Journal of Criminal Justice Vol. 18, pp.

2 6 1 - 2 7 4 (1990)
All rights reserved. Printed in U.S.A.

0047 2 3 5 2 / 9 0 $3.00 + .00

Copyright 1990 Pergamon Press plc

POPULAR CULTURE A N D CRIMINAL JUSTICE:

A PRELIMINARY A N A L Y S I S

GRAEME R. NEWMAN
School of Criminal Justice
State University of New York at Albany
Albany, New York 12222

ABSTRACT
This article reviews criminal justice themes in various popular culture media--chiefly comics, TV,
and movies. It sets up a preliminary scheme for classification o f motifs, points to areas that are crucial
for research, and makes some general observations about the significance of some of the trends observed f o r criminological researchers o f differing viewpoints.

INTRODUCTION
Research on popular culture has surged in
the 1980s, but little work has been done on
popular culture as it relates to criminal justice.~ It has been estimated that in the mid1980s detective, police, and other criminal
justice-related programs accounted for some
eighty percent of prime-time TV viewing
(Berman, 1987). If broader criminal justicerelated themes are included, for example,
crime and punishment, (Marongiu and Newman, 1987), justice and injustice, violence
and corruption, the portion of air time devoted to criminal justice must be equaled only
by soap operas 2 (in which the criminal justice-related content increased considerably
during the time frame covered by this review
[Chase, 1986]) and game shows. If other media are c o n s i d e r e d - - c o m i c books and popular n o v e l s - - t h e imagery of criminal justice in
popular culture is even more pervasive. Comic
books, as discussed below, are a major venue
261

for criminal justice motifs. At their height in

the 1950s, nearly all children read them. They
have continued to have an enormous circulation through the 1980s, not just among children, but adults as well. 3 Children's cartoon
shows on TV have imitated many of these
favorites (Superman, Captain A m e r i c a , Spiderman, etc). To this long list may be added
the western, still popular for movies and novels, and the extensive use of criminal justice
themes in the lyrics of popular music (Chase,
1986).
From this brief overview, the enormous
extent to which Americans are exposed
through the media to criminal justice and related themes can be seen. It is incredible that
researchers in criminal justice have ignored
this rich and provocative source of data for
so long. This is especially striking, given the
recent penological emphasis on community
corrections. In view of the potential for popular-culture stereotypes, which prevail in the
media, to influence public opinion on various

262

GRAEME R. NEWMAN

issues, it would be expected that scholars

would examine any possible link between
community attitudes and opinions concerning
crime and punishment and these stereotypes.
Of course there has been a large amount of
research on the question of whether violence
on TV causes those who watch it to be violent. The conclusions of this research are
controversial, though there is a feeling among
professionals that there ought to be less violence on TV (Pearl, Bonthilet, and Lazarla,
1982). 4 However, empirical research on this
topic will continue to provide ambiguous results because of the assumptions made about
the messages actually being conveyed through
the media. Very little research has been conducted to analyze the content of the media
portrayal of violence or the media portrayal
of the criminal justice system. This article
examines the general field of popular culture
with a view to identifying some important issues pertaining to criminal justice. It is argued that this is a step that needs to be taken
before an attempt is made to measure the effects of popular culture on individual or community opinions. Furthermore, previous research that focused on the effects of TV
violence assumed that the process is one-way
(from the media to the people). The opposite
case can be argued: that the media reflect the
consciousness of the masses.
Probably there is an influence in both directions. To separate popular culture from the
individuals who are immersed in it may be a
highly artificial way to research the problem.
Instead, this article provides a mapping of the
content of popular culture and points to places
on this map where criminal justice may well
benefit from further research. This approach
is in line with the humanistic tradition, which
encourages discovery of unrecognized or hidden themes and implications in the content of
literate and artistic works. This approach is
appropriate for research on popular culture.
In terms of criminal justice research, this
approach directly follows the line begun by
Leslie Wilkins (1985), who viewed the public as "consumers" of criminal justice, s In
addition, some recent studies on the demand
for punishment also have called for an analysis of what contributes to this demand (Pease,

1989). Market researcla long has recognized

the visual media as powerful vehicles though
which to assess and t0cus consumer demand.
Advertisers are very careful in the programs
they select for their advemsements: they wish
to reach a particular type of audience. To
achieve that goal, the 5, must unaerstan~l program content. This article can make a contribution in that direction. More importantly,
it can facilitate understanding of popular demand for punishment of criminals.
THE MED1A AND MESSAGES OF
POPULAR JUSTICE
Because certain themes occur throughout
various media while other themes are typical
of particular media, it is difficult to develop
a coherent classification of criminal justice
media themes. The following draws heavily
on the pioneering work of Chase (1986), who
examined popular culture in relation to the
portrayal of law and lawyers. It should be
recognized that a book could probably be
written about each category. This article simply points to areas in which research would
be most illuminating.

Television Detectives
Cops and robbers have dominated primetime television since its inception. Martine
Kane, Private Eye (1949-54) and Man Against
Crime (1949-54, 1956) represent the beginning of the ongoing American obsession with
detectives, crooks, and law and order. Critics
have observed that the portrayal of the criminal justice system in these programs is more
mythical than real. However, the genre 6 has
undergone important transtormations during
the course of its history. The early programs
portrayed the detective as the simple, gungho cop (private or regular) out to track down
the despicable foe, the criminal. Dragnet
perhaps displayed this type at its finest. The
somewhat seedy private eye, often at loggerheads with the public police (for example,
Mike Hammer), took over in the 1960s. By
the 1970s there was an enormous variety of
detectives, each with his own modus operandi. Some were violent (Kojak), some were

