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a standard for judging legal insanity which requires that either an offender did not know what he or she were doing, or that, if he or she did, that he or she did not know it was wrong.
mafia
See Cosa Nostra.
Mala in se
acts which are thought to be wrong in and of themselves.
mala prohibita
acts which are wrong only because society says they are.
marxist criminology
See radical criminology.
mass murder
the illegal killing of four or more victims at one location, within one event.
mesomorph
a body type described as athletic and muscular.
meta-analysis
a study of other studies about a particular topic of interest.
misdemeanor
a criminal offense which is less serious than a felony. One punishable by incarceration, usually in a local confinement facility, typically for a year or less.
money laundering
the process of converting illegally earned assets, originating as cash, to one or more alternative forms to conceal such incriminating factors as illegal origin and true ownership.
monozyotic (or MZ)
twins, as opposed to dizygotic (or DZ) twins, develop from the same egg, and carry virtually the same genetic material.
moral enterprise
a term which encompasses all the efforts a particular interest group makes to have its sense of propriety enacted into law.
mores
are behavioral proscriptions covering potentially serious violations of a group's values, and would probably include strictures against murder, rape, and robbery. See also folkways.
motor vehicle theft (UCR)
the theft or attempted theft of a motor vehicle. This offense category includes the stealing of automobiles, trucks, buses, motorcycles, motorscooters, snowmobiles, and so on.
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