Exam 4 law

Sentencing Process

- The presentence investigative report - Recommendations from the prosecutor and defense attorney. In fact, judges' sentencing decisions are highly influenced by the prosecutor's request for a lengthy sentence, a finding that can be explained by a judgment process called anchoring. Defense attorneys' sentencing recommendations are also influenced by the prosecutors' demands. When researchers asked lawyers to assume the role of defense attorneys in a simulated rape case, they found that though defense attorneys requested a lower punishment than prosecutors, they were still influenced by the level of the prosecutors' recommendation, and assimilated their own sentencing demands to those of the prosecutor -In one study, the judge agreed with the probation officer's recommendation in 78% of cases that resulted in community sanctions and 62% of cases that resulted in incarceration -front-end sentencing by judges that mark the beginning of an offender's punishment. - Back-end sentencing occurs when parolees are arrested for new crimes or violate the conditions of their parole -Back-end sentencing is now responsible for approximately one-third of all prison admissions -Examination of these parole revocations shows that parole board officials, eager to protect themselves from public scorn, are especially harsh on sex offenders and serious and violent offenders, regardless of what these offenders did to violate their parole.

The Assumption of a Blank Slate

Courts assume that jurors can put aside any preconceptions about defendant guilt or the merits of civil defendants and plaintiffs when forming judgments -.(In criminal cases, the "blank slates" should be tinted at the outset by a presumption that the defendant is innocent of the charges.) -The courts assume that individual jurors can divest themselves of any improper "leaning" toward one side or the other, and that through jury selection procedures the ideal of open-minded jurors can be achieved. Courts also assume that attorneys can identify and dismiss prospective jurors whose preconceptions would affect their verdicts, so the trial can begin with a fair and unbiased jury. -First, attorneys are motivated to select jurors who are favorable to their own side, rather than those who are neutral. Second, it is impossible for anyone to be entirely free of influence by past experiences and resulting prejudices.

Veterans Courts

Special problem-solving courts designed to work with military veterans who have committed offenses and are struggling with substance abuse or mild mental health issues

Sentencing Policies

-Some states have indeterminate sentencing schemes, in which judges exercise their discretion by imposing a variable period of incarceration for a given offense (e.g., 6-20 years), and a parole board determines the actual date of release -In other states, the legislative branch has imposed a determinate sentencing system on the judiciary, effectively reducing judges' discretion. In these systems, offenders are sentenced for a fixed length of time determined by statutes and guidelines, and there is no parole. The primary goals of these sentences are retribution and moral outrage -In a further attempt to reduce discretion, some states impose mandatory minimum sentences for certain offenses, including drug crimes. These policies require judges to sentence offenders to a minimum number of years in prison regardless of any extenuating circumstances -75% of offenders subjected to a mandatory minimum penalty were convicted of a drug trafficking offense -In 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that the mandatory nature of the guidelines was unconstitutional (United States v. Booker, 2005) -In 2007, the Supreme Court upheld the sentence, stating that federal judges have the authority to set any reasonable sentence as long as they explain their reasoning (Gall v. United States, 2007)

Jurors' Abilities to Decide Complex Cases

-The case in Judge Singleton's court actually entailed three trials: a 15-week criminal trial that involved 4 corporations, 27 corporate officers, scores of witnesses, and hundreds of documents; a four-month-long trial with 113 witnesses and 5,000 exhibits; and a second trial involving plaintiffs who had opted out of the original lawsuit. Discovery and trials took five years. -some prominent examples include (1) the evidence is too difficult for a layperson to understand; (2) the general information load on juries is excessive because of the large number of witnesses, particularly expert witnesses, who testify in these cases; and (3) because of voir dire procedures that result in the exclusion of jurors with some understanding of or interest in the case, less-capable jurors are left to decide -in 2 of the 12 cases, the expert testimony was so complicated and esoteric that only professionals in the field could have understood it -Mock jurors had difficulty deciding a breach of contract case that involved a claim, an affirmative defense, a permissive counterclaim, and a third-party claim -. Jury aids such as written summary statements of expert testimony and interim summaries can enhance the quality of jurors' decision-making

Reentry for juveniles

-There are six areas in particular that are important in the reentry planning process: family functioning, housing (if not living with the family), school or job, mental health and/or substance abuse services, monitoring, and social support -graduated sanctions approach involving three steps: (1) prerelease planning; (2) a structured transition involving institutional and aftercare staff prior to, and following, release; and (3) long-term reintegrative activities to facilitate service delivery and social control -"Wraparound services" involve the delivery of individualized services in the context of collaboration between agencies such as those responsible for mental health care, educational services, and juvenile corrections. In this approach, funding follows the adolescent's treatment, rather than being allocated to particular programs

Secure Residential Interventions

- Reasons for: -- Lack of community-based interventions -- High perceived risk to society - Effectiveness -- Difficult to assess -- May be effective with training, educational & mental health treatments

Sentencing Sex Offenders

- So the vast majority of convicted sex offenders are not rearrested for another sex crime. And when sex offenders do commit other crimes, typically they are not sex crimes -But in a number of ways, judges and corrections professionals do treat individuals who offend sexually differently than other (nonsexual) offenders. Upon release from prison, sex offenders in many jurisdictions are required to register with state officials, who then publicly notify the community about the location of the offender's residence. - Sex offenders are prohibited from living within certain distances of schools, day-care facilities, parks, and other locations frequented by children, and can be involuntarily committed to a mental health facility following the completion of their sentence. In addition, these individuals can be subjected to extraordinary sanctions, including enhanced sentences and mandatory treatments.

Jurors' Abilities to Understand Their Instructions

- jurors were quite accurate in how they discussed the instructions: only 19% of their comments were incorrect. But nonetheless, they averaged 52 errors per case. -One source of confusion was the legal language itself -A large number of research studies have focused on improving comprehension by modifying the language of the instructions. These studies borrow principles from the field of psycholinguistics (the study of how people understand and use language). -only approximately 30% of the errors involved language misunderstanding and these were often corrected by other jurors. The more common errors stemmed from the piecemeal construction of jury instructions and the fact that they failed to address crucial topics -Instructing the jury at the conclusion of the trial reflects a belief in the recency effect: that the judge's instructions will have a more powerful impact on a jury's decision when they are given late in the trial, -This line of reasoning gains support from research in cognitive psychology showing (1) that people learn more effectively when they know in advance what the specific task is, and (2) that schematic frameworks facilitate comprehension and recall -primacy effect—that instructions will have their most beneficial effect if they are presented first, because jurors can then compare the evidence they hear to the requirements of the law and apply the instructions to the evidence in order to reach a verdict -focus better during the trial and follow evidence -jurors should be able to ask questions during trial

Restorative Approaches

- views crime as a violation of the victim and the community - to repair the harm and restore the losses caused by offensive activity, reintegrate offenders into society, and empower victims and the community to move from feelings of vulnerability and loss to a sense of understanding and closure - People apparently do value its role in repairing harm done to victims and communities. In fact, for less serious crimes, people prefer to respond with restorative measures, and for more serious offenses, people prefer responses that combine restorative procedures and punitive sanctions (i.e., prison sentences), rather than either of these options alone - Victim satisfaction seems to drive these reactions:

change of venue and surveys

--4. Change of venue. A change of venue, the most extreme remedy for pre-trial prejudice, is typically requested by defense attorneys in cases that have generated a great deal of biased publicity (e.g., the Boston marathon bombing case). Changing venue means that the trial is held in a different geographic jurisdiction and that jurors for the trial may be drawn from this new jurisdiction. But venue changes are expensive, inconvenient, and time-consuming, so judges are reluctant to grant them, though some evidence suggests that they are more easily persuaded when defense attorneys provide media analyses documenting the extent of news coverage. - Venue changes can result in significant variations in characteristics of the communities, and hence, the jurors, involved, as illustrated by the case of William Lozano, a Hispanic police officer who was convicted of killing an African American motorist in Miami. After his conviction was reversed because of pre-trial publicity and he was granted a retrial, the case was first moved to Tallahassee (which has a much smaller Hispanic population than Miami) and eventually tried in Orlando (where the Hispanic population is more sizeable). The Florida appellate court reasoned that in cases in which race may be a factor and changes of venue are appropriate, trials should be moved to locations where the demographic characteristics are similar to those of the original location (State v. Lozano, 1993). Public opinion surveys gauge how many people have read or heard about a case, what they have read or heard, whether they have formed opinions, what these opinions are, and how their opinions influence perceptions of the case. - Public opinion surveys are also time consuming, and often require more resources than the typical client can afford. - Moreover, even if the venue is not changed, the results of the survey can often be used in jury selection. Because of the multiple purposes for which they can be used, public opinion surveys are a popular tool among trial consultants.

Determinants of Discrepancies

-A few of the jury-judge discrepancies resulted from facts that one party knew but the other did not. For example, in several cases, the judge was aware of the defendant's prior arrest record (a matter not introduced into evidence) and would have found him guilty, but the jury acquitted him -A second, smaller source of judge/jury discrepancies was the relative effectiveness of the two attorneys. In some trials, the jury was apparently swayed by the superiority of one lawyer over the other and produced a verdict that was, at least in the judge's opinion, contrary to the weight of the evidence -Perhaps the most important explanation of judge- jury differences, accounting for roughly half of the disagreements, involves what Kalven and Zeisel called jury sentiments (view of juror that is unrelated to the evidence and the law in a trial) -In one case included in the Kalven and Zeisel study, a man was brought to trial for stealing two hot dogs. Because this was his second crime, he would have been sentenced to prison. Whereas the judge would have found him guilty, the jury voted 10-2 for acquittal. -Jurors sometimes acquit (when judges would have convicted) because they believe that a law is unfair. In trials for the sale of beer and liquor to minors who were in the military, juries concluded that there was minimal social harm -limitations: judges picked what trials to report on,small sample size, now more diverse in juries, only have judge's p.o.v

Institutional Interventions

-A jail is a community-based facility that houses both individuals who are pretrial (those who have been charged with offenses, but not yet convicted) and others who have been convicted of relatively minor offenses, usually with sentences no longer than a year. -By contrast, a prison is part of a correctional system that is either operated by the state (usually a state department of corrections will include a number of prisons) or the federal government (which operates the Federal Bureau of Prisons within the Department of Justice). Those who are incarcerated in prison have all been convicted of criminal offenses. -have programs for life skills, rehab, etc.

Concerns about Innocence

-A study that analyzed every capital conviction in the United States between 1973 and 1995 revealed that serious mistakes were made in two-thirds of the cases, a startling indictment of the criminal justice system. The most common problems included incompetent defense attorneys (37%), faulty jury instructions (20%), and misconduct on the part of prosecutors (19%). -Since executions resumed after the Gregg case, more than 150 people have been freed from death rows upon proof of their innocence -As a result of these widely publicized errors, a number of states give death row inmates the right to post-conviction DNA testing, though the Supreme Court has ruled that states are not required to do so (District Attorney's Office for Third Judicial District v. Osborne, 2009).

Community-Based Interventions

-A variation on the standard conditions of probation involves school-based probation, in which the youth's attendance, performance, and behavior in school are monitored through the probation officer's personal visits to the school. Probation conditions may also include drug use monitoring (through testing blood or urine); substance abuse treatment; mental health treatment; and skills-based training in particular areas (e.g., anger management, decision-making). -Probation may also vary in intensity, with intensive probation involving more frequent monitoring contact. -Youths who are placed on probation typically live at home. Alternatively, a youth in a community-based placement might participate in a specific program or alternative school during the day but return home at night.

Lawyers' Theories: Stereotypes in Search of Success

-An implicit personality theory is a person's organized network of preconceptions about how certain attributes are related to one another and to behavior. Trial lawyers often apply their implicit personality theories to jury selection -case where a man refused to pay child support and al;l males were eliminated from jury because they believed they would side with a man -In addition to applying their own theories of personality to juror selection, some attorneys use their understanding of group structure. For example, they play hunches about which jurors will be the most dominant during the deliberations -Some lawyers maintain a simple "one-juror verdict" theory—that is, they believe that the final group decision is usually determined by the opinions of one strong-willed, verbal, and influential juror -tends to be male gender, an extroverted personality style, and height greater than that of their fellow jurors -Another common attorney strategy is based on the assumption that jurors who are demographically or socially similar to a litigant will be predisposed to favor that litigant, a belief known as the similarity-leniency hypothesis -Here, the so-called black sheep effect may apply: Although people generally favor individuals who are part of their in-group, they may sometimes strongly sanction those fellow members who reflect negatively on and embarrass the in-group -When the offender has committed previous wrongdoings, jurors render harsher judgments against members of their in-group than members of an out-group

The Role of Psychologists in Prisons

-Appropriate (RNR-consistent) treatments reduced criminal reoffending by an average of 50% when compared with inappropriate approaches. Appropriate treatment approaches were those that systematically assessed offender risk and needs with specialized tools (e.g., the Level of Service/Case Management Inventory; ), targeted the criminogenic needs of offenders in treatment, and used cognitive-behavioral approaches to change deficits and increase strengths. -therapeutic community (TC). This is an approach in which the staff, other clients, and physical setting are all part of the therapeutic environment -A total of 31% of offenders who received treatment in any dosage recidivated, compared with 41% who received no treatment.

Updating Criminal Case Comparisons

-As before, judges stated, prior to hearing the juries' verdicts, whether they would acquit or convict and what they thought about the evidence. One obvious advantage of this study over its predecessor is that all groups (judges, attorneys, and jurors alike) gave their views of the evidence -The rate of jury/judge agreement was 70% -Juries were more lenient -when the defendant and another defense witness testified, jurors were 50% more likely than judges to acquit. Jurors were also impressed by the absence of a prior criminal record: when the defendant and another defense witness both testified and when the defendant had no prior record, jurors were 90% more likely to acquit -Juries are also more lenient than judges in death penalty cases. Although the Supreme Court has ruled that only juries may impose a death sentence (Ring v. Arizona, 2002), this was not always so -A reasonable explanation for these differences is that jurors and judges assume their roles differently. -jurors may take more seriously their instruction to acquit unless the prosecution can prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt, may feel sympathy for someone in the defendant's situation, and may possess a commonsense understanding of what motivates people to act impulsively

The Impact of Character and Propensity Evidence

-Character evidence can be used to provide evidence on guilt when it is relevant to the defendant, the alleged victim, or a witness -Evidence of other crimes or wrongdoing (so-called propensity evidence) is also typically inadmissible because of its potential for prejudice. Thus, prosecutors may not suggest that because a defendant had the propensity to act in a criminal manner, he or she is guilty of the crime charged. -In 1994, Congress passed a law making evidence of other sex offenses admissible to show a defendant's propensity to commit the charged sex offense -

Registration and Notification

-Convicted sex offenders are required to register with local law enforcement after they are released from prison and to notify authorities of subsequent changes of address. The period of required registration depends on the classification of the offender, which is a product of a formal risk assessment. - many sex offenders do not register and others fail to inform authorities when they move, and a lack of resources within jurisdictions hinders follow-up. -The intent of these laws is to reduce recidivism among juveniles who committed a sexual crime and prevent other young people from committing their first sexual offense. But the laws seemed to have missed the mark: studies show no changes in recidivism or prevention measures from before to after the registry requirements were implemented -. And offenders subjected to these laws have experienced negative mental health outcomes