Popular Culture and Criminal Justice

cunning (Columbo), some were brilliantly organized (Mission Impossible), yet others as
smart as Sherlock Holmes (Raymond Burr in
his policeman role in lronside).
In the 1980s attempts were made to reproduce the old detective genre (The New Mike
Hammer) and to continue a heavy emphasis
on violence (Hunter, Miami Vice), but there
was also a definite tendency to portray cops
as human beings with conflicts and hang-ups.
The clearest examples of programs that have
portrayed cops as sympathetic people are
Cagney and Lacy and Hill Street Blues. The
1980s have been concerned with identity.
Miami Vice perhaps portrays this concern with
identity, especially through its MTV-like atmosphere. The program always has long periods of music and reflection with close-ups
on the faces of the hero cops. The style, except for the music, is reminiscent of the Wild
West movies, with their "deep" and introspective gunmen, so well played by Clint
Eastwood and others. The focus on identity
prompts questions about the audience these
programs seek to reach. In general, adolescents tend to be preoccupied with identity. It
could be hypothesised that programs that emphasize this aspect of policing are trying to
reach a younger audience. The models of justice presented--whether violent, fair, or corr u p t - a r e of great significance in this regard.
In contrast to the portrayal of police, the
portrayal of criminals has not changed. Most
criminals on TV have been, and still are, portrayed as white materialists, motivated by
greed and lasciviousness (Berman, 1987). This
raises an important question pertinent to the
concerns of the radical criminologists: if the
media are manipulated by the ruling class,
what is to be gained by this one-sided portrayal of criminals? A particularly intriguing
question is why greed--probably the most
cherished value of capitalism--is portrayed
as criminal. (This would also appear to be the
message conveyed in the box-office success,
Wall Street). That the majority of criminals
are portrayed as white, when the majority of
criminals, according to the FBI, are Black,
also raises questions concerning the image of
criminality the "ruling class" is attempting to
produce, it is widely believed that conser-

263

vatives use racial stereotypes in propaganda.

What they have to gain by denying the criminality of Blacks is certainly puzzling, unless
the media are dominated by liberals.

Soap Operas
These are perhaps one of the most important areas awaiting study. The more common
image of the cop (possibly "inner-city lowerclass"), as presented on nightly prime-time
shows, is usually absent from daytime soaps.
Instead, the focus is on professional roles, with
an emphasis not so much on life in the big
city (though the soaps may be set in these
settings) but rather on middle-class interpersonal relationships, patterned after the smalltown atmosphere made popular by Peyton
Place. Thus, the realism is often so vivid that
viewers have difficulty distinguishing the actors from the roles they play. Indeed, some
research has suggested that soaps may be a
major source of information about the larger
society for millions of people (Allen, 1985).
Soap-opera characters include a large representation of professionals, such as doctors or
lawyers, and if cops are portrayed, they tend
to be well dressed "professionals" (wellmannered detectives) or small-town sheriffs
who know the other players well.
The fine line between reality and fiction is
well demonstrated by the real-life drama, The
People's Court. The cases are real, but they
are portrayed dramatically on TV. Several
imitations of this show have created fictitious
courtroom drama, attempting to reproduce
exactly The People's Court format (e.g., Divorce Court). The focus in these courtroom
scenes is not so much on the cliff-hanger of
"who dunnit?" (the hook in the traditional
courtroom drama, like that of Perry Mason)
but on the personal lives and conflicts of ordinary people.

Nonfiction Television
Although there is constant coverage of crime
on local and national news programs, this
coverage is not realistic. As Graber (1980)
has shown, crime news presents a picture of
crime that is almost opposite to what official

264

G R A E M E R. N E W M A N

records indicate. The ordinary viewer would

conclude from news coverage of crime that
eighty percent or more of it is violent. According to FBI statistics, the reverse is generally the case. However, in the 1980s, with
the advent of more magazine-format TV programs, there has been expanded coverage of
white-collar criminals and con artists, along
with a more direct examination of certain aspects of the criminal justice system through
interviews and talk shows. The effects of this
new "realism" (actual convicted murderers
and other criminal types have been interviewed live on many programs) is yet to be
assessed. Indeed, on many radio talk programs in the 1980s, it has been common for
inmates to call in from prison and exchange
views with the host or the guests.
The gamut of criminal justice issues, from
the death penalty to community corrections
to the causes of crime, have been discussed
constantly on such programs as Donahue,
Oprah Winfrey, and Nightline, and in the
1980s the living-room nightly news drama
changed from the violence of the Vietnam war
to the mass unrest and revolutions in the Middle East. A great deal of media attention was
suddenly focused on Islamic ways of life, with
actual reporting of executions. For a period
it was possible to switch on the television and
see "traitors" actually hanging by the neck
moments after their public executions, an indication that the distance that had developed
in the twentieth century between the public
and punishment had diminished. This is a
challenging observation since it has been argued recently that the public is actually further away from the concrete idea of punishment, as experienced in small communities
two hundred years ago, when most punishment was public (Newman, 1984; 1985).
Through television people may now be closer
to the practice of punishing criminals than at
any other time since the eighteenth century.

Advertising
There is much to be done in analysis of the
advertisement portrayal (and, by inference,
the assumptions made by advertising execu-

