Jennifer L. Schulenberg

Structuring Police Discretion The Effect on Referrals to Youth Court

This article examines the impact of the Youth Criminal Justice Act of 2002 on police discretion with apprehended young offenders in Canada. Data for 1986 to 2005 from the Canadian Uniform Crime Reporting Survey are analyzed using an interrupted time series design. The Youth Criminal Justice Act was successful in achieving its objective of reducing youth court referrals by structuring police discretion. It caused a substantial change in the exercise of police discretion with apprehended youth: a substantial decrease in the use of charges and a corresponding increase in the use of alternatives to charging. The substitution of extrajudicial measures for charges occurred in all four regions of Canada and was much greater with minor offenses than with serious youth crime. Possible reasons for the success of the Youth Criminal Justice Act are discussed.

Police Decision-Making in the Gray Zone The Dynamics of Police–Citizen Encounters With Mentally Ill Persons

Research finds mentally ill persons have higher rates of police contacts, arrests, and criminal charges for minor offenses and noncriminal behavior. It remains unclear whether the decision-making process and factors affecting discretion reflect a procedural bias that criminalizes the mentally ill. Using observational data from a Canadian police service, the findings suggest higher odds for criminal charges with serious offenses, males, older citizens, a prior criminal record, being under the influence of alcohol or drugs, and being uncooperative with requests for information and compliance. The odds of a citation are higher for proactive calls, more serious offenses, older citizens, mentally ill persons, those under the influence, or with a disrespectful demeanor. The overall findings suggest an indirect procedural bias exists due to situational constraints, a disjuncture between policy and police culture, and limited mental health resources that lead to response strategies that contribute to criminalization of the mentally ill.

Police discretion with apprehended youth: assessing the impact of juvenile specialization

The decision to have dedicated youth officers is not an easy option for many police agencies due to financial and human resource constraints. Yet, very little research examines whether specialization impacts police discretion. Using statistical and interview data, this paper explores differences in police decision‐making with apprehended youth in Canada. The data suggest that specialized agencies are more likely to use referrals to external agencies and pre‐charge diversion, are less likely to charge a youth, are more likely to detain a youth once charged, and consider situational factors pertaining to the youth and that particular offense when using their discretion.

Moving Beyond Arrest and Reconceptualizing Police Discretion: An Investigation Into the Factors Affecting Conversation, Assistance, and Criminal Charges

Research on police discretion largely focuses on explaining the arrest disposition, while little attention is directed to the range of nonarrest decisions within an encounter. The research objective is to contribute to the discourse on police behavior by exploring the factors affecting different types of discretionary outcomes, a reconceptualization of demeanor, and the role of offence seriousness in different contexts. Using field observational data from a mid-sized Canadian police service, logistic regression models investigate the factors affecting police action identified in prior discretion research on three measures: conversational requests and directives, police assistance, and laying a criminal charge. The results support demarcating demeanor into disrespect and noncompliance, as they have unique independent effects on the use of discretion. Contrary to expectations, offence seriousness is only a significant predictor of noncoercive actions, while situational factors are better predictors of the arrest or charge decision than nondispositional outcomes.

Police Culture and Young Offenders: The Effect of Legislative Change on Definitions of Crime and Delinquency:

As of April 2003, Canada has new youth justice legislation that has implications for how police do their work in the areas of informal action (extrajudicial measures or sanctions). Because of legislative change, there exists a strong potential for challenges within the police cultures typifications and recipes for action in how police officers define a youth as a delinquent and an offense as serious. Using a mixed method–mixed model design and data from 202 semistructured interviews collected during 2002, this article explores the continuity and discontinuity in definitions between the police culture and the legislation. These are compared and contrasted to assess whether the nature of official responses to juvenile crime will differ in the new legislative environment. The results suggest that for legislative change to be effective in harmonizing police behavior, it must not only be represented in policies and procedures but also incorporated into the police culture.

An Experimental Test of Deviant Modeling

Objectives: Test the effect of deviant peer modeling on theft as conditioned by verbal support for theft and number of deviant models. Methods: Two related randomized experiments in which participants were given a chance to steal a gift card (ostensibly worth CAN

Content and Adequacy of Specialized Police Training to Handle Youth-Related Incidents: Perceptions of Trainers, Supervisors, and Frontline Officers

15) from the table in front of them. Each experiment had a control group, a verbal prompting group in which confederate(s) endorsed stealing, a behavioral modeling group in which confederate(s) committed theft, and a verbal prompting plus behavioral modeling group in which confederate(s) did both. The first experiment used one confederate; the second experiment used two. The pooled sample consisted of 335 undergraduate students. Results: Participants in the verbal prompting plus behavioral modeling group were most likely to steal followed by the behavioral modeling group. Interestingly, behavioral modeling was only influential when two confederates were present. There were no thefts in either the control or verbal prompting groups regardless of the number of confederates. Conclusions: Behavioral modeling appears to be the key mechanism, though verbal support can strengthen the effect of behavioral modeling.

An application of procedural justice to stakeholder perspectives: examining police legitimacy and public trust in police complaints systems

Examinations of specialized police training to handle youth-related incidents are typically approached with researcher-defined concepts rather than key concepts derived from the perceptions of police officers. In response to disagreements in the literature on the usefulness and applicability of training for specific law enforcement functions, this research builds on previous literature by investigating the content and perceived adequacy of specialized training received based on their duty assignment. A grounded theory analysis of 59 interviews conducted in 2002, with 67 Canadian police officers who received training from one of the two training facilities (Justice Institute of British Columbia and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police [RCMP] Depot) finds similarities and differences in the perceptions of training content and adequacy for training, supervisory, and frontline personnel. The differences are most pronounced between the trainers and practitioners than they are between supervisors and frontline officers. Definitions of training adequacy are considerably conditioned by the informal socialization process in the police culture. The data suggest that the academy focus on training generalists has the effect of increasing the impact and importance of informal socialization by field training officers on officer perceptions and procedures for handling youth-related incidents.

The Social Context of Police Discretion with Young Offenders: An Ecological Analysis

ABSTRACT Considerable research focuses on the complainant experience with civilian oversight agencies but we know much less about the perceptions of divergent stakeholders on the fairness in quality of decision-making and treatment associated with investigating allegations of police misconduct. Over 150 members of the community, law enforcement, and policy-makers were brought together to collaboratively develop recommendations to improve the transparency, accessibility, and accountability of a Canadian police complaints system (PCS). Using participant observation and survey data, the findings suggest the majority of participants hold negative views due to underlying themes of distrust in the investigation process, a reluctance to report due to inadequate knowledge and a fear of police reprisals, particularly by high risk and marginalised populations. Stakeholder confidence cannot be separated from the principles of procedural justice and due process constraints. Views on the legitimacy of both the police and the PCS are shaped by the absence of procedural justice principles of fairness in treatment and decision-making. Further, citizens appear to confound perceptions of legitimacy of the PCS with that of behaviour during police–citizen encounters. Thus, to increase public confidence the PCSs must work with police services to improve relationships with the community by developing initiatives that target the elements of the procedural justice model separately.