LibGuides: Criminal Justice: Articles

Criminal justice databases are essential resources that provide access to primary sources, scholarly research, and archival materials related to law enforcement, the legal system, criminology, and public safety. These databases compile various documents, including case law, court records, legal statutes, law enforcement reports, and academic studies, covering various aspects of the criminal justice system across different periods, regions, and themes.

Researchers use criminal justice databases to investigate legal precedents, analyze crime trends, and understand the social dynamics that influence criminal behavior and justice policies. By exploring digitized legal and historical records, users can gain direct insight into the context of laws, the evolution of the justice system, and the lived experiences of those affected by it, enabling a deeper understanding and critical analysis of criminal justice issues.

Furthermore, these databases support interdisciplinary research, allowing scholars to examine the intersection of criminal justice with other fields, such as sociology, psychology, political science, and public health. With tools for cross-referencing and data mining, researchers can uncover patterns, trends, and correlations within extensive datasets, offering new perspectives on complex issues in crime and justice.

Educators utilize criminal justice databases to enhance classroom learning, giving students direct access to primary sources and helping them develop critical thinking skills. By integrating legal documents and case studies into their curricula, instructors encourage students to engage with the material, fostering a deeper understanding of the criminal justice system and its impact on society.

In summary, criminal justice databases are crucial for expanding access to legal knowledge, promoting scholarly inquiry, and preserving the records of the justice system for future generations.

Here's a curated list of databases tailored to criminal justice studies, providing an excellent starting point for your research:

Criminal Justice & Law Databases A -G

ABI/INFORM Collection (Global, Archive, Dateline, Trade & Industry) This link opens in a new window This resource enables one to search multiple ABI databases: ABI/INFORM Global, ABI/INFORM Archive Complete, ABI/INFORM Dateline, and ABI/INFORM Trade & Industry. Funded by Florida Virtual Campus. 
CQ Almanac This link opens in a new window Analysis on the major legislation and actions of congress since 1945. Data on the voting patterns of Congress members provides insight into the legislative process and history of the institution. Users can follow the history of a policy issue with the Policy Tracker tool which links reports on the same issue for almost 70 years.
CQ Magazine This link opens in a new window Coverage of the U.S. Congress: including status of bills, votes and amendments, and floor and committee activity.
Criminal Justice (Gale OneFile) This link opens in a new window This collection offers more than 700 journals in the legal and criminal justice field.
Criminal Justice Abstracts This link opens in a new window Contains comprehensive coverage of international journals, books, reports, dissertations, and unpublished papers on criminology and related disciplines.
Criminal Justice and Public Safety in Video This link opens in a new window Criminal Justice and Public Safety in Video illustrates the strategies, techniques, and experiences of professionals serving on the front lines of justice and public safety. This compilation of documentaries, training videos, and interviews visually depicts the theoretical principles and practical application of criminal justice and emergency response.
Criminal Justice Database (Proquest) This link opens in a new window Criminal Justice Database supports research on crime, its causes and impacts, legal and social implications, and litigation and crime trends. It includes U.S. and international scholarly journals, correctional and law enforcement trade publications, dissertations, crime reports, crime blogs and other material.
Florida Supreme Court Opinions This link opens in a new window Open Access Florida Supreme Court opinions.