tives) of criminal justice. A salient example

is provided by the advertisements using John
Houseman in his role as the quintessential authority figure of Paper Chase, in which he
tells viewers that the people he represents
"...
make money the old fashioned way:
they earn it." The complex conservative ideology underlying this pronouncement needs
to be analyzed. 7 Another advertisement, for
a type of outboard motor, portrays two convicts escaping from prison. They steal a boat,
only to find that they cannot start the motor.
A well dressed state trooper purrs up beside
them in his nice motorboat. "Looks like you
boys could do with a Mariner Motor . . ."
he says, bedecked with dark glasses and
speaking with a strong southern accent. Portrayals of many other law-enforcement situations have been used to sell a variety of
products. A popular one is the individual
pulled over for a traffic offense. The authority figure of the policeman is apparently used
with success in selling products.
The extent to which certain corporations
have portrayed themselves as "the pillar of
the law" is also quite impressive. Honeywell,
in a "public service announcement" (30 seconds), was portrayed as collaborating with a
white, ethnic-mix cop team (very professional), which was using a Honeywell computer to collect key evidence. Honeywell representatives burst into the courtroom just in
time to support the prosecutor. 8 State (and local governments) also have made considerable use of TV advertisements to promote their
aims. For example, the "take a bite out of
crime" pronouncements have promoted the
idea that it is acceptable to call the police and
report law violations by acquaintances. There
was a period when people in New York were
especially encouraged (with rewards) to turn
in tax cheats. The many advertisements by
local enforcement organizations to communities to "watch for crime," portraying themselves as the "people's friend," are also significant in the light of persistent reports of
corruption in police and government agencies. The CBS program "60 Minutes" often
has uncovered hidden dimensions to these
public-relations ploys. 9 The campaign against

Popular Culture and Criminal Justice

265

drugs also merits close scrutiny, in view of

its apparent lack of success.

libidinous state. Clearly much ideological

conceptual clarification is needed in this area.

Pop/rock Music

Comics

As Allan Bloom, in his recent best seller,

The Closing of the American Mind, has pointed

out, pop/rock music as a source of culture
and value, as an "ideology," has rarely been
seriously studied. This is odd, in view of the
enormous amount of time students spend listening to pop/rock m u s i c - - a n activity made
so much easier with the technology of
"Walkman" radios and tape players. Bloom
has argued that the blatant and raw sexuality
and violence promoted by pop/rock music
and its companion videos threatens to turn the
youth of today (and the adults of tomorrow)
into barbarians, obsessed with power, "sex,
hate and a smarmy, hypocritical version of
brotherly love." Whatever the interpretations
of the form and content of pop/rock music,
it is clear that, even at the superficial level,
criminal justice issues are prominent in the
lyrics. Themes range from prison, as in "Jailhouse Rock" (1957), and punishment, as in
"Tom Dooley" (death penalty, 1958), to Eric
Clapton's "I Shot the Sheriff" (1974) and
"Ride that Train, High on Cocaine. "] Themes
of violence (often horrific), drug taking, and
drugged states are rife throughout music video.
What relationship this music may have to
criminal justice remains to be explored. But
given the enormous commercial value of the
music business and the incredible market of
youth, and especially the mass nature of the
market, surely this deserves careful study.
The issue presents a substantial challenge
to the ideology theorists, for the popularity
of rock music appears to cross all class lines.
That pop/rock music is often regarded as
"inherently radical," in the sense that devotion to it separates young people from adults,
is another reason for it to be studied, especially since official data suggest that crime is
most prevalent in the age group that listens
to this music most. One problem is that it is
just as easy to interpret rock music as "reactionary," given its emphasis on violence,
hatred, and return to a kind of uncontrolled,

Various estimates have suggested that some

300 million comics are sold each year in the
United States (Reitberger and Fuchs, 1972).
In West Germany, 144 million are sold each
year (Reitberger and Fuchs, 1972). Their mass
circulation reached its peak in the late 1950s,
which also was a time when there was most
concern about comics corrupting the young.
Conservatives criticized them in much the
same way as they have criticized the corrupting influence of pop/rock music in the
1980s. In fact, in his very influential book of
the 1950s, Seduction of the Innocent, Frederick Wertham presented arguments strikingly similar to those of Bloom: that comics
taught children to be violent and sapped their
spontaneity, lj In the Kefauver Commission
on violence in 1968, one speaker held up the
cover of a horror comic, which showed a person holding up a severed head, complete with
dripping blood. W. M. Gaines, the creator of
Horror Comics, insisted that it was a restrained cover, since the open severed neck
had not been portrayed. Looking at the history of comics, it can be seen that their themes
and startlingly explicit imagery have not
changed much.
The history of comics can be traced well
back to the fifteenth century (Kunzle, 1973).
Their themes always have focused on three
general topics: politics and social criticism,
religion and morals, and criminal justice. Their
importance in public life has been such that
the history of popular culture could easily be
viewed as a history of the comic media. As
Kunzle clearly has shown, the early comic
book typically used concrete imagery, especially the viciousness and violence of punishments. It was through the portrayal of
punishments in exquisite detail that a vivid
image of sin was presented. The c o m i c - printed on broadsheets--wasdirected to the
common people. Printed narratives were circulated to the educated merchants. Of particular interest is the way moral and political

266

G R A E M E R. N E W M A N

issues were reduced to simple opposites: crime

and punishment, good and evil, vice and virtue, etc. This is strikingly similar to what
Chase (1986) observed in his study of the
portrayal of lawyers and law in popular culture in the twentieth c e n t u r y - - t h e pervasiveness of antinomial pairs. Death also has been
a perennial theme, and it has been a particular preoccupation in horror comics, movies,
and novels of the twentieth century. There are
also certain character types in comics that are
of particular relevance to criminal justice:
super heroes and detectives.
Super heroes. The influence that super
heroes have had on the mass psyche of the
twentieth century has yet to be assessed. Although there have been many psychoanalytic
interpretations ~2 of the obsession with such
heroes (such as "Superman" and "Batman"),
little attention has been given to the criminal
justice roles they often play. Interpretation has
been confused. Nostalgic adoration dominated the Time essay that marked the fiftieth
anniversary of Superman. The character was
portrayed as all good and nonviolent, or if
violent, never cruelly so: "Superman's violence is never cruel, however; he punches
villains but rarely does them any real h a r m . "13
Yet it is abundantly clear that Superman has
never had time for the regular process of
criminal justice. He never has read offenders
their rights. He has dealt with his enemies
violently, often in a most vengeful fashion
(for example, in the Diner scene in Superman
I/). In Superman comics the villains are almost invariably slammed against (or through)
solid walls and pummeled unmercifully. The
criminal justice system is portrayed as comparatively passive and helpless in the face of
an overwhelming crime wave, and it accepts
as its due the criminals that Superman so violently apprehends. The drawing style makes
clear that this is not a passive hero, nor was
he meant to be. Many other heroes have been
developed from this one idea and style (Batman and Robin, Wonderwoman, Spiderman,
The Phantom, Captain Amerika, Captain
Marvel, and many more). A preliminary hypothesis is that, while at the psychological
level the superhero may appeal to the feelings
of powerlessness of common individuals and

