Situational Crime Prevention and Non-Violent Terrorism: A "Soft" Approach Against Ideologically Motivated Tax Refusal (From Reducing Terrorism Through Situational Crime Prevention, P 173-206, 2009, Joshua D. Freilich and Graeme R. Newman, eds., see NCJ-229596)

• NCJ Number: 229604
• Author(s): Roberta Belli; Joshua D. Freilich
• Date Published: 2009
• Length: 34 pages
• Sale Source: Criminal Justice Press/Willow Tree Press
• Publication Format: Book Chapter
• Publication Type: Research (Applied/Empirical)
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This chapter discusses the use of situational crime prevention to examine non-violent acts of terrorism, specifically ideologically motivated tax refusal.

Abstract

This paper explores the applicability of situational crime prevent (SCP) to "ideologically motivated tax refusal," a non-violent crime of omission committed by far-right extremists in the United States as a form of political protest. Most terrorism research focuses on stopping violent behaviors by terrorists, neglecting the relationship existing between terrorism and other serious - but nonviolent - ideological crimes. All previous applications of SCP have been to criminal offenses that require a proactive behavior on the side of the offender. This paper examined these issues as well as factors that contribute to the occurrence of tax refusal among far-rightists, such as the offenders' characteristics, decisionmaking process and resources, to highlight the opportunity structure and possible key points for intervention. In conclusion, the author's suggest the use of eight selected situational techniques that propose a "soft" approach - as defined by Wortley and others in contrast with traditional "hard" SCP (e.g. target-hardening, etc.) - for preventing this crime problem. Figures, notes, and references (Published Abstract)