t waste time! Our writers will create an original "Keeping criminal trials fair" essay for you Create order Exclusion of evidence can be made during the trial process, by means of the trial judge directing that the jury ignore that evidence, and staying of proceedings stops the trial process, and is only exercised when there has been an abuse of the process. English fair trial jurisprudence commenced from domestic common law, then developed via section 78 of Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, and thereafter via international human rights law, in particular Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) incorporated into domestic legislation by the Human Rights Act 1988 (HRA 1988), as discussed below. Regarding the exclusion of evidence, the original common law rule from the mid-eighteenth century to early twentieth century, was that the admissibility of evidence at trial was wholly unaffected by the circumstances in which it was obtained 1, and also reaffirmed in 1955 by the Court of Appeal. 2 The trial judgeà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s discretion at common law to exclude relevant evidence was provided in Sang, 3 which laid down two principles that evidence could be excluded, firstly if it was to have a prejudicial effect outweighing its potential value, and secondly to exclude improperly or unfairly obtained evidence. In Sang the trial judge ruled that he had no discretion to exclude evidence relating to the commission of an offence to conspire to utter forged banknotes on the basis that it had been initiated by an agent provocateur, that is, an agent enticing the defendant to commit the crime, being the defence of entrapment. This was reaffirmed by the House of Lords, in which the existence of the discretion to exclude improperly or unfairly obtained evidence was recognised, but that this was limited to evidence obtained after the commission of the offence. 4 ______________________________________________________________________________ 1 R v Warwickshall [1783] 1 Leach 263; R v Griffin [1809] Russ Ry 151 2 Kuruma à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" R [1955] A.C. 197 3 R v Sang [1980] AC 402 HL 4 Brannan à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Peek [1948] 1 K.B. 68 The trial judgeà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s discretion to exclude evidence was only exercised in exceptional circumstances. In Apicella 5, a sample of bodily fluid taken from the defendant in a routine examination and used to verify that he had passed on a venereal disease to the victims was not held to be an unfair use of prosecution evidence. Furthermore, even illegality of police procedures could not render such evidence inadmissible as in Fox à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Chief Constable of Gwent 6, where although it was held that the actions of police officers in unlawfully entering the defendantà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s property to arrest and take him to the police station to provide a breath sample, instrumental in securing a conviction for drunk driving, the sample itself as evidence was still admissible evidence. Since the mid 19 80s, the common law approach was radically altered by the development of the exclusionary discretion under section 78 PACE 1984, which provides:- In any proceedings, the court may refuse to allow evidence on which the prosecution proposes to rely to be given if it appears to the court that, having regard to all the circumstances, including the circumstances in which the evidence was obtained, the admission of the evidence would have such an adverse effect on the fairness of the proceedings that the court ought not to admit it. The landmark case of Mason 7 showed that the Court of Appeal was prepared to interpret section 78 broadly and marked the departure from the common law approach. The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal and quashed the conviction of the defendant, as his confession had been obtained after being falsely informed by police officers that his fingerprint had been found at the scene of the crime. As stated above, the defence of entrapment, (Sang, ibid), was not considered a valid defence at common law. However, in Smurthwaite; Gill 8 the trial judge took into account such allegations when exercising his discretion under section 78, though the evidence was admitted as the trial judge decided that the police officer, though posing as an undercover hit man, was not acting as an agent provocateur when he recorded the secret conversations of a husband and wife hiring him to kill each other, as the defendants made their own efforts and were not enticed. In the case of identification eviden ce, the trial judge is required to warn the jury of the need for caution and explain the reasons for it, particularly the particular dangers attached to the evidence. This is the Turnbull direction, in which the judge asks the jury to carefully consider the circumstances in which the witness saw the offender and a reminder that even a confident witness can be wrong. 9 ______________________________________________________________________________ 5 Apicella [1985] Cr App R 295 6 [1986] 1 AC 281, HL 7 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Mason [1988] 1 WLR 139 CA 8 R v Smurthwaite; R v Gill [1994] 98 Cr App R 437 CA 9 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Turnbull [1976] 3 All ER 549 In Boardman à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" DPP 10 Lord Hailsham laid down further guidelines in identification cases, that if the only evidence the prosecution has is a history of a pattern of similar offences, this would be weak and prejudicial evidence, and a à ¢Ã ¢â€š ¬Ã‹Å"hallmarkà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ or à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‹Å"signatureà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ is required, as demonstrated in Mullen 11, in which the à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‹Å"signatureà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ was the use of a torch to crack the window glass by means of a blow to gain entry. Identification evidence reduces the need to establish such a à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‹Å"signatureà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢, but an identification parade has been deemed to be unnecessary if the witness knows the defendant. 