Examining Predictors of Parole Release in a Rural Female Jail Population

Parole has long been a linchpin of correctional practices but few studies have examined discretionary parole release in a female population. The current study examines factors, both static risk and dynamic needs, that influence parole decision making in a rural female jail population. The researchers collected data on parole releases from a rural county jail over a 3-year period beginning in 2012 (N?=?138). Offenders obtained a recommendation for parole release from a reentry assessment team that met at the jail each month to evaluate cases for parole eligibility. Logistic regression was used to explain variance in the factors considered by the reentry assessment team and it was evident that both static risk factors and dynamic needs play a role in discretionary parole release. We also examined obstacles or challenges that female offenders face when paroling to a rural location. Several policy recommendation related to the study are addressed.     

Recidivism in a Sample of Serious Adolescent Offenders

Objectives

A broad research literature in criminology documents key aspects of how criminal offending develops and changes over the life span. We contribute to this literature by showcasing methods that are useful for studying medium-term patterns of subsequent criminal justice system involvement among a sample of serious adolescent offenders making the transition to early adulthood.

Methods

Our approach relies on 7 years of post-enrollment follow-up from the Pathways to Desistance Study. Each person in the study was adjudicated delinquent for or convicted of one or more relatively serious offenses during adolescence. Their local jurisdiction juvenile court petition records and their adult FBI arrest records were systematically searched.

Results

We estimate in-sample 7 year recidivism rates in the 75–80 % range. Our analysis also provides recidivism rate estimates among different demographic groups within the sample. Extrapolated long-term recidivism rates are estimated to be on the order of 79–89 %.

Conclusions

The Pathways data suggest that recidivism rates of serious adolescent offenders are high and quite comparable to the rates estimated on other samples of serious offenders in the extant literature. Our analysis also reveals a pattern of heightened recidivism risk during the earliest months and years of the follow-up period followed by a steep decline.

     

Working with Misspecified Regression Models

Objectives

Conventional statistical modeling in criminology assumes proper model specification. Very strong and unrebutted criticisms have existed for decades. Some respond that although the criticisms are correct, there is for observational data no alternative. In this paper, we provide an alternative.

Methods

We draw on work in econometrics and statistics from several decades ago, updated with the most recent thinking to provide a way to properly work with misspecified models.

Results

We show how asymptotically, unbiased regression estimates can be obtained along with valid standard errors. Conventional statistical inference can follow.

Conclusions

If one is prepared to work with explicit approximations of a “true” model, defensible analyses can be obtained. The alternative is working with models about which all of the usual criticisms hold.

     

The Approved Narrative of the Srebrenica Massacre

The Srebrenica massacre has taken on both symbolic and mythical properties, all in the service of political agendas. The symbol is of Serb evil, manifested in an alleged cold-blooded and unprovoked massacre of innocents reminiscent of Nazi behavior during World War II. The myth is that 8000 Bosnian Muslim “men and boys” were executed in the vicinity of Srebrenica in July 1995, and that any executions there were unprovoked and carried out in accord with a genocidal plan. Both facts and language have had to be aggressively massaged to support these claims. The political agendas served by the massacre claims were those of the Bosnian Muslims, striving to get NATO to enter the Bosnian struggle more actively, the Croats, who needed a demonization of Serbs to carry out their own ethnic cleansing plans (most notably, removing 250,000 Serbs from Croatian Krajina in the very next month, August 1995), and the Clinton administration, under attack for a failure to intervene more actively on behalf of the Croats and Muslims and searching for an excuse to do so.This paper is partly drawn from and cites chapters in a forthcoming book on the Srebrenica massacre, Srebrenica: The Politics of War Crimes, written by George Bogdanich, Tim Fenton, Philip Hammond, Edward S. Herman, Michael Mandel, Jonathan Rooper, and George Szamuely. This book is referred to in the notes below as Politics of War Crimes. The author and his colleagues are indebted to Diana Johnstone, David Peterson, Vera Vratusa-Zunjic, Milan Bulajic, Milivoje Ivanisevic, Konstantin Kilibarda, and George Pumphrey for advice. Johnstone’s Fools Crusade is a fine basic statement of an alternative perspective on the Balkan Wars; George Pumphrey’s “Srebrenica: Three Years Later, And Still Searching,” is a classic critique of the establishment Srebrenica massacre narrative and repeatedly hit the target with facts and analyses still not rebutted.     

What Small Spatial Scales Are Relevant as Electoral Contexts for Individual Voters? The Importance of the Household on Turnout at the 2001 General Election

For many years, scholars of voting behavior have been thwarted in their attempts to identify micro spatial variations in turnout by data limitations. This has meant that most analyses have been ecological, which has implications for valid inference. Here, for the first time, a hierarchical approach is used to show the relative importance of several micro spatial scales, including the household, on voter participation. The findings highlight the importance of the household context. While those who live together often turn out together, the relative level of clustering within households as opposed to between geographical areas is found to be more important for two-person households compared to other households. Even after taking account of whether individuals are likely to self-select others from similar social backgrounds or with similar political attitudes, there is strong evidence of large and significant household effects on voter participation.     

The Civil Servant as Legislator: Law Making in British Administration

How are government policy commitments converted into legislation and what happens in the conversion? The role of civil servants in preparing legislation is far more important than is generally assumed. By looking at the work of four recent bill  teams in Britain – teams of civil servants given the task of developing Acts of Parliament – their crucial roles in initiating policies, placing them on the political agenda (even helping secure their place in a party manifesto), developing them, making sure they pass through parliament and enacting them once they have reached the statute books are assessed. The article explores the composition and working methods of bill teams. These teams work with considerable autonomy in developing legislation, but it cannot be assumed that they operate outside ministerial control. Teams see themselves as reflecting the priorities of the government in general and their ministers in particular. Yet ministers typically know relatively little about the law they are bringing in until they receive the submissions and briefings from their officials. Perhaps the biggest danger for democracy is not a civil service putting forward proposals which a minister feels forced to accept, but rather that ministers do not notice or fully appreciate what is being proposed in their name despite having the political authority to change it and a civil service which bends over backwards to consult and accommodate them.