Staying Out: Reentry Protective Factors Among Rural Women Offenders

The current study examines protective factors for women who transition from county jails to rural Appalachian communities, areas with limited health and behavioral health services. The study included drug-using women recruited from three jails in rural Appalachia and followed-up at 12-months post-release. Analyses focused on differences between women who remained in the community and those who returned to custody, as well as a multivariate model to determine protective factors for reentry success. At the bivariate level, staying out of jail was associated with being older, having a job, not using drugs, stable housing, receiving health treatment, and having prosocial peers. In the multivariate model, the most robust predictors of staying out of jail were drug use abstinence, health care utilization, and prosocial peers. Most research on criminogenic needs associated with reentry success have focused on men, and most focused on reentry to urban communities where services and resources are more accessible. These findings have important implications for criminal justice systems to implement reentry programs for women offenders during the transition to the community.     

Using Reentry Simulations to Promote Changes in Attitude toward Offenders: Experiential Learning to Promote Successful Reentry

This research examines the viability of using reentry simulations as a tool for influencing changes in participants’ perspectives about the realities of coming back in the community after a period of incarceration. Using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies, we investigated changes in attitudes toward offenders after participants completed a reentry simulation designed to replicate the experience of the first four weeks in the life of a person attempting to reenter society after incarceration. Participants were 27 students enrolled in a community corrections course that was cross listed and co-taught between criminal justice and social work. Participants completed a quantitative pre- and post-test that assessed attitudes toward prisoners as well as a reflection assignment about the simulation experience. Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test was used to analyze scores from pre- and post-tests. Qualitative analysis of the reflection papers identified and analyzed themes. Both quantitative and qualitative analysis indicate that simulations humanize perspectives toward former offenders and develop a better understanding of their situation. This understanding creates empathetic feelings that can reduce discrimination and stigma, thereby creating an environment more conducive to successful reintegration. Based on the results of this study, use of simulation-based training is recommended with audiences including criminal justice personnel, service providers, court practitioners, judges, and legislators as a way to more clearly articulate the realities faced by this vulnerable population.

     

Country Profile: A Review of the New Juvenile Offenders Status in Cambodia

This publication seeks to explore whether the position of juvenile offenders vis‐à‐vis the Cambodian criminal law has changed with the passage of the new criminal legislation and whether this change has been positive or otherwise. The quality of this change will demonstrate to the reader whether the overall process of the reform of the juvenile justice component of the Cambodian system of criminal justice, which spans the last fifteen years and has been funded by the international community, has been a success. The author limited the scope of this inquiry to a comparison between the various domestic laws applicable to juvenile offenders and did not include comparisons with international law, model laws or juvenile laws of other states. Being the first publication of its kind, this analysis limits its claim to the analysis of the relevant statutory provisions rather than ‘practice notes’ which have yet to develop.     

Family Profile of Young Offenders Who Abuse Their Parents: A Comparison With General Offenders and Non-Offenders

This study aimed to explore the family profile of adolescent-to-parent abuse cases. Concretely, this paper examines whether or not there is a different family profile of parent-abuse offenders compared with other types of offenders and with non-offender adolescents. The sample included 90 adolescents who were clustered into three groups (parent-abuse offenders, other type of offenders, and non-offender adolescents). Participants completed measures of quality of communication with parents and parents’ educational styles. They were also evaluated using a brief interview with questions about family structure. Results indicate offenders who assault their parents have a different family structure and dynamics. Differences were found concerning the type of household, family size, and family incomes. In addition, parent-abuse offenders reported a lower quality of communication with both parents perceiving them as less warm, more rejecting, and less inductive than did the other groups.     

An At‐Risk Profile of Probation Supervised Youthful Offenders in a Rural,Midwest County: Significant Gender and Race Differences

There have been multiple risk factors identified that lead to youth delinquent behaviors and activities. These risks are family, school, peer, disability, and neighborhood related, though the studies to date have primarily focused on larger urban juvenile court jurisdictions. This exploratory study of one rural juvenile court (in Ashtabula County, Ohio) furthers these risk factor investigations through the evaluation of 91 randomly selected, adjudicated delinquent youth (supervised in 2008 and 2009). Data on 23 risk factors was collected, with further analysis of significant gender and race differences. Key results were that a majority of youth experienced poverty and lived in a one‐parent family; 40% had a mental health or substance abuse problem; 25% were in need of special education disability services; males were much more likely to have school‐related difficulties and to commit felony offenses; females had significantly more mental health and substance abuse problems; and minority youth successfully completed probation more often.     

Recognizing Perspectives on Community Reentry From Offenders With Mental Illness: Using the Afrocentric Framework and Concept Mapping with Adult Detainees

By using concept mapping techniques and incorporating the Afrocentric framework, the study demonstrated that people with mental illnesses, when asked and provided the means to participate, can engage in meaningful identification of their needs, service conceptualization and prioritization. They provided 13 service area needs that included 104 indicators of their success when returning to the community. The identification of these indicators of success is helpful to program developers so that they can address the challenges of the consumer and move offenders with mental illness toward independent living. Implications of the findings for social workers and public health professionals working in the corrections field were explored and discussed.     

Women Who Participate in Illegal Pyramid Selling: Voices from Female Rural Migrant Offenders in China

Asian Journal of Criminology - Mainly through a case study, this article examines Chinese women’s involvement in one form of organised crime—illegal pyramid selling—which is...     

一群自我放逐的另类与逃亡者——田纳西·威廉斯戏剧中的男性群像

田纳西·威廉斯戏剧中塑造了一群自我放逐的男性群像.他们或是生活的失败者,或是感情畸零的同性恋者,或是被生活主潮冲刷到边缘的另类,或是沉迷于幻想中的行吟诗人.这些男性人物在与女性人物的对峙中,在责任与荣誉面前,往往选择了逃亡.剧作家通过对这些男性人物悲剧命运的描写,表达了对社会现实的批判和对美国现代文明弊病的厌弃.     