the wish for omnipotence, 14there are also important ideas conveyed about what is permissible in dealing with crime and the power
or lack thereof of public institutions in dealing with it.
Comics and the detective genre. The detective genre is a tremendously complex subject in itself. Perhaps more has been written
about detective stories than most other aspects of popular culture. 15 One of the most
significant observations that can be made about
the detective genre in comics is that the most
widely acclaimed, and possibly most influential detective, Dick Tracy, was a "regular"
cop. This contrasts with the detectives in
novels, who are almost all private police (with
some minor exceptions, such as Eliot Ness).16
This is of particular interest, since the creator
of Dick Tracy, Chester Gould, clearly intended him to be a take-off of Sherlock
Holmes. 17 It is likely that Gould adapted certain personality characteristics of Holmes, such
as his persistence, his use of modern scientific principles, methods, and technology, and
his single-mindedness, as well as the general
moral atmosphere of the Sherlock Holmes
s t o r i e s - - a kind of singular war against dedicated criminals, many of them incredibly
fiendish. Dr. Moriarty is very likely the model
on which Gould developed his many fiendish, grotesque criminals (just a few examples: Haf and Haf [1966], a character with
only haft a face; the Mole [1941], who looked
like one; Pruneface [1942]; Flattop, [1956];
Brow, [1944]; Mumbles, [1947]; Torcher,
[1980]; Stooge Viller [1933]).
There are, however, vast differences between Dick Tracy and Sherlock Holmes.
While Holmes fought his battle as a "gentleman" and lived generally a gentleman's life,
according to quite definite rules of etiquette,
he caught his criminals after a considerable
battle of witts. The criminals were fiendishly
clever, but Holmes in the end was more of a
genius than Moriarty (though Holmes was
never 100 percent confident that he had rid
society of Moriarty forever). Tracy on the
other hand, was created by Gould in a time
in the United States when organized crime was
at its height, especially in Chicago. In reacting to the violence of Chicago, Gould con-

Popular Culture and Criminal Justice

sciously created a character in Tracy who
would deal with these criminals "via the hot
lead route," to use Gould's own words. That
is to say, unlike Holmes, Tracy would use
violence, as well as cleverness and modern
technology, to catch the hoodlums of America's inner cities. In fact, Tracy was the first
detective in comics to shoot individuals
(though it is claimed that he never actually
killed anyone). It is also likely that Gould was
influenced by the "realism" of American detective fiction, which had reached its height
of popularity with the dime novels written by
the famous detectives, Burns and, especially,
Allen Pinkerton. ~8
The artistic style is also of great importance in the Tracy cartoons. The frames are
drawn in harsh black lines with heavy shadow.
The backdrop of inner-city industry and decay is starkly depicted with "inverted V ' s . "
Frames of Dick Tracy were in fact picked up
by Andy Warhol and turned easily into pop
art (Crouch, 1987). The use of strong vertical
line and shadow is reminiscent of the great
designs of Aubrey Beardsley (though the angular forms contrast with Beardsley's more
detailed and flowing pen). The style matches
the theme of the strip: issues are black and
white, law is law, order is order; violence is
met with violence. Tracy is the good guy, devoted and committed to his job. Tracy never
has any doubts. He is looked up to by the
younger generation, who are encouraged
through the character of "Junior" (aiming for
a career in law enforcement) to join the ~crime
stoppers club," which is full of tips to stop
crime and criminals, with many thousands of
members at its height in the 1950s (Crouch,
1987).
Detectives play a role in other popular fictional media besides comics, of course.
Klockars has outlined basic elements of the
detective genre, which will be discussed
shortly. As background, it is necessary to examine popular novels and, especially, movies.
Movies
In those movies with criminal justice themes
that have come to be regarded as classics,
courtroom scenes and great trials predomi-

267

nate, especially in those made before the mid1970s. Indeed, some catalogs of law in film
insist that only those films with trial scenes
should be included in the category. 19 The
analysis by Chase (1986) of law and lawyers
in popular culture using antinomial pairs is
particularly useful in this context since it allows for both the simplified presentation of
issues in visual media, especially in the Hollywood tradition, and the presentation of
conflicting messages and imagery. It fosters
a more complex interpretation than, for example, that of the ideologists of law, who
claim that popular culture presents the law in
the best light to promote false consciousness
and hide the fact that the ruling class uses the
law for its own ends.
The virtuous lawyer is well represented in
such movies as To Kill a Mockingbird (Gregory Peck, 1954) and Knock on Any Door
(Humphrey Bogart, 1949), in which the archetypal American lawyer is portrayed: "a
protector who stands with his or her client
against all the world no matter what the odds;
indeed, no matter what the attorney's personal or political views or estimate of the
client's 'guilt' or 'innocence.'" The "moral
problem" of defending guilty or despicable
clients has for the most part been avoided in
these movies since most clients are innocent.
Perry Mason hardly ever defended a client who
turned out to be guilty. A complication is the
portrayal of the over-zealous lawyer who degrades and belittles witnesses and everyone
else in order to win a case. Young Mr. Lincoln (1939) is the representative film of this
type. However, the zealousness was always
acceptable because it was used to "save" a
falsely accused defendant.
The other side is the lawyer as crook or
cheat, as in Walter Mathau's portrayal of the
personal-injury attorney in The Fortune
Cookie. More recently, the rough edges and
imperfections of lawyers have been examined more closely: for example, Jagged Edge,
a story of a woman attorney who falls in love
with her murderous client; the power-hungry
prosecutor in Slaughter on Fifth Avenue; the
totally corrupt and crazy judge in And Justice
For All (and the equally virtuous lawyer, who
risks his life and reputation to save his client