Criminal Justice & Law Databases H - Z

HeinOnline This link opens in a new window HeinOnline is an online research platform that provides multidisciplinary periodicals, government documents, international resources, case law, and more. With HeinOnline, users can access more than 3,200 scholarly journals, all dating back to the first issue published. In addition, there is coverage of U.S. government publications, and the archive of case law consists of federal, state, and overseas cases; international resources address many countries, regions, and international organizations.
LegalTrac (Gale OneFile) This link opens in a new window Indexes major law reviews, legal newspapers, bar association journals, and international legal journals.Funded by Florida Virtual Campus. 
National Criminal Justice Reference Service (NCJRS) This link opens in a new window Open Access The NCJRS web site is a federally funded resource offering justice and substance abuse information to support research, policy, and program development worldwide.
National Criminal Justice Reference Service (NCJRS) Abstracts Database This link opens in a new window This resource contains summaries of over 189,000 U.S. and international publications, including federal, state, and local government reports, books, research reports, journal articles, audiovisual presentations, and unpublished research. The NCJRS Abstracts Database excludes most legal decisions, opinions, and statutes. Unique elements of the collection include agency produced documents and final grant reports of Office of Justice Programs sponsored research. Documents are either written in English or have an English-language summary.
Nexis Uni This link opens in a new window Accesses over a billion full-text news, magazine, legal, and business articles and reports, including newspapers, magazines, state and federal laws and regulations, case law, newsletters, and company and industry information.Funded by Florida Virtual Campus. 
ProQuest Congressional This link opens in a new window Provides the tools for searching the Congressional Record, finding members of Congress, tracking proposed legislation by keyword and sponsor, and searching Congressional hearings, the Federal Register, the U.S. Serial Set Digital Collection, Congressional committee schedules, Committee Prints and Miscellaneous Publications, and Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports.
ProQuest Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports This link opens in a new window Includes the full text of reports from the Congressional Research Service (CRS) which was established within the Library of Congress to provide members, committees, and congressional staff with nonpartisan and objective research and analysis on all public policy issues.
Resources - Center for Security Studies This link opens in a new window Open Access The fundamental purpose of the Resources section is outreach. It features the publications and analyses of CSS experts, external partners and like-minded institutions in order to promote further dialogue on important international relations and security-related issues.
Westlaw This link opens in a new window Westlaw enables students and faculty to research law-related issues. This comprehensive collection of legal content includes expert's analysis from hundreds of law reviews and journals, encyclopedias, treatises and full-text legislation, regulations, and court decisions.

Access World News (Newsbank) This link opens in a new window Research diverse perspectives, topics and trends that align with curricular areas such as Political Science, English, Sociology, Humanities, Business, International Studies, and more. Features reliable, credible information from a wide variety of international, national, and local news sources including the including the Miami Herald, Palm Beach Post, and others.
African American Newspapers, 1827-1998 This link opens in a new window This resource enables users to search more than 270 African American newspapers published in the 19th and 20th centuries. Created in partnership with the Wisconsin Historical Society, the Kansas State Historical Society and the Library of Congress, African American Newspapers chronicles a century and a half of the African American experience.
America's Historical Newspapers, 1690-1900 This link opens in a new window Early American newspapers including titles from all 50 present states. Includes: Early American Newspapers, Series I (1690-1876) and Series II (1758-1900).
Caribbean Newspapers, 1718-1876 This link opens in a new window Caribbean Newspapers, 1718-1876 enables users to search more than 66 newspaper titles from 22 islands, including Bermuda, published in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Chicago Tribune This link opens in a new window Complete full-text content of local and regional news, including community events, schools, politics, government policies, cultural activities, local companies, state industries, and people in the community. Paid advertisements are excluded.
Christian Science Monitor This link opens in a new window Full-text coverage of the Christian Science Monitor.Funded by Florida Virtual Campus. 
Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers This link opens in a new window Open Access This site allows you to search and read newspaper pages from 1900-1910 and find information about American newspapers published between 1690-present. Chronicling America is sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library of Congress as part of the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP).
CQ Researcher Plus Archive This link opens in a new window The CQ Researcher explores a single "hot" issue in the news in depth each week. Topics range from social and teen issues to environment, health, education and science, and technology. There are 44 reports produced each year, including four expanded reports.Funded by Florida Virtual Campus. 
Current Affairs in Video This link opens in a new window Current Affairs in Video features award-winning films and documentaries emphasizing detailed analysis and discussion of the critical issues of the day.
Education Week This link opens in a new window Independent, non-profit newspaper covering K-12 education. Published 37 times a year, including three issues of annual reports.
Ethnic NewsWatch and Ethnic NewsWatch: A History This link opens in a new window Ethnic NewsWatch is an interdisciplinary, bilingual (English and Spanish) and comprehensive full text database of the newspapers, magazines and journals of the ethnic, minority and native press. Designed to provide the "other side of the story," ENW full-text titles offer additional viewpoints from those proffered by the mainstream Funded by Florida Virtual Campus. 
Florida Digital Newspaper Library This link opens in a new window Open Access The Florida Digital Newspaper Library exists to provide access to the news and history of Florida.
Florida Newspaper Database This link opens in a new window Indexing to news resources from around the state. Includes some full text.
Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) Daily Reports, 1974-1996 This link opens in a new window FBIS Daily Reports consists of translated broadcasts, news agency transmissions, newspapers, periodicals and government statements from nations around the globe.

