Page 201 - Essencials of Sociology

174 cHAPteR 6 Deviance and social control

the conflict Perspective
6.4 Explain how social class
is related to the criminal justice
system and how the criminal justice Class, Crime, and the Criminal Justice System
system is oppressive. TRW sold transistors to the federal government to use in its military satellites. The transis-
tors failed, and the government had to shut down its satellite program. TRW said that the
failure was a surprise, that it was due to some unknown defect. U.S. officials then paid
TRW millions of dollars to investigate the failure.
Watch on MySocLab
Video: Deviance: The Basics Then a whistle blower appeared, informing the government that TRW knew the transistors
would fail in satellites even before it sold them. The government sued Northrop Grumman
Corporation, which had bought TRW, and the corporation was found guilty (Drew 2009).

In early capitalism, children worked What was the punishment for a crime this serious? The failure of these satellites compro-
alongside adults. At that time, just mised the defense of the United States. When the executives of TRW were put on trial,
as today, most street criminals came how long were their prison sentences? Actually, these criminals weren’t even put on trial,
from the marginal working class, as and not one spent even a night in jail. Grumman was fined $325 million. Then—and
did the children shown in this 1911
yarn mill in Yazoo City, Mississippi. this is hard to believe—on the same day, the government settled a lawsuit that Grumman
had brought against it for $325 million. Certainly a rare coincidence.