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G R A E M E R. N E W M A N

from sure death resulting from a traffic offense); and Star Chamber, in which judges
take the punishment of offenders into their
own hands. The latter film appears to have
reversed the early veneration of the law--both
its spirit and letter, as upheld by Atticus Finch
in To Kill a Mocking B i r d - - a n d instead to
suggest that justice is not served by bureaucracy. Rather, direct action--like Dick Trac y ' s - - i s what is required to deal with the crime
problem. Chase noted that in fact a number
of late twentieth-century movies have suggested that there are alternatives to lawyers
(such as zealous policemen) for dealing with
the crime problem. This calls for consideration of the detective and cop genre in movies.

The Detective Genre in Movies

In the 1960s George Orweil complained that
millions of people were "drugged into thinking that TV (the gangsters, etc.) is real life."
As Klockars (1983) has shown, the portrayal
of police in movies is quite different from the
reality. For example, Klockars suggested that
most detective novels and movies revolve
around a small number of themes:
Murder is the case. However, ninety-nine
percent of police work has little to do with
solving cases, let alone murder.
Wrong person is the hook. Drama is generated by allowing the viewer or reader to see
the wrong person being accused or apprehended. The detective proceeds to "prove the
accused innocent." It should be recognized
that this ploy is similar to that used to portray
the virtuous lawyers, described above.
The "Private Detective" is by and large the
model. While from time to time there have
been regular police on TV (discussed above),
by far the most prominent character on TV
and in movies is the private eye. One of the
reasons for this is provided in Klockars's
thoughtful analysis of the origins of policing.
The difficulty in doing detective work stems
from the need to work closely with criminals.
In the early days when the New police were
being formed out of the social unrest of eighteenth-century England, these police could not
perform the functions of detectives. This was

because the "solution" of crimes, especially

those of property, were "provided" by "thief
takers" (who could be described as con-artists) such as Jonathan Wild, who worked in
close collaboration with all three parties:
thieves, victims, and public office. They were
able to solve crimes by retrieving stolen
property (for a fee). Thus, so that the police
could separate themselves from this rather
doubtful form of law enforcement, their early
functions centered on patrol rather than solving cases.
The private detective therefore filled a gap
in public police work. The private detective
could solve cases and make money doing it.
But for him to retain the status of "law abiding" detective, it was necessary for him to
have special characteristics: commitment to
defense of the weak (Mike Hammer); a thorough knowledge of criminal habits and "street
life" (Mike Hammer and Marlow); an impeccable, uncorruptible (un-bribable) character; and an ability to "get things done"
without hindrance by the bureaucracies that
interfere with the public law-enforcement ofricer. At the same time he had to be able to
use violence liberally, without fear of tainting the "state" as a "police state." Often, the
public detective is made to seem stupid in
comparison or, if not stupid, powerless to act.
The criminals he fought in the past twent),
years or so were quite different from those
fought by Sherlock Holmes or even Dick
Tra~,. Those super-sleuths pitted their brains
against highly intelligent criminals, who were
often "gifted" but who chose to use their talents for evil purposes (this model of the criminal is also dominant in the super-heroes stories). In the more recent depictions of cops
and robbers, for example, in the Dirt)' H a r ~
series, the typical criminal is shown as "stupid" enough to get caught, as someone who
does not learn a lesson, someone who sadistically enjoys violence, who almost always
shows a kind of dirty smirk on his face when
about to hurt someone, especially if he is to
attack women. In short, criminals are depicted as ~losers," who deserve only what they
g e t - - w h i c h is usually a severe prison term
or, more likely, being beaten up thoroughly
or shot dead by the pursuing private eye. 2

Popular Culture and Criminal Justice

The genre affirms the supremacy of rationality. Klockars (1983) has identified recurring characters such as the wealthy victim,
damsel in distress, sympathetic stranger, and
friend wronged, and he has suggested that the
moral lesson of the detective genre is that
anyone who uses reason and observation can
overcome evil. However, these generalizations are more applicable to the English tradition of detective novels, 2~ and they apply
only to a minority of characters in American
detective lore. The style of Sherlock Holmes
contrasts sharply with the violence of American comic-book heroes. In fact, Dick Tracy
was the first comic-book character to use violence. The classic detectives of the nineteenth century were morally concerned with
means, and thus they disdained the violence
of the criminals they pursued. However, this
distinction between the methods of the detective and those of the criminal slowly but
surely eroded from the birth of detective fiction in nineteenth-century England to creation of some of the characters in late twentieth-century American movies.
The confusion reached its height with the
Dirty Harry series, in which violence became
the dominant behavior of both cop and criminal. The "justification" for Dirty Harry's use
of violence was illustrated in such movies as
Death Wish and, more subtley, The Onion
Field. These movies reflected the strong
backlash in the 1970s against "coddling"
criminals, suggesting that the authorities either
were too soft on crime or were so hopelessly
bureaucratized that they were unable to see
that "justice" (that is, a severe enough punishment) was done: murderers were able to
escape punishment by the authorities. Thus,
these movies conveyed, much to the delight
of the audience, that sometimes it is necessary for the sake of justice for strong individuals to take the law into their own hands. 22
Chase has insisted, however, that the "ideology" of law propounded by this series of
movies is by no means consistent. Magnum
Force, for example, has Dirty Harry ferreting
out a cell of cryptofascist cops who are bent
on "executing criminals." They take the law
into their own hands, just as he did (although
Dirty Harry's justification was the endemic

269

corruption in the force). The central conflict

of these movies may be summed up as the
familiar problem all police face: "Policing is
only easy in a police state.'23