HarpWeek This link opens in a new window This resource provides electronic access to Harper's Weekly: 1857-1912.
Historical Atlanta Daily World This link opens in a new window This database offers full-page and article images with searchable full text. The collection includes digital reproductions providing access to every page from every available issue. Coverage spans 1931- 2003.
Historical Chicago Defender This link opens in a new window Black Studies Center provides the full-text backfile, from 1910 to 1975, of the influential black newspaper The Chicago Defender.
Historical Los Angeles Sentinel This link opens in a new window This database offers full-page and article images with searchable full text, covering 1934 -2005. The collection includes digital reproductions providing access to every page from every available issue.
Historical Los Angeles Times This link opens in a new window This database offers full-page and article images with searchable full text back to the first issue. The collection includes digital reproductions providing access to every page from every available issue. Coverage spans 1881- 2000.
Historical New York Amsterdam News This link opens in a new window The Amsterdam News was founded as a six-page weekly covering local news by James Henry Anderson in 1909. Under the ownership of C. B. Powell and Philip M. H. Savory from 1938, it became the largest black community weekly in the United States. Contributors to the newspaper have included W. E. B. Du Bois, Roy Wilkins and Malcolm X. Our coverage spans 1922-1993.
Historical New York Times This link opens in a new window This database offers full-page and article images from the New York Times from its first issue in 1851 to 2020. The collection includes digital reproductions of every page from every issue, cover to cover, in downloadable PDF files. The database is an ongoing project.
Historical Pittsburgh Courier This link opens in a new window This database offers full-page and article images with searchable full text. The collection includes digital reproductions providing access to every page from every available issue. Coverage spans 1911- 2002.

Historical U.S. Newspapers (Primary Source Guide) The United States Historical Newspaper Research Subject Guide provides the research with links to historical American Newspapers.

Historical Wall Street Journal This link opens in a new window Each issue is indexed for easy searching; and this resource offers complete pages and images from the run dating back to the first 1889 issue through 2012.

Historical World Newspapers (Primary Source Guide) This resource is a Subject Research Guide that links historical newspapers worldwide.