12 In Beckford 13 such a warning was deemed necessary even though the witness knew the defendants and the main issue at hand was not accuracy. The prosecution is required to demonstrate that the circumstances of the identification are of good quality to avoid a submission of no case, in which the judge withdraws the case from the jury. However, in cases involving an abnormal or perverted personality, such as in cases of sexual offences, the jury may attach excessive weight to the pattern of previous convictions in ma king a decision about the defendantà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s guilt, the à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‹Å"similar facts principleà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢, as in West 14, in which Rosemary West was accused of complicity in her husband Frederick Westà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s abduction, torture, rape and murder of young girls, and all evidence relating to her sexual history was laid bare. The justification for the admission of such evidence was to demonstrate that she had such a perverted personality that she was capable of anything, and the Court of Appeal dismissed any prejudice. In such cases, it is for the trial judge to make the appropriate directions to the jury and to consider whether to exclude such evidence, but as the Criminal Law Revision Committee suggested 15, this problem does not exist in France where the defendantà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s criminal record is read out at the commencement of the trial. In any event, the law is inclined to ban evidence which shows that the defendant has the disposition or propens ity to behave in a certain way if the probative value of the evidence is exceeded by its prejudicial effect. However, in Kray and others 16, it was held that a number of offences of a similar character could constitute a series of offences, in which the evidence relating to one could be admissible in the trial of another. In such cases the judge can exercise his discretion to direct that counts be severed and order separate trials, to avoid joining of the charges, it he considers that this would affect fairness of the proceedings. ______________________________________________________________________________ 10 [1990] 90 Cr App R 325 11 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Mullen [1992] Crim L R 735 12 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v- Reid [1994] Crim LR 442 13 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Beckford [1993] Crim LR 944 14 The Times, 3 Apr 1996 15 Evidence (General) Eleventh Report (1972) 16 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Kray and others [ 1969] 53 Cr App R 569 In Sawoniuk 17, regarding the admission of evidence of multiple instances of the defendantà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s mistreatment of Jewish prisoners in a war crimes prosecution, the Court of Appeal permitted the presentation of this evidence but as background evidence than under the à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‹Å"similar facts principleà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢. Following on from section 78, the HRA 1988 enabled the direct application of the European Convention on Human Rights into English law. Article 6(1) of the ECHR provides that à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearingà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦.by an independent and impartial tribunal established by lawà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ . The main impact of the application of the ECHR is that the trial judge was given considerable discretion to ascertain whether the proceedings as a whole, including the way evidence was taken, was fair. In Shannon 18, entrapment was a key consideration for the trial judge in deciding whether to rule evidence as inadmissible, but did not justify exclusion of the evidence. The agent provocateur, in this instance, was a journalist who posed as an Arab Sheikh and the defendant supplied him with drugs, but the appeal that this evidence was unfairly obtained and thereby the defendant was denied a fair trial with regard to Article 6 of the ECHR was unsuccessful. The trial judge, in exercising his discretion whether to exclude the evidence, had to consider whether admission would compromise the fairness of the trial as if the evidence was unreliable or tainted. In considering this, the Court of Appeal looked at the European Courtà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s judgement in Texeira 19. The Court decided that there had been a violation of Article 6(1) as the defendant had been denied a fair trial from the outset. Two undercover police officers asked to buy heroin from the defendant, who bought the drugs for them, but the court had regard to the lack of evidence that he was predisposed to crime a nd the offence would not have been committed but for the officersà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ intervention. The Court of Appeal distinguished Shannon from Texiera on the basis that there was