Law, Order and the Western

Westerns are not usually considered criminal justice-related, but they really are. The
focus on well known outlaws and bandits, such
as Jesse James, makes this obvious. The
criminal as hero is a phenomenon that occurs
from time to time when the criminal achieves
his exploits through the media (Angiolillo,
1979; Hobsbawm, 1969), as James certainly
did. 24 Yet the criminal justice themes run
deeper than the exploits of bandits and outlaws. The "wild west" is portrayed as a place
where one can contemplate the possibility of
no order, or at least a breakdown in order,
and the idea of quick, personal justice. In these
movies and novels, violence is the focus, almost the sole raison d ~tre, of the plots.
Physical violence, often brutal, always cold
and cool, is used to disrupt a romanticized
"free" frontier life--whether of farmers and
settlers, miners, or shopkeepers. And it is direct violence that restores law and order once
again. As Neale has observed:
. . violence . . . marks the process of the
elements disrupted and which constitutes the
means by which order is finally (re)established.
(1980:48)
In this genre the basic themes of western
society--law and order, justice, civilization,
private property, civic responsibility--are
played out in simple terms of physical
violence.

CONCLUSIONS
From this review of the major themes and
media portrayals of criminal justice in popular culture, it can be seen that the potential
for research is enormous. This article has attempted, as a preliminary step, to catalog these
themes and images.
This general review of criminal justice and
popular culture does, however, raise issues

270

GRAEME R. NEWMAN

that have been largely ignored in criminolo g y - w h e t h e r traditional or radical. Popular

culture theorists have claimed that their field
has been ignored by elitist scholars, who view
popular culture as not worthy of serious study,
because it is popular. That is, it is "low culture" rather than "high culture." (Chase, 1986;
Johnson, 1979). This attitude toward popular
culture has prevailed since Matthew Arnold's
Culture and Anarchy (1869). Popular culture
began to receive scholarly attention in the
1960s and 1970s, but the 1980s saw a resurgence of the conservative viewpoint, illustrated by the "back to basics" movement
in education exemplified in the Harvard Core
Curriculum 25 and the ideas expressed by Allan Bloom in his best seller, The Closing of

the American Mind.

The distinction between high and low culture, however, is not straightforward. Arnold, for example, excluded Dickens from
those worthy of study. A case could be made
for the exclusion. Most of Dickens's works
were published first in serial form, in publications with a mass readership. Thus, his
works belonged to popular culture. However,
there is no question that Dickens's works deserve serious study in academia. It is difficult
to avoid concluding that the distinctions between high and low culture have been made
according to social class, and some influential social theorists of the twentieth century
have argued strongly for this view. 26
But it may be too simple to equate high
culture with "ruling class culture." Scholars
on the left also have failed to take popular
culture seriously. This may reflect the fact that
Marxist theory states that the masses have false
consciousness, conditioned by the trappings
of capitalism. Since these theorists focus on
analyzing legal theory, the seductive language of law, its "ideology" as exemplified
in endless court cases, they ignore the source
of the images that they so often seem to uncover in their analyses: popular culture. As
Chase bas noted:
The substantive focus of law-as-ideology
scholarship is on the text of American law's
high culture: appellate case reports and the
walls of doctrine woven around them. (1986:
528)

It could be argued that popular culture is

constructed and marketed by the capitalist
system, so that the images, beliefs, expressions, and portrayals are utilized in a quite
obvious manipulation of the consciousness of
the masses. Although there is no doubt some
"truth" to this view (in the sense that enormous amounts of money are made from the
supermarket of popular culture), any marketing expert will attest that discerning what
the masses will buy or reject is inordinately
difficult. Certain songs will sell millions;
others will be ignored. Certain TV programs
will be watched avidly; others will not. Another problem is the difficulty of drawing the
line between "false" and "real culture." This
has led some Marxist scholars to ridiculous
claims, such as that American Abstract
Expressionism was an expression of an
American imperialist plot and that its aggressive painting style was significant of
America's expansionist foreign policy. 27
This prejudice has not been confined to orthodox Marxists. The critical theorists, such
as Adorno, who reacted to the "mass psychology of fascism" (brilliantly explained by
Wilhelm Reich) found it difficult to say anything "good" about the masses at all. Their
arguments in the end tried to portray American Abstract Expressionism as revolutionary
acts. That is to say, they would not take the
consciousness that had produced this form of
art seriously--as an expression in and of itself. Rather, it had to represent something else,
in this case revolution. 28 The controversy
simmers, never to be resolved, because it asks
for extreme, unidimensional explanations. It
is possible to conclude with Chase that " . . .
modern art, like so much else in the realm of
culture and intellectual production, has no clear
politics and cannot be simply reduced to an
ideology expressive of a class position"
(1986:n.76)
A similar lack of interest in the "lower"
aspects of culture can be seen in the study of
history and its transformation over the past
thirty years. E. P. Thompson and his followers first began this transformation when they
tried (successfully) to write history from the
"bottom up." Thompson argued that most of
English history had been written by, for, and

