Problematic Components Found in Many Criminal History Formulas

2019 ◽  
pp. 183-206
Author(s):  
Richard S. Frase ◽  
Julian V. Roberts
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Juvenile Court ◽  
Criminal History ◽  
Extra Weight

The focus of this chapter is on five components of criminal history scores that lack strong justification from the perspective of recidivism risk, retribution, or both rationales. These components are: juvenile court adjudications, misdemeanor convictions, the offender’s “custody status” when committing the offense being sentenced (whether he was incarcerated or on some form of criminal justice release), weighting prior felony convictions according to their severity ranking or other seriousness indicator, and the policy in some jurisdictions of according extra weight to prior offenses that were similar to the offense being sentenced (“patterning” premiums). The chapter then presents data from Minnesota, showing how the inclusion of the first four of these score components greatly increases the frequency and duration of recommended and imposed prison terms. The chapter concludes that criminal history scores should not routinely include any of these five problematic components, although judges might consider them as potential aggravating factors.

Found Out and Opting Out

2016 ◽  
Vol 665 (1) ◽  
pp. 127-141 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Esther Lageson
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Family Relationships ◽  
Justice System ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Criminal History ◽  
Criminal Records ◽  
Opting Out ◽  
Private Lives ◽  
Criminal Histories ◽  
The Relationship

Online criminal histories document and publicize even minor brushes with the law and represent people who may not even be guilty of any crime. This has dramatically changed the relationship that millions of Americans have with the criminal justice system and may affect their social and private lives. Drawing on interviews and fieldwork with people attempting to expunge and legally seal their criminal records, I explore how online versions of these records impact family relationships. Many who appear on mug shot and criminal history websites are arrestees who are never formally charged or convicted of a crime. The indiscriminate posting of all types of justice contact on websites may impact those who, for the most part, desist from crime and are core contributors to their family and community. I find that many of those who are affected by the stigma of online records did not know that records existed until they “popped up” unexpectedly, and that this experience leads them to self-select out of family duties that contribute to child well-being.

Not Working and Unable to Work

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keesha M. Middlemass
Keyword(s):  
Social Capital ◽  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Child Support ◽  
Public Policies ◽  
Criminal History ◽  
State Governments ◽  
Background Checks ◽  
Ethnographic Data ◽  
Convicted Felons

This chapter explores the challenges felons face in securing employment, including criminal history background checks, industry restrictions, changes in public policies, the growth of technology, and the reluctance of companies to hire felons. Most participants reentered society unable to secure legal employment due to divergent levels of education and social capital, and the increased use of criminal history background checks. A job is critically important to successfully reenter society due to the increased practice of local and state governments imposing criminal justice fees and fines, as well as child-support payments in arrears. Based on interview and ethnographic data, this chapter details the challenges convicted felons encounter when looking for work, and also explores some of the strategies that participants used in an effort to secure gainful legal employment.

Restitution as a Sanction in Juvenile Court

1986 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 177-185 ◽  
Author(s):  
William G. Staples
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Criminal Justice System ◽  
Justice System ◽  
Historical Perspective ◽  
Juvenile Court ◽  
Current Trend ◽  
Tort Law ◽  
The Past ◽  
Victims Of Crime ◽  
Policies And Practices

Over the past decade, restitution has assumed increasing significance as a sanction both in the juvenile and in the criminal justice system. The purpose of this article is to examine the current trend toward utilizing restitution from a critical and historical perspective. Current restitution policies and practices are placed within the context of three major trends in justice: (1) the individualization of the juvenile court; (2) the growing concern with the victims of crime, and (3) the blurring of traditional distinctions between criminal and tort law. Restitution as a sanction is evaluated in the context of these three developments, and the contemporary form of restitution is compared with its historical predecessors.

scholarly journals Surveys, Records, and the Study of Incarceration in Families

2016 ◽  
Vol 665 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amanda Geller ◽  
Kate Jaeger ◽  
Garrett T. Pace
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Population Based ◽  
Criminal History ◽  
Criminal Justice Agency ◽  
Administrative Records ◽  
Paternal Incarceration ◽  
Criminal Histories ◽  
Current Survey ◽  
American Children

More than 2 million American children have a parent incarcerated, making the consequences of parental incarceration for families a critical concern. A growing literature documents significant challenges not only among incarcerated men, but also among their spouses, partners, and children. Much remains to be learned about these experiences, however; and the data available for doing so are limited. In this article, we demonstrate how the quality of available data on paternal incarceration can be improved by supplementing a leading population-based survey of families with administrative records on criminal history from a state criminal justice agency. This administrative supplement provides only a low-end estimate of the extent of criminal justice involvement in our sample, but still increases the number of fathers identified with criminal histories by more than 20 percent. Building on such a supplement—in our current survey or future ones—could improve the identification of justice-involved fathers on a broader scale.

scholarly journals Legal Protection Reform for Children Conflicted with Law

Rechtsidee ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 59
Author(s):  
Emy Rosna Wati
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Criminal Justice System ◽  
Child Protection ◽  
Justice System ◽  
Juvenile Court ◽  
Legal Protection ◽  
Victims Of Crime ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Government

