Prisons, Press and Populism: The Role of the Media in Parole Policy Development and Implementation

It is often presumed that the media has an impact on the development and implementation of sentencing policies. This thesis adopts a mixed methods approach to examine the role that the media plays in the development and implementation of sentencing policies, using the recent example of parole reforms following the highly publicised rape and murder of Jill Meagher by recidivist sex offender Adrian Bayley in Melbourne, Victoria. This thesis concludes that through various mechanisms the media can have an influence on sentencing policies, and offers a number of options by which the role of the media may be moderated.