271

Popular Culture and Criminal Justice

about the upper crust or the great men of

British history and rarely, if at all, with any
attention to the lives and issues surrounding
the workers or lower classes. Thompson's
seminal book, The Making of the English
Working Class, began this change in the study
of history. 29 Many other works have followed, such as Albion's Fatal Tree, a book
devoted entirely to the crime-and-justice issues relating to the common people of England. In his book Hay and his colleagues tried
to expose certain presumptions of previous
histories of criminal law and British society.
One such presumption was that the criminal
law, while often harsh, was largely obeyed
by the common folk, who had great reverence for the law and their king. Hay and his
colleagues attempted to show how this was
certainly not the case, especially in their description of the "illegal tradition" in eighteenth century England. 3
From this very brief review of the study of
popular culture in the late twentieth century,
it may be concluded that there are two somewhat contradictory views of popular culture.
One sees the masses as developing a sort of
"cretinize[d] public consciousness" (Chase,
1986) and being capable of any fickle behavior from the unquestioning, lock-step support
of Hitler to the "generation of a President who
has difficulty distinguishing between real historical events and anecdotes drawn from movie
nostalgia. ,3~ Yet there is another view, given
credence only indirectly, when scholars decide to raise works of popular culture into the
realm of high culture. This is a view of popular culture that "comes as close as the creation of high culture to telling us who we are
as a people or what we need most to know
about society" (Chase, 1986).
No matter which view one adopts, the
starting point of study should be the same: to
analyze the content and media of popular culture as a way to understanding the kind of
consciousness it represents, no matter whether
one takes it on face value or as an important
key to another level of consciousness that lies
behind it. It is important to understand the
history of popular culture, its media, and its
content. In relation to criminal justice, it is
necessary to attend to the various themes, ira-

ages, politics, ideologies, and functions of the

institutions and players in the criminal justice
process. In fact, at some point, all people are
players in criminal justice, especially when
criminal justice is examined as a punishment
process. 32

NOTES
1. I have found only two articles, both by the same
author, that deal with popular culture in relation to criminal justice. Even these are more concerned with law
and lawyers in popular culture than with criminal justice
generally. However, these pioneering works offer an
outstanding introduction to the area. See Anthony Chase,
Toward a Legal Theory of Popular Culture, Wisconsin
Law Review (1986): 527-69; Lawyers and Popular Culture: A Review of Mass Media Portrayals of American
Attorneys A.B.F. Research Journal 2:(1986): 281-300.
2. These shows have fourteen million viewers every
day.
3. See Time Magazine, 14 March 1988, for a review of Superman at 50. That he should be portrayed
on Time's front cover attests to the great importance of
popular culture in American life. It may be possible to
infer that Time sees Superman as equal in importance
to the political figures it generally features on its cover.
4. For a contrary view see J. L. Freedman, "Effect
of Television Violence on Aggressiveness," Psychol Bull
96:2(1984): 227-246.
5. Wilkins suggested that criminal justice should be
"marketed" to consumers as a ~service."
6. Use of this term is based on recognition that there
is much difficulty and controversy concerning what
constitutes a genre. However, although there may be
some difficulty in identifying a consistent genre of lawyers-in-film, the detective genre is relatively well established (Chase, 1986).
7. That ideology is the "fair players" doctrine, so
well defined and criticized by William Ryan in Equality
(New York: Pantheon, 1981). Budweiser beer commercials during the 1988 winter olympics provided a
recent illustration of the fair-players ideology. The idea
conveyed was that if each individual just applies himself
or herself and works hard with devotion and commitment, he or she can achieve greatness comparable to
that of the olympic athletes. The amount of work involved and the fact that only a small minority ever realizes this dream seem to be denied. The myth that
"anyone can become President" is deeply embedded in
the American popular psyche. The extent to which it is
important to conservative as opposed to liberal ideology
requires further analysis. Criminals are most often portrayed on fictional TV as "losers," which raises the
question of what this does for the self concepts of the
masses of viewers. Clearly the area of criminal and noncriminal identity needs to be studied.
8. For a detailed analysis, see Chase (1986:555-57).
9. On 14 March 1988 the program showed how it

272

GRAEME R. NEWMAN

took two years tbr the special organized-crime task force

to respond to neighbors' complaints of drug dealing from
a neighborhood house. Local law enforcement during
all this time ran advertisements encouraging people to
report crime and to be vigilant. It was finally revealed
that three or more local police were actually involved
in the drug dealing.
10. Other songs of recent times with explicit romanticization of sex and drugs include: ~I want your Sex"
(George Michael, 1987); "I want a new Drug" (Hughey
Lewis and the News, early 1980s), and "Sugar Walls"
by Sheila E. (1980). For a more complete list up to the
1970s, see Chase, Legal Theory, n 109. See also Jaff,
Law and Lawyer in Pop Music: A Reason for Self Reflection, U. Miami Law Review, 659 (1986).
11. Wertham and his colleague, Gersham Legman,
carried on a vigorous crusade against comics in the 1950s.
They saw many of the characters and motifs as explicitly sexual or homosexual, and their efforts eventually
resulted in the "Comic Code," which purportedly pledged
comic book publishers to clean up their act (Legman
and Wertham, 1949; Wertham, 1954).
12. See, for example, Arthur Asa Berger, The Comic
Stripped American, New York: Walker and Co., 1973,
and Frederick Wertham, Seduction of the Innocent.
Generally, it has been suggested that the super heroes
are linked quite directly to the myth of the hero as outlined by Rank and others. The archetypal story involves
a figure like Moses, who is abandoned and then found
and raised in a rich family, later suffers an enormous
injustice, such as his family being killed violently by an
intruder, and takes up the cause of justice for the rest
of his life. See also Newman, "Vengeance and Super
Heroes," paper presented to ACJS, 1987, and Marongiu
and Newman, Vengeance.
13. This adoration is uniformly shared by many who
have written about comic books. Jules Feiffer, a cartoonist in his own right, and one known for his cutting
satire, indulged in considerable nostalgic adoration of
the super heroes. See Jules Feiffer, The Great Comic
Book Heroes (New York: The Dial Press, 1965). Other
examples are Herb Galewitz (ed.), The Celebrated Cases
of Dick Tracy 1931-1951 (New York: Chelsea House);
Martin Sheridan, Comics and their Creators (New York:
Hale, Cushman and Flint, 1942); Michael L. Fleisher,
The Encyclopedia of Comic Book Heroes (New York:
Macmillan, 1976).
14. Even here, the effects cannot be predicted. Take
the admission of Jules Feiffer: "While Superman went
around beating up crooks, in my dreams I was beating
up authority figures," quoted in Time, 14 March 1988,
69. Superman never beat up any authority figures. How
did this transformation occur? Feiffer claimed it was because of the Depression era when he read it, that the
feelings of helplessness were transformed through
Superman into a wish to rail against authority, or perhaps, the economic forces against which people felt
powerless to act.
15. Crime has figured heavily in American Comic
books since their very inception. The height of crime
comics was in the post-World War II era. This was the
period of the romanticization of the FBI (with not a little
help from J. Edgar Hoover). Comics had such titles as