Illustrated Civil War Newspapers and Magazines This link opens in a new window The Illustrated Civil War Newspapers and Magazines website makes it possible for you to discover the lively news stories, illustrations, cartoons, editorials, biographies, literature, and even advertisements that shaped and reflected public opinion in this era.
Latin American Newspapers This link opens in a new window This collection provides more than 35 fully searchable key Latin American newspapers published in the 19th and 20th centuries, featuring titles from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Cuba, Guatemala, Mexico, Peru, Venezuela and elsewhere.
Los Angeles Times This link opens in a new window Also see Historical Los Angeles Times. Major daily newspaper from Los Angeles. With the nation's largest editorial department, it offers extensive coverage of national, international, and local news.
Meet the Press This link opens in a new window Network television's longest running program (premiering in 1947), Meet the Press, is now searchable on a single platform, and includes thousands of interviews, panels, and debates. Many episodes have not been seen since their original broadcast.
Miami Herald Collection with Historical Archive This link opens in a new window Complete full-text content of local and regional news, including archive years of the Miami Herald from 1911 to 1982.
Miami Herald Historical Archive This link opens in a new window Archive years of the Miami Herald from 1911 to 1982, with full-text content of local and regional news.
Nation Archive This link opens in a new window This database contains indexing & abstracting and full text for the complete archive of The Nation beginning with its first issue in 1865 through to the present.
New York Times This link opens in a new window Also see Historical New York Times. Provides coverage of national and international news, plus coverage of important speeches and documents, Supreme Court decisions and presidential press conference transcripts.
Nexis Uni This link opens in a new window Accesses over a billion full-text news, magazine, legal, and business articles and reports, including newspapers, magazines, state and federal laws and regulations, case law, newsletters, and company and industry information.Funded by Florida Virtual Campus. 
Palm Beach Post This link opens in a new window Complete full text of local and regional news.
Readex AllSearch This link opens in a new window Cross-search historical collections containing books, pamphlets, broadsides, newspapers, government documents, and ephemera. This resource provides access to America's Historical Imprints, including Early American Imprints Series I: Evans, Early American Imprints Series II: Shaw-Shoemaker, American Civil War Collection, and American Slavery Collection; America's Historical Newspapers, including African American Newspapers and Caribbean Newspapers; Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) Daily Reports; and World Newspaper Archive: Latin American Newspapers.
Regional Business News This link opens in a new window Provides comprehensive full-text coverage for regional business publications, including business journals, newspapers, and newswires from all metropolitan and rural areas within the United States.
Sun Sentinel This link opens in a new window Complete full-text content of local and regional news, including community events, schools, politics, government policies, cultural activities, local companies, state industries, and people in the community. Paid advertisements are excluded.
Times Digital Archive This link opens in a new window Search with the Times Literary Supplement Historical Archive on Gale NewsVault. Researchers can search through the complete digital edition of The Times (London), using keyword searching and hit-term highlighting to retrieve full-facsimile images of either a specific article or a complete page. The entire newspaper is captured, with all articles, advertisements and illustrations/photos divided into categories to facilitate searching.
Times Literary Supplement Historical Archive This link opens in a new window Search with the Times Digital Archive on Gale NewsVault. Includes the complete run of The Times Literary Supplement from 1902 to 2008, including reviews, letters, poems, articles and literary criticism. The TLS has attracted the contributions of the worlds most influential writers and critics, from T.S. Eliot and Virginia Woolf in the 1920s and 30s to A.N. Wilson and Christopher Hitchens in the 1990s and 2000s.
USA Today This link opens in a new window With daily circulation exceeding 2 million in all 50 states, USA TODAY is the most widely read newspaper in the country.
Wall Street Journal This link opens in a new window Also see Historical Wall Street Journal. The paper is considered the preeminent publication for business news and information on financial markets worldwide. Each issue of every newspaper is indexed thoroughly, so researchers can access not only top news stories but also detailed information from all the paper's sections. For each article cited in the database, an abstract of up to 75 words helps the researcher know if the complete text will meet his or her needs.
Washington Post This link opens in a new window Coverage of national, international, and local news. The Washington Post is renowned for its political reporting, editorials and columnists.
Westlaw This link opens in a new window Westlaw enables students and faculty to research law-related issues. This comprehensive collection of legal content includes expert's analysis from hundreds of law reviews and journals, encyclopedias, treatises and full-text legislation, regulations, and court decisions.

