Estimation of arrest careers using hierarchical stochastic models

This paper introduces a general procedure using hierarchical stochastic models for characterizing criminal careers within a population of heterogeneous offenders. Individuals engage in criminal careers which are treated as stochastic processes governed by fixed parameters (e.g., a rate parameter), and these parameters come from specified distributions. The parameters of these distributions at the upper level of the hierarchy must then be specified. The models are estimated using data on all persons arrested at least once in the six-county Detroit Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area during the 4 years 1974–1977 for a criterion offense (an index crime other than larceny) and arrested at least once for robbery through April 1979. The collected data set is not a random sample of all such offenders in the population. There is a bias toward selecting those with a higher arrest frequency. In order to make more general inferences, statistical adjustment was needed to overcome the arrest-frequency sampling bias. We construct a series of models for the arrest career and fit the models with the data set of arrests. After correcting biases in the data, we estimate the model parameters using empirical Bayes methods and then examine the resulting models.     

A provisional typology of lawyer attitudes towards divorce practice

To test the proposition that attorneys in divorce may be classified into distinctive types, 46 members of the Family Law Section of the New Jersey State Bar Association completed a 61 item Lawyer Role Questionnaire (LRQ). The LRQ assessed attitudes regarding goals of and obstacles to a constructive settlement, sources of professional satisfaction, usefulness of mental health professionals, and general attitudes towards divorce and divorce clients. The modal responses on the LRQ portrayed the attorney as a fair, but tough-minded professional, primarily concerned with the welfare of children and ensuring equity. Factor analysis identified four principal attitudinal components of the LRQ: aPsychological factor, anAdvocacy factor, aSocial Work factor, and aClient as Problem factor. Hierachial cluster analysis utilizing the mean factor scores yielded two highly distinguishable attorney subgroups:Counselors (n=24), oriented to psychological and interpersonal issues and disinclined towards the use of adversarial tactics, andAdvocates (n=22), with the reverse orientation. Two subclusters of these main groups were also identified:Gladiators (n=4), with a strongly combatative stance and a highly negative attitude toward the client, andJourneymen (n=10), best characterized by their lack of enthusiasm for any of the dimensions popular with the other types. The results correspond well to the previous, but scanty, literature on lawyer dispositions. Methodological and conceptual issues raised by the study are considered and the possible relationship between lawyer type and the process and outcome of settlement negotiations is discussed.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the meeting of the American Psychology-Law Society, Baltimore, Maryland, October, 1979.