West Side Rag — Crime On The Upper West Side Over the Decades

“Crime is constantly fluctuating,” said Dr. Jeffrey Butts, a research professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, in a recent phone interview. “The numbers go up and they go down,” he said, and looking at short-term changes doesn’t reflect meaningful trends. “You never understand the history of something until you can look at it with a little bit of distance.” Continue reading West Side Rag — Crime On The Upper West Side Over the Decades

MSN — La Masacre de la Escuela de Texas fue el Tiroteo Número 203 de EEUU en Todo 2022

“Es una mezcla de racismo, resentimiento de clase, miedo al cambio, inexistente control de armas y políticos que quieren inflamar y explotar todo esto para mantenerse en el poder”, explicó Jeffrey Butts, profesor del centro John Jay de Justicia Criminal de la Universidad de Nueva York. Continue reading MSN — La Masacre de la Escuela de Texas fue el Tiroteo Número 203 de EEUU en Todo 2022

Governing Magazine — What We’ve Learned — and Failed to Learn — from a Million COVID Deaths

Many criminologists blame the pandemic and its societal and economic disruptions for the spike in homicides over the past couple of years. “It’s not that the whole society fell apart,” says Jeffrey Butts, director of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. “It’s just that there are enough people who were already living on the edge, and this pushed them off of it.” Continue reading Governing Magazine — What We’ve Learned — and Failed to Learn — from a Million COVID Deaths

The Virginian-Pilot — In Portsmouth, Violence Interrupters Defuse Tense Scenes Before the Bullets Fly

Jeffrey Butts, a researcher at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, likens it to the decades-long — and eventually successful — campaign to end smoking. “So can that strategy be used to reduce the incidence of gun violence? And that’s the big question,” Butts said. Continue reading The Virginian-Pilot — In Portsmouth, Violence Interrupters Defuse Tense Scenes Before the Bullets Fly

National Catholic Register — How Restorative Justice Helped Make the Justice System Work Better in Seattle

If done properly, restorative justice can foster “the most natural human response to crime — to try to talk things through and resolve the conflict,” said Jeffrey Butts, director of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City. Continue reading National Catholic Register — How Restorative Justice Helped Make the Justice System Work Better in Seattle