Academic OneFile (Gale) This link opens in a new window Academic OneFile is a source for peer-reviewed, full-text articles from the world's leading journals and reference sources with extensive coverage of the physical sciences, technology, medicine, social sciences, the arts, theology, literature and other subjects. Includes full-text coverage of the New York Times back to 1985.
Academic Search Complete This link opens in a new window The world's largest scholarly, multi-disciplinary full-text database. This scholarly collection offers information in nearly every area of academic study including computer sciences, engineering, physics, chemistry, language and linguistics, arts & literature, medical sciences, and ethnic studies.
Academic Video Online: Premium This link opens in a new window Academic Video Online brings together over 40 multidisciplinary video collections from Alexander Street Press, covering art and architecture, diversity, health sciences, history, music and performing arts, psychology and counseling, sciences and engineering, and social sciences. See separate collection titles and the mulitmedia platform -Alexander Street Press- within our A-Z Database List.
Alexander Street Press Video This link opens in a new window ProQuest's Alexander Street Video contains Alexander Street's streaming video content. Subject matter spans across the curriculum —in literature; music; social and cultural history; film; the performing arts; religion; sociology; and other areas. This platform contains our owned collections and our subscription to Academic Video Online: Premium.
Biography (Gale In Context) This link opens in a new window Biography (Gale In Context) merges Gale's reference content with periodicals and multimedia. Users can search based on name, occupation, role, historical period, dates and places, and other aspects. These entries cover international figures from all time periods and areas of study.Funded by Florida Virtual Library. 
Gale General Reference Center Gold This link opens in a new window A general interest database that integrates a variety of sources in one easy-to-use interface. Use General Reference Center Gold to find articles from newspapers, reference books, and periodicals, many with full text and images. Find the latest current events, popular culture, business and industry coverage, the arts and sciences, sports, hobbies, and more.
Gale Virtual Reference Library This link opens in a new window A database of encyclopedias, almanacs, and specialized reference sources for multidisciplinary research. These reference materials once were accessible only in the library, but now you can access them online from the library or remotely 24/7. Because each library creates its own eBook collection, the content you see may vary if you use the database at different libraries (your school, your public library, or your office). Funded by Florida Virtual Campus. 
General OneFile (Gale) This link opens in a new window A one-stop source for news and periodical articles on a wide range of topics: business, computers, current events, economics, education, environmental issues, health care, hobbies, humanities, law, literature and art, politics, science, social science, sports, technology, and many general interest topics.
HathiTrust This link opens in a new window Open Access. FAU users may log in with FAUNet ID to download ebooks. HathiTrust is a partnership of academic & research institutions, offering a collection of millions of books digitized from libraries around the world. FAU is a partner institution.
JSTOR This link opens in a new window More than 2000 scholarly journals in education, humanities, mathematics, science, and social science disciplines. Most full-text access is archival; some current full text. Also includes a collection of over 500 Spanish-language e-books, which are student tech fee funded.
JSTOR Sustainability Collection This link opens in a new window Includes a wide range of journals, ebooks, and more than 5,400 Open Access research reports in the field of sustainability. Explores resilience and sustainability, and covers research on environmental stresses and their impact on society. Generously funded by the FAU Student Government Association.
Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary This link opens in a new window College level English language dictionary.
NYPL Digital Gallery This link opens in a new window Open Access NYPL Digital Gallery is the New York Public Library's image database, developed to provide free and open online access to thousands of images from the original and rare holdings of the Research Libraries. Spanning a wide range of visual media, NYPL Digital Gallery offers digital images of drawings, illuminated manuscripts, maps, photographs, posters, prints, rare illustrated books, and more. Encompassing the subject strengths of the vast collections of the Research Libraries, these materials represent the applied sciences, fine and decorative arts, history, performing arts, and social sciences.
Opposing Viewpoints (Gale In Context) This link opens in a new window This database covers today's hottest social issues, from offshore drilling to climate change, health care to immigration. It includes pro/con viewpoint essays, topic overviews, primary documents, biographies, periodical articles and more. This is a good source for students to start research or analysis of an issue, to complete writing assignments, prepare for a debate, or create a presentation.
Points of View Reference Center This link opens in a new window This database contains resources that present multiple sides of an issue, aiding students in developing persuasive arguments and essays. Covering many subjects, each topic includes an overview (objective background/description), point (argument) and counterpoint (opposing argument).
ProQuest This link opens in a new window An all-inclusive list of databases availble to FAU from this vendor.
ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global This link opens in a new window ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global includes international dissertations and theses as well as all previous content. It is the world's most comprehensive collection of dissertations and theses from around the world, spanning from 1743 to the present day and offering full text for graduate works added since 1997, along with selected full text for works written prior to 1997. It contains a significant amount of new international dissertations and theses both in citations and in full text. Funded by Florida Virtual Campus. 
Social Science Premium Collection (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window This collection provides access to databases covering the international literature in the social sciences, including politics, sociology, social services, anthropology, criminology, and education.Funded by Florida Virtual Campus. 
Taylor & Francis Online This link opens in a new window The Taylor & Francis Online journal collection includes scholarly journals in the Humanities, Social Sciences, and Science and Technology. Imprints include Psychology Press and Routledge.
WorldCat This link opens in a new window WorldCat is now available on the new WorldCat Discovery platform. A comprehensive catalog with over 179 million bibliographic records representing library collections from around the world. The catalog includes books, print journals, DVDs, historic photos, video games, musical scores, newspapers, webpages and other items.

Last updated on Mar 7, 2025 3:01 PM