Terry Fain

How Criminal System Racial Disparities May Translate into Health Disparities

Disadvantaged racial and ethnic minorities in the U.S. are strikingly over-represented in the juvenile justice and adult criminal justice systems. This paper briefly reviews the extent of over-representation attributable primarily to drug offenses and an earlier conceptual framework introduced by Iguchi and colleagues showing how the use of incarceration as a key drug control tool has disproportionately affected the health and well being of racial and ethnic minority communities. We then provide observations from the field that demonstrate how the implementation of a quality assessment approach might be used to mitigate procedural/structural biases that contribute to disparities in minority confinement, and ultimately, to reduce disparities in access to resources and health care.

A DECADE OF DRUG TREATMENT COURT RESEARCH

As drug treatment courts have multiplied over the past decade, so too have research evaluations conducted on their implementation and effectiveness. This article explores the decade of drug treatment court research conducted at RAND, starting with the experimental field evaluation of Maricopas drug testing and treatment options to the most current 14-site national evaluation of courts funded in 1995–96 by the Drug Court Program Office. The article presents summaries of findings, a brief description of a drug treatment court typology, and suggestion of where future research might focus.

Evaluating an Experimental Intensive Juvenile Probation Program: Supervision and Official Outcomes

In 1996, California provided funding to 14 county probation agencies to implement multiagency, comprehensive services to keep troubled youths from recommitting crime and progressing farther into the justice system. We report results of a randomized experiment used to evaluate Ventura County’s 4-year demonstration project called the South Oxnard Challenge Project (SOCP). We followed youths for more than 2 years after random assignment to SOCP or routine probation. We found no significant differences between SOCP and routine juvenile probationers on recidivism or other official-record outcomes. Although most youths were rearrested, most did not receive a sustained petition or incarceration. The modest additional services did not affect outcomes.

An Experimental Juvenile Probation Program Effects on Parent and Peer Relationships

In an effort to provide a wider range of services to youth and their families than is traditionally available in routine probation, the South Oxnard Challenge Project (SOCP) employed a team approach to service delivery of an intensive probation program. The researchers interviewed juveniles who were randomly assigned to either the SOCP experimental condition or the control condition of a routine probation program. The intensive probation program, among other goals, focused on improving parent–child relationships and teaching youth how to choose better peers. At 1 year post random assignment, experimental and control youth were not significantly different on key family or peer relationship measures. Level of program intensity, implementation issues, and other problems inherent in doing this type of research are provided as possible explanations for the lack of differences. These null findings are examined in light of the recent movement toward parental involvement legislation.

Effects of Case Management on Parolee Misconduct The Bay Area Services Network

The Bay Area Services Network (BASN) provides case management, drug abuse treatment, and links to other health/social services for drug-involved parolees in the San Francisco Bay Area. In a quasi-experimental evaluation, the authors found no difference between BASN and comparison parolees in treatment duration, access to health/social services, drug use days, or criminal recidivism. However, mean scores for dose of case management (number of contacts with case manager) and treatment duration were low among BASN parolees overall. In analyses using BASN parolees only, the authors found those with a stronger case management dose reported fewer drug use days and property offenses. These findings persisted when self-reported abstinence motivation was controlled for as a proxy for self-selection. The effect of case management dose on drug use days was mediated by treatment duration. BASN case management may have had favorable effects on recidivism and drug use when delivered in a sufficient dose.

An Evaluation of the Federal Government’s Violent Offender Incarceration and Truth-in-Sentencing Incentive Grants

The 1994 Crime Act authorized

Implementing “Corrections of Place” Ideas: The Perspective of Clients and Staff

10 billion through fiscal year 2000 to help states expand prison space for violent offenders, provided states had truth-in-sentencing (TIS) laws. Few states enacted new TIS statutes to qualify for funding; only

A National Picture of Prison Downsizing Strategies

2.7 million actually reached the states. By the end of fiscal year 1999, more than 50,000 new beds had been added using violent offender incarceration (VOI) and TIS funds, a capacity increase of around 4%. TIS did not increase incarcerations per violent crime committed. The percentage of sentence served by released violent offenders has increased since 1993 for both TIS and non-TIS states. By fiscal year 2002, VOI/TIS funding was discontinued.

Los Angeles County Juvenile Justice Crime Prevention Act: Fiscal Year 2007-2008 Report

Restorative justice has recently become popular among practitioners, but there have been few rigorous evaluations of programs. For approximately 5 years, Ventura County, California, probation staff and other local organizations worked together on the South Oxnard Challenge Project (SOCP), a juvenile probation program designed to implement Clear’s “corrections of place” (COP) ideas. The program is evaluated using a randomized experimental design and the results of surveys with youth clients, staff, and the youths’ caregivers regarding the effectiveness of the SOCP in reaching COP-related goals are reported. Results reflect that there were few differences between SOCP clients and routine probationers’ perceptions of their experiences. SOCP staff members were significantly more likely to believe they were reaching COP goals than were routine probation officers. Caregivers believed the SOCP was more helpful than routine probation.

Simultaneous Recruitment of Drug Users and Men Who Have Sex with Men in the United States and Russia Using Respondent-Driven Sampling: Sampling Methods and Implications

Abstract Many states faced fiscal pressures on their corrections budgets as the country entered a deep recession in 2008. A 2011 survey by the Association of State Correctional Administrators (ASCA) asked corrections officials in all 50 states about changes in correctional facilities, focusing on closures, new facilities, and altering existing facilities as a response to budget pressures. States employed a combination of these strategies. Between fiscal year (FY) 2007–2008 and FY 2011–2012, 148 facilities were closed, 29 new facilities were opened, and 23 states added 22,740 beds to existing facilities, resulting in about a 19,000 net bed reduction overall. Closures did not necessarily appear to be related to fiscal pressures or always related to reductions in the prison population. Despite the Great Recession, correctional funding is still a large part of state expenses and many states’ correctional populations continue to grow.