Family‐Centered Practice in Adult Treatment Courts: What Can We Learn from the Family Treatment Court Best Practice Standards?

Estimates suggest that upwards of 50% of participants in adult treatment courts (ATC) are parents. Previous studies point to negative impacts of unmet parenting needs on substance use treatment and criminal justice outcomes, and that family‐centered practices such as parenting classes substantially reduce recidivism among ATC participants. Judges and team members interested in adopting family‐centered practices in their ATC program may be unsure where to begin. One recent source of information regarding evidence‐based, family‐centered practices in treatment court settings is the Family Treatment Court (FTC) Best Practice Standards. The FTC Standards suggest adopting a family‐centered mission, expanding partnerships with child‐ and family‐serving agencies, discussing parenting and family roles during hearings, implementing family‐centered case management, and considering the effect of therapeutic responses on children and families. Building on the ATC Standards, the flexibility inherent in voluntary court programs, and existing community partnerships creates a pathway toward family‐centered practice in criminal settings.     

Form follows function: Applying photographic content analysis to forensic firearm identification

Drawing forensic conclusions from an image or a video is known as “photographic content analysis.” It involves the analysis of an image, as well as objects, actions, and events depicted in images or video. In recent years, photographic depictions of objects suspected as illegal firearms have substantially increased, appearing on CCTV surveillance footage, captured by mobile phones and shared on social media. However, the law in Israel states that a person can be charged with illegally possessing a firearm only if it can be proven that the object is capable of shooting with lethal bullet energy. This becomes more challenging in cases where the firearm was not physically seized, and the evidence exclusively consists of images and video. In this study, photographic content analysis was applied to images and video where objects suspected as commercial or improvised firearms had been depicted. An image and event sequence reconstruction video databases of both firearms and replicas were created in order to better define firearm-specific functional morphological features. We demonstrate that it is possible to classify an object as a firearm by analyzing the functional, and not only the esthetic, morphology in images and video. It is also shown that event sequence reconstruction in video may be used to infer that an object suspected as a firearm has the capacity to shoot by confirming the occurrence of a shooting act or shooting process. Thus, photographic content analysis may be used to forensically establish that an object depicted in an image or a video is a firearm by ruling out other known scenarios, and without physically seizing it.     

The aftermath of enforcement episodes for the children of immigrants

For 30 years, U.S. immigration policy has increasingly focused on enforcement. This article goes beyond cataloging the harms of such policies to document the processes by which they become more or less salient in the lives of children of immigrants over time. In-depth interviews with 86 young adults raised in New York show that enforcement policies shape children's lives either through lived experiences of enforcement episodes or through diffuse fears arising from indirect threats. Qualitative analysis of narratives of (a) deportations post-incarceration, (b) removals, (c) arrests and detentions (d) direct threats, and (e) diffuse fears identifies characteristics related to each that may affect children even after they age into adulthood.     

Fatal Accident Cause and Conclusion

Abstract:  The Toolmarks Laboratory prepared a report concerning a traffic accident involving the death of a road workman. The driver of the vehicle that hit the workman claimed that the wheels had failed to respond when turning left at a roundabout. A traffic investigator photographed the rack and pinion assembly of the steering system, which was subsequently removed and brought to the Toolmarks Laboratory. The rack and pinion assembly of the steering system was rebuilt, and examination showed that the system functioned properly. Specifically, the front wheels responded correctly to the steering input. Laboratory photographs of the steering system were taken in two different positions, from the same angles as the investigator's photographs at the scene of the accident. It was clear that the steering system had not been assembled properly in the garage.     

Monetary Costs of Gender and Ethnicity Disaggregated Group-Based Offending

Research on criminal careers has examined distinct longitudinal patterns of offending across unique trajectories of offenders and a recent study has linked the costs of criminal offending imposed by these unique trajectories, with a specific focus on chronic offenders. In this study, we use longitudinal data from the Second Philadelphia Birth Cohort Study to examine the extent to which the monetary costs of crime across distinct trajectories of crime vary across both gender and ethnicity. Results indicate that male adolescent-peaked and low and high-rate chronic offending impose substantial costs, and the average costs imposed on society by one male high-rate chronic offender is greater than 1.5 million. Although female chronic offending is rarer, these female offenders still impose greater than1.5 million. Although female chronic offending is rarer, these female offenders still impose greater than 750,000 in costs on average. African-American chronic-offending costs the most of any racial/ethnic trajectory group at greater than 1.6 million on average for each chronic offender. Hispanic chronic offending on average costs slightly more than1.6 million on average for each chronic offender. Hispanic chronic offending on average costs slightly more than 200,000, and low-rate White offending costs greater than $100,000 on average. Costs also appear to peak at different ages for males and females and for African-Americans, Hispanics, and Whites. Policy implications and study limitations are also discussed.     

FAMILY COURT–UNIVERSITY PARTNERSHIP TO BENEFIT DIVORCING FAMILIES: THE EXPERIENCE OF MARICOPA COUNTY (ARIZONA) FAMILY COURT DEPARTMENT AND ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY'S PREVENTION RESEARCH CENTER*

Using evidence‐based methods to help divorcing families requires the combined best efforts of legal professionals, courts, judges and administrators, mental health oriented service providers, and university researchers. Collaborative program development, implementation, and evaluation involve a complicated process of negotiation between professionals, yet this process is hardly ever described. The current article describes the processes we underwent in forging an alliance of researchers from Arizona State University's Prevention Research Center with professionals from the Maricopa County (Arizona) Family Court, a collaboration that involved a true dialogue and cooperation from the earliest stages and continuing throughout the project. A Community‐Based Participatory Research model was the underlying basis for our partnership; its lynchpin device was a Joint Planning Committee.