not an actual incitement by the agent provocateur to commit the offence in the former case. The House of Lords, looking at Shannon, decided that the Texiera judgement did not intend to state that there was a breach of Article 6 every time police officers provided an opportunity to commit an offence and the person took advantage of it. 20 ______________________________________________________________________________ 17 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Sawoniuk [2000] 2 Cr A R 220 CA 18 [2001] 1 Cr App R 168 19 Texiera de Castro à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Portugal [1999] 28 EHRR 313 para 74; Att-Genà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s Reference (No 2 of 2001) 1 WLR 1869 [2001] 20 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Looseley: Att-Genà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s Reference (No 3 of 2000) [2 002] 1 Cr App R 29 Regarding the exercise of the trial judgeà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s discretion to stay proceedings for abuse of process, the case of Latif 21 considered whether illegality in the investigation process could lead to a prosecution being stayed for abuse of process. The House of Lords considered that such illegality could have this effect but that this would not necessarily lead to a stay of proceedings. Lord Steyn set a test: à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“the judge must weigh in the balance the public interest in ensuring that those that are charged with grave crimes should be tried and the competing public interest in not conveying the impression that the court will adopt the approach that the end justifies the means.à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  In Chalkley 22, the scope of section 78 in exclusion of evidence was regarded as entirely distinct from the question of whether a prosecution should be stayed for abuse of process. In Looseley, the trial judge exercised his discretion to stay the p roceedings. In this case, undercover police officers cajoled a defendant into selling them heroin by plying him with cigarettes and making repeated requests, when the defendant had actually disclaimed any interest in drug dealing. The trial judge decided that the officers had solicited the offence and ordered a stay of the proceedings for an abuse of the process. The Court of Appeal overturned this decision and decided that the defendant had voluntarily provided the drugs to the officers and had had previous convictions for drug dealing. The House of Lords issued monumental directives regarding the importance of maintaining fairness and integrity of criminal proceedings. The House of Lords allowed this defendantà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s appeal and Lord Nicholls stated:- à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“Every court has an inherent power and duty to prevent abuse of its process. This is a fundamental principle of lawà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦It is simply not acceptable that the state through its agents should lure its citizens into committing acts forbidden by the law and then seek to prosecute them for doing so. That would be entrapment.à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚  The House of Lords agreed that a stay of proceedings on the grounds that there had been an abuse of process was the only acceptable remedy. However, it was also considered that section 78 would be applicable where tainted evidence could be excluded from the trial process without having to stop it. A clear distinction has been drawn between a willing defendant ready to supply drugs and someone who was coerced into this via a campaign of repeated requests and encouragements. ______________________________________________________________________________ 21 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Latif [1996] 1 All ER 353 22 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Chalkley [1998] 2 Cr App R 79 Lord Hoffman laid down five criteria for the admissibility of evidence, having had regard to the guidance of trial judges in previo us cases. These criteria have refined the Court of Appealà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s approach to the jurisprudence on entrapment and have established a framework for trial judges to follow when deciding when to exercise their discretion to exclude evidence or stay proceedings. Staying of proceedings is obviously considered to be the only remedy where there has been a clear abuse of process, but this must be decided upon with regard to the facts of the case. Fairness of proceedings can also be affected by whether the prosecution chooses to withhold disclosure on the grounds of public interest, but this must be on the basis of an informed decision after consulting the Treasury Solicitor 23. Public interests include the protection of police operations, though this obviously conflicts with cases where entrapment has been used. Recommendations have been provided by the Royal Commission on Criminal Justice that trial judges be given the power to exclude repetitious or conflicting evidence 2 4, an attempt to avoid time-wasting in this respect. Recommendations have also been provided by the Auld Review of the Criminal Courts, which highlighted the problems that may occur when evidence obtained through deception or otherwise, is excluded, even if it is potentially reliable, and looked at the overlap between the courtsà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢ power to stay proceedings as an abuse of its process and its powers to exclude evidence. The Review called for simplification of the jurisprudence regarding the exclusion of unfairly obtained evidence and that of staying a prosecution on the ground of an abuse of process. In