实现帮教安置工作“四化”目标研究

深入落实科学发展观,从源头上预防和减少社会矛盾,是党的十七大对新时期、新阶段构建社会主义和谐社会,维护重大战略机遇期的社会稳定所提出的明确要求。刑释解教人员帮教安置工作是影响社会和谐稳定的重要因素之一,务必引起各级高度重视。2004年初,中央综治委刑释解教人员帮教安置工作领导小组提出“帮教社会化、就业市场化、管理信息化、工作职责规范化”的目标要求。     

Getting Tough With Juvenile Offenders: Ignoring the Best Interests of the Child

Abstract Despite a declining delinquency rate, legislatures and courts are getting tough with juveniles. Such policies are antithetical to the “best interest of the child” philosophy and counter-productive to treatment. Protecting the child's rights to due process and individualized treatment must be enhanced, not subverted. The laws which govern the behavior of citizens, companies, institutions, and various other elements in our society are man-made. “Public policy is whatever governments choose to do or not to do.”¹ However, these decisions are not made in a vacuum. They are ultimately made by the confluence of the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of the government that are, and of necessity must be, at least tangentially responsive to perceived public needs. “Courts respond … to societal pressures; they are moved by the same tides of public opinion as are legislatures and executives.”² The resultant public policies and the programs created to administer them reflect these societal needs and respond to them accordingly. The evolution of the Children's Code in America, its eventual adoption into law and its subsequent changes over the years mark these shifts in society's view of its children. Throughout this slow and sometimes grudging process, the legal status of children has made numerous gains. Today, children hold a special place in our culture and until recently, the Children's Code was utilized to assist them in maintaining and enhancing that status. However, within the last few years this tide of evolutionary gains has turned into a flood of erosion of due process rights. Yet:     

Punishing Sex: Sex Offenders and the Missing Punitive Turn in Sexuality Studies

At precisely the same time that gay and lesbian activists were securing marriage rights for same‐sex couples nationwide, courts and “tough on crime” state legislatures were devising new ways to regulate sex. Despite recent estimates that over 750,000 Americans are registered sex offenders, few sexuality scholars have examined the growth of punitive policies regulating sex offenders. In this article, I draw on a unique set of data on the population of sex offenders in the United States to analyze: (1) whether recent trends in sex offender registration mirror those of corrections more generally, and (2) whether these policies disproportionally impact racial minorities. Findings reveal that sex offender registries grew dramatically between 2005 and 2013; that this growth is out of step with concurrent trends in corrections; and that black communities are disproportionately impacted. I conclude by considering whether these data reveal a new mode of “governing through crime” specifically targeting sex.

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Punishing the Wicked: Examining the Correlates of Sentence Severity for Convicted Sex Offenders

Objectives

To examine the correlates of sentence severity for convicted sex offenders under sentencing guidelines, contrasted with individuals convicted of non-sexual, violent offenses.

Methods

Drawing on 7 years of data from the Pennsylvania Commission on Sentencing, we utilize a logit-negative binomial hurdle model to examine the predictors of incarceration and sentence length, and an accompanying Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition of the gap in sentencing outcomes between the groups. We then implement a quantile regression framework to examine variation in effects across the distribution of sentence lengths. All analyses are contrasted with a matched sample of violent offenders to consider the extent to which estimated associations are unique to sex offenders.

Results

The analyses suggest several predictors of sentence severity for sex offenders, and that these predictors vary between the incarceration and sentence length decisions. In comparing effects for sex and matched violent offenders, divergent effects were observed for both case and offender characteristics. An Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition suggests that differences in the coefficient estimates account for less than one-fifth of the gap in average sentencing outcomes between sex and violent offenders. Subsequent quantile regressions indicate that these effects vary considerably over the sentence length distribution in ways that are not captured or obscured by the hurdle models.

Conclusions

The predictors of sentence severity for sex offenders, and points of divergence from violent offenders, are congruent with the notion that judges utilize crime-specific stereotypes in arriving at sentencing decisions. Further, the application of quantile regression following point-based estimation can reveal meaningful patterns in sentencing disparities.

     

Sympathy for the Devil: An Exploration of Federal Judicial Discretion in the Processing of White-Collar Offenders

Since the late 1990s, the United States has experienced a series of major corporate malfeasance events leading to the collapse of corporations such as Worldcom and Enron, predatory lending practices which devastated the nation’s real estate market and the Bernie Madoff scandal serving as prime examples. While the leading culprits in such well-publicized cases have met stiff sanctions, the common notion is that white-collar offenders are treated more leniently than street offenders by the criminal justice system. Given the scope and severity of victimization attributable to the contemporary white collar crime epidemic, the matter of sanctioning fairness and severity is of timely importance. This paper examines judicial discretion in the form of the decision to incarcerate and the length of sentences imposed for federal white collar and street level offenders. Findings inform discussion oriented around the related issues of deterrence and public safety.     

A Perspective on Policy and Practice in the Re-Integration of Offenders

Concentrations of unemployment and crime are promoting a slow crisis in the lives of unskilled young men, and obstruct the successful re-integration and resettlement of offenders. At the same time, criminal justice system programmes for offenders are seeking a new balance between treatment approaches and the creation of opportunities. In this article the author reflects on the policy frameworks which give rise to these approaches, and considers the danger that criminal justice systems may place emphasis on diverting people from crime without directing them towards opportunities for re-integration. The author considers the needs of offenders in relation to housing and employment in particular.