"All True Crime," "Authentic Police Cases" (usually

with a claim that these were taken directly from FBI
files), and many others. It is significant that the word
"crime" was invariably featured in huge letters, with
other descriptors (such as "justice") in tiny print. See
Reinhold Reitenberger and Wolfgang Fuchs, Comics:
Anatomy of a Mass Medium (Boston: Little, Brown,
1971).
16. Eliot Ness, The Untouchables (New York: PocketBooks, 1957). The Untouchables story and TV series is
of special interest for the particular images and counterimages it provides for policing. See M. Nalla and
Graeme Newman, Regulatory Bureaucracies and Policing," paper forthcoming, ASC. (Meeting, Chicago, November 1988).
17. This explains the "hooked nose," which developed only after the initial few strips. In fact, the first
strips done by Gould were called "Plainclothes Tracy " I
an attempt to appeal to the mystery of a policeman
working "undercover." Gould himself, however, has
stated that he was strongly influenced by Sherlock
Holmes. See Bill Crouch, Jr., ed., Dick Tracv." America's Most Famous Detective (Secaucus, N.J.: Citadel
Press, 1987).
18. For a discussion of realism in American detective
fiction, especially as it relates to detectives dealing with
white-collar and professional criminals, see Larry K.
Hartsfield, The American Response to Professional
Crime, 1 8 7 0 - 1 9 1 7 (Westport, CT: Greenwood press,
1985).
19. See, for example, Mastrangelo, Lawyers and the
Law: A Filmography, Legal Reference services Q. 3
(1983): 31; Mastrangelo, Lawyers and the Law: A Filmography II, Legal Reference Services Q 5 (1985): 5. For
a discussion centering on the narrowness of this point
of view, see Chase, Legal Theory, p. 525.
20. The manner of death of criminals at the hands of
law enforcement, public or private, is of particular interest. Although James Bond was probably the first "operative" actually to kill an enemy coldly, the number of
times the assailant meets his doom as a result of a wrong
step backwards (for example, Dr. NO when he falls into
the "meltdown") is not inconsiderable. This is an ageold ploy for avoiding direct responsibility for punishment. (See Graeme Newman, Just and Painful.) The
ideal is for the guilty to punish themselves, as is so well
shown in Kafka's stories, "In The Penal Colony" and,
especially, the end of "The Trial" (so well played by
Orson Welles, although the movie does not faithfully
reproduce Kafka's ending).
21. The nonviolent character of English detectives is
noteworthy; examples include the characters of Dorothy
Sayers such as Miss Marple and Lord Peter Whimsey.
There are also the Europeans such as Poirot, all very
capable rationalists and certainly not physical types.
22. For a more detailed analysis of this "motive" to
punish, especially of vengeance and the elementary sense
of injustice, see Marongiu and Newman, Vengeance.
23. See Chase (1986), Legal Theory. In a different
way this point has been made by Klockars (1988:87),
"Morally speaking, because good and decent and honest

Popular Culture and Criminal Justice

means cannot always be counted on to achieve good

ends, we have police."
24. For an account of the media "invention" of the
Jesse James myth and an analysis of the themes underlying it, see Marongiu and N e w m a n , Vengeance, Chapter 8.
25. See Spanos, The End of Education, The Harvard
Core Curriculum Report and the Pedagogy of Reformation. Boundary 2 10:2(1982): 1-33.
26. See, for example, Karl Mannheim, Ideology and
utopia: An introduction to the sociology of knowledge,
trans. L. Wirth and E. Shils (New York: Harcourt, Brace,
1936).
27. See S. Guilbaut, H o w N e w York Stole the Idea
o f Modern Art: Abstract Expressionism, Freedom and
the Cold War, 1983. For other examples see Chase, Legal Theory, notes 7 6 - 7 7 . From the other side, others
claimed that this attack on Abstract Expressionism was
part of a communist plot.
28. See F. Jameson, Fables o f Aggression (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1979), 13a.
29. There were other books concentrating on the lives
of ordinary people that preceded T h o m p s o n ' s , though
these were less historical and more contemporary. See,
for example, Friedrich Engels's The Condition of the
Working Class in England (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1958). Hobsbawm also focused on the lives
of peasants in his study of primitive rebels and bandits,
Primitive Rebels (New York: W. W. Norton, 1959).
30. After considerable acclaim, this book also received a degree of criticism. See John H. Langbein,
"Albion's Fatal Flaws," Past and Present 98:96, 101.
31. Chase, 1986. Reagan's confusion, documented
by C B S ' s 60 Minutes, was between a scene from The
Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954) and the event he thought actually occurred. 15 December 1985.

Engels, F. (1958). The condition of the working class

in England. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
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heroes. New York: MacMillan.
Freedman, J. L. (1984). Effect of television violence in
aggressiveness. Psychol Bull 96: 227-46.
Galewitz, H. (1981). (ed.) The celebrated cases of Dick
Tracy 1931-1951. New York: Chelsea House.
Graber, F. (1980). Crime news and the public. New
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Guilbaut, S. (1983). H o w N e w York stole the idea of
modern art: Abstract Expressionism, freedom and the
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Hay, D. (1975). Albion's fatal tree. New York: Pantheon.
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32. This is made very clear in the question of vengeance, which has been clearly demonstrated to underlie the widespread demand to punish, as does the fear
of crime. See Marongiu and Newman, Vengeance.
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