The government has long been giving protection to children. Protection is reflected in the issuance of various Law. One of them is the Law No. 23 of 2003 on Child Protection. The legal protection of children in conflicted with law and child as victims of crime are regulatedin articlenumber 64. Issuance of Law No. 3 of 1997 on Juvenile Court actually originates from a passion for protecting the rights of children in conflicted with the law. However, due to inadequate understanding and mindset of Juvenile Court, which is do not have the children’s perspective, what comes up is that the substance of Law on Juvenile Court is not to protect children but to prosecute children. However, after the release of Law No. 11 of 2012 onThe Criminal Justice System of Children, legal protection of children in conflict with the law was encouragingly reformed. How To Cite: Rosna Wati, E. (2014). Legal Protection Reform for Children Conflicted with Law. Rechtsidee, 1(1), 59-70. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.21070/jihr.v1i1.101

Juvenile Justice before Juvenile Court

2003 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 109-136 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Wolcott
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Juvenile Offenders ◽  
Criminal Justice System ◽  
Police Officers ◽  
Justice System ◽  
Juvenile Court ◽  
Criminal Courts ◽  
Law Enforcement Agencies ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Juvenile Arrests

Progressive Era campaigns to establish juvenile courts maintained that police and criminal courts failed to distinguish between children and adults. They suggested that law enforcement agencies either sentenced juveniles as if they were adults, imposing excessive punishments, or let kids go, failing to discipline them and encouraging them to commit further crimes. However, this case study of juvenile arrests in turn-of-the-century Detroit indicates that, before the creation of juvenile court, criminal justice institutions had more complex interactions with delinquent youth than has been recognized previously. Boys typically were arrested for very different offenses than were adults, and the police and courts often segregated children and adolescents from the harshest elements of the criminal justice system. The police sought every opportunity to decide the outcome of juvenile arrests themselves, without a court hearing, particularly if boys had committed only status offenses such as truancy or if crime victims decided not to prosecute. When juveniles did appear in criminal courts, judges found ways to soften their experiences, rarely jailing younger boys and instead sentencing some to reform school for ostensible rehabilitation. After 1900, efforts to protect young offenders from criminal justice institutions expanded as specially assigned police officers increasingly sought to discipline delinquents prior to arrest and the courts introduced an unofficial form of probation. Rather than constituting a break from the past, the creation of Detroit’s juvenile court in 1907 mainly made official juvenile offenders’ growing separation from the criminal justice system.

Race and Juvenile Court Dispositions

1981 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 287-301 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carl E. Pope ◽  
William H. Feyerherm
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Racial Discrimination ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Justice System ◽  
Juvenile Court ◽  
Referral Source ◽  
Relative Impact ◽  
Current Analysis ◽  
Relevant Variables ◽  
Court Dispositions

Allegations of racial discrimination in the criminal justice system abound. Many theorists appear to accept such discrimination as a demonstrated fact. However, a review of research is not so conclusive; mixed results are apparent. The current analysis examines the relative impact of race and other social factors as compared to a set of legally relevant variables such as referral offense and referral source. The focus of the analysis is the processing of juveniles in California, in particular the decision at intake to release, handle informally, or handle case with a formal petition. The analysis indicates that the legally relevant set of variables has a greater impact on processing than race. Indeed, age of the juvenile has a greater impact on processing than race.

Juvenile Decertification

2005 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 278-301 ◽  
Author(s):  
Geoffrey R. Marczyk ◽  
Kirk Heilbrun ◽  
Tammy Lander ◽  
David Dematteo
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Justice System ◽  
Juvenile Justice System ◽  
Juvenile Court ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
Level Of Service ◽  
Psychopathy Checklist ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Total Charges

This study considers the impact of data from the Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version (PCL:YV), the Massachusetts Youth Screening Instrument (MAYSI), and the Youth Level of Service Case Management Inventory (YLS/CMI) on the court’s decision whether to decertify an adolescent defendant back to juvenile court or keep the defendant in criminal court. There are significant positive relationships between certification status and age; number of violent charges; total charges; PCL:YV, YLS/CMI, and MAYSI total scores; and select subscales of the MAYSI and the YLS/CMI. Significant differences are found between those who remained in the adult criminal justice system and those who were decertified to the juvenile justice system for age, YLS/CMI total score, and the Prior and Current Offenses and Dispositions and Personality and Behavior subscales of the YLS/CMI. The combination of PCL:YV total score and select subscales from the MAYSI and YLS/CMI provided the most accurate model for predicting certification status.

A Preliminary Investigation of the Psychological Inventory of Criminal Thinking Styles–Layperson Edition–Short Form

2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (5) ◽  
pp. 756-769 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean M. Mitchell ◽  
Nicole R. Bartholomew ◽  
Robert D. Morgan ◽  
Kelly C. Cukrowicz
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Criminal Behavior ◽  
Factor Model ◽  
Short Form ◽  
Preliminary Investigation ◽  
Reliability And Validity ◽  
Criminal History ◽  
Thinking Styles ◽  
Criminal Thinking ◽  
Psychological Inventory

The Psychological Inventory of Criminal Thinking Styles (PICTS) is commonly used to assess criminal thinking (thoughts related to criminal behavior); however, the item wording may not be an appropriate assessment for individuals without a criminal history (laypersons) who still may be at risk of engaging in crime. Therefore, a layperson version of the PICTS may more accurately assess criminal thinking among this group. This study examined the psychometric properties of the PICTS–Layperson–Short Form (PICTS-L-SF). Participants were 619 college students without a criminal justice involvement history. Analyses of the PICTS-L-SF indicated that a bifactor model fit the data better than a one- and two-factor model (general criminal thinking; proactive and reactive criminal thinking). Results provide strong evidence for the reliability and validity of the PICTS-L-SF, suggesting it can be used with individuals who are not criminal justice involved to assess criminal thinking.

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