Patrick Jackson
ProfessorCriminology & Criminal Justice Studies
Sonoma State University
Rohnert Park, CA 94928
Phone: 707.664.2934
email: jackson@sonoma.edu
World wide web: http://www.sonoma.edu/ccjs/faculty/jackbio.shtml
M.A. & Ph.D., Sociology, University of California, Davis
Prior appointments:
Administration of
Justice Department
University of Missouri-St. Louis
UC Davis Sociology Department
Postdoctoral Fellow, Center on Administration of Criminal Justice
U C Davis School of Law
Interests and Activities
Professor Pat Jackson is the founding Editor of the Western Criminology Review, an online scholarly criminology journal that has been devoted to open access principles for the past ten years, ensuring free and immediate access to scholarly information by all.
His published research includes:
- a classical experimental study of parole supervision in the California Youth Authority (now a part of CDCR)
- policy research on the crime reduction and jail crowding implications of proposals for pretrial preventive detention in seven U.S. cities
- a comparative study of the uses of jail confinement in three California counties
- a contiguous cohort study of the movement of inmates and staff from Sonoma County's old linear jail to its new generation jail
- a review of the literature on theories about gangs, taken from a report he completed for the California Attorney General on youth gangs, and a separate study of moral panics about youth gangs in California
- an extensive review of the literature on the efficacy of alternative forms of defense counsel for defendants charged with crime
- the validity of varied criminal data sources for the study of crime
- a nationally representative survey on the systematic errors that exist in the measurement of arson
His most recent publication ("Situated Activities in a Dog Park: Identity and Conflict in Human-Animal Space," 2012 Society & Animals 20/3), available at this link, is an ethnography that examines how people manage animal-related problems and conflicts in a public park, ranging from failing to responsibly manage a dog to a physical altercation between their human caretakers.
He recently completed an evaluation of a curriculum designed to instill responsible parenting among juveniles in a continuation school and has also collected qualitative data on the decision-making criteria used by fire agency personnel as they filter arson incidents.
His web contributions accumulate crime and criminal justice information in The Redwood Highway, which includes SuperCell, California's crime control superhero, along with the Sonoma County Justice Profile, which is used a great deal by local citizens. More recently he created the Pacific Crime Blog, an attempt to bring attention to crime issues distinctive to the Western Region of the U.S.
At present he is involved in several projects:
- a quantitative, ten year followup study of offenders using event history analysis
- research on the role of animal interaction and mentoring in reducing delinquency and adult crime
- using qualitative research strategies to develop restorative justice interventions for young offenders
- a comparative study of the role of evidence in sentencing.
At SSU he teaches classes in criminology, juvenile delinquency and juvenile justice, research methods, media and crime, corrections, and the department's capstone course in CCJS. He has also worked closely with Local, Sonoma County, State and Federal agencies to develop and professionalize the CCJS Department's internship program. Currently he is a member if the Institutional Review Board for the Protection of Human Subjects and has recently served on the School of Social Science Reappointment, Tenure and Promotion committee, the Degree Audit Task Force, Peer Review Committee, and department hiring committee. He served as department chair for a decade and returned to teaching full time in Fall of 2010.
In the local community he volunteers for a public high school, a program for helping foster children, and performs in several music groups for public benefits.