fact, the Review called for more trust to be given to the trial judgeà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s discretion, as stated:- à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“The English law of criminal evidence should, in general, move away from technical rules of inadmissibility to trusting judicial and lay fact finders to give relevant evidence the weight it deservesà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ . In conclusion, it is submitted that the trial judgeà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢s present powers to exclude evidence are sufficient. The trial judge has an extremely wide discretion to exclude unfairly obtained evidence and to stay proceedings if he or she considers there has been an abuse of the process. The exercise of staying of proceedings is only rarely exercised, as there has to be a clear abuse of process, as in Looseley, otherwise the judge can just direct the exclusion of such evidence. The guidelines provided from section 78 and thereafter the human rights law incorporated after 1988 have further refined and developed the original common law approach into a fairer system of the administration of criminal justice. As stated in Montgomery and Coultier 25, the Scots law requirement is to balance the interests of the defendant as opposed to the public interest in ensuring that a serious crime is prosecuted, and this should be the main consideration in English law. ________________________________________ ______________________________________ 23 R à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Horseferry Road Magistrates Court, ex parte Bennett (No. 2) [1994] 1 All ER 289 24 Cm 2263, para 8.13 25 Montgomery à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" Coultier à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" v à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" HM Advocate [2001] 2 WLR 779 BIBLIOGRAPHY A Guide to The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984: TC Walters MA Oà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â€ž ¢Connell (Financial Training Publications) pp 103-104 Criminal Evidence (5th edition): Richard May Steven Powles 5th edition (Sweet and Maxwell) pp10-02 à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" 10-33 Criminal Evidence: Paul Roberts Adrian Zuckerman (Oxford) pp147 à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" 175 Criminal Evidence Procedure: The Essential Framework (2nd edition): Stephen Seabrooke John Sprack (Blackstone) Evidence and the Adversarial Process à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" The Modern Law (2nd edition): Jenny McEwan (Hart Publishing) pp 197 à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" 221 Human Rights, Serious Crimes and Criminal Procedure: The Hamlyn Lectures: Andrew Ashworth QC (Sweet Maxwell) pp 52 à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã¢â‚¬Å" 87 Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984: A Practical Guide: Greg Powell Chris Magrath (Oyez) pp 192-206 The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (3rd edition): Michael Zander (Sweet Maxwell) pp 172 251

Poetry Reflecting Cultural Progress A Comparative...

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Essay on The Dark Writings of Edgar Allan Poe - 1679 Words

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Subcultures Sociology and Chicago School free essay sample

This essay explores firstly the insight offered by applying aspects of the Chicago Schools theory, specifically the Concentric Zone Model and analysis of the City, to the subcultures group of gangs. Their ideas will be explored and contrasted with those in Brown, Vigil and Taylor 2012 article: The Categorization of Blacks in Los Angles: the Emergence of Street Gangs.Further to this I will analyses the limitations of the Chicago Schools theory and contrast this with insight offered form the Birmingham School of thought. The notion of culture can be conceptualized in a variety of different ways but in mineral terms can be purported to encompass the behavioral norms of a society and the knowledge, beliefs and laws which inform their customs (Taylor, 1871). Similarly, the definition Of what constitutes a subculture is contested and open to multiple interpretations.The common theme of subcultures definitions includes the notion that subcultures construct, perceive and portray themselves a s isolated groups separate from the parent culture (Macdonald, 2001, 152). The relationship be;en culture and subculture can arguably be understood through the subcultures subordinate, subaltern and subterranean relationship principally the vestures inferior status which has been conferred through conceptual difference (Thornton, 1995, 4).The Chicago School was established in 1 982 and remained at the pinnacle of sociological thought through to the late sass. The American sociological tradition, which was influenced greatly by the work of Druthers, Simmer and Townies, has focused largely on the ecological model of society and on the emergence of subcultures, a result of arbitration with the City at the Crux of social investigation (Williams, 2007). Central to the schools work on the city is Park and Burgess Concentric ZoneModel which uses an amalgamation of ethnographic methods and ecology to construct a diagram of urban land use (Mansions and Plumper, 2005). The Concentric Zone Model theory proposes that the form of the City falls into five concentric rin gs, formed through an organic rhythm as opposed to strategic forethought. Each band is colored by levels of desirability and the social consequences of each zone, with the city centre as the most degenerate area impacted highly by social changes such as poverty, overcrowding and immigration (Mansions and Plumper, 2005).Social dislocations, such as: gangs, violence and crime, for the Chicago School are ironically considered to be consequences of the intersection of urban ecology and social stratification (Headgear). Brown, Vigil and Tailors article focuses on the lived reality of the African-American community from a historical perspective in an attempt to explain gang formation and in doing so stresses the significance Of the effects Of racism. Central to their argue meet is the concept of multiple marginality who ICC reflects the complexities and persistence of racial forces on the African-American experience (Vigil, 1978).The image of the African-American community is arguably intrinsically linked tit that of, guns, drugs, gangs and murder making it hard to separate the two ideals from each other however this negates the fact that the African- American community thrived for over a century and a half before the conditions deteriorated (Brown, Vigil, Taylor, 2012, 225). The rise of gangs was a result of the normalization of the Black community which ranged from employment discrimination to social segregation, a process by which the opportunities and prospects of both adults and youth in the co mmunity was severely limited (Degrade, 1980).The Chicago Schools explanation for the cause of gangs contrasts that which s presented in the article. Robert Park, suggested that gangs are a result of city wilderness influenced by their location in the concentric zone model without regard to race, creed or color (Park, 1927). Brown, Vigil and Tailors article proposes that this idea overlooks the way in which the African- Americans place in the Concentric Zone model was determined by racist attitudes. Vigil (1980) suggests that, the African-Americans living in Chicago Were forcibly segregated and relegated to the fringes of society into the least desirable social and economic conditions at the city centre as a result of their ace. The two theories align in the sense that the further away you get from the city centre the better off you are but disagree as to why this is. This fundamental difference in thinking leads to different conceptions of gangs, with the Concentric Zone Model offering a useful description of crime and gang stratification but failing to provide an accurate explanation.Cohen and Taylor (1 989), suggest that the importance the Chicago school places on space overlooks the fundamental issue of race which fundamentally shaped Chicago and is inextricably linked with the division of class and opportunity. The Chicago School overlooked the importance of the African-Americans forced segregation and rather focused on other ethnic groups successful assimilation and succes sful social mobility through the process of succession and dominance, options not available to the African-American population.Further criticism of the Chicago Schools theory is historically and contextually specific and therefore dated in its relevance, for example, in Auckland, the City Centre rent prices are higher than those on the outskirts, which is essentially the opposite to the Concentric Zone Model (Macro Auckland, n. ). The ideas of the Birmingham school (CSS) broke away from the concepts of the Chicago School favoring a neo-Marxian approach focusing on class and power. The CSS rejected the ethnographic approach of the American tradition and focused on semiotic analysis in an attempt to deconstruct the assigned meanings of subcultures.The CSS focused on the emergence of youth subcultures in Britain however their theory is useful in the analysis of gangs in Chicago as it introduces the idea of subcultures as a site Of resistance against the parent culture (Clarke et al. 1976). Rapid migration into he Transitional Zone of the City produced ramifications that the African- American community were unable to deal with further increasing their racial isolation, which accompanied with racial oppression lead to the emergence of African- American gangs as a form of retaliation (Collins, 1977).African- American gangs such as the Black Panther movement engaged in political action against the oppressive actions of the white powers and were often acts of self-defense as opposed to provocation. The larger gangs were disseminated in the late 1 sass resulting in a generation of youth without role oodles in search of a new identity that was ultimately found in gang life (Alonso, 1999). The formation of gangs and gang membership initially provided as a means of social resistance but was transformed into bonds of necessity as the youth required protection from external threats and rivalries.Further to this the youth were largely uneducated which made opportunities available to them limited, the youth sought employment and the gangs offered drug sale commissions and robberies (Davis, 1992). In conclusion, our understanding of subcultures can be enhanced through the academic abates of subcultures theorists. The Chicago Schools work on the Concentric Zone Model revealed the Way in which the early city of Chicago was divided in terms of urban ecology.While the article by Brown, Vigil and Taylor contest the idea that the concentric bands have been formed through organic rhythm and proposes rather that this has taken place through the historical patterns of racism. In contrast the work of the Birmingham School allows for the deconstruction of the norms that are usually in ferred to present Brown, Vigil and Tailors premise that gang culture is not inherent to African-American society but rather as a socialized habit.Despite the limitations of each theory, their contribution to the understating of subcultures activity has successfully enhanced and deepened the multiple understandings that we have of subcultures groupings and have assisted in providing a language to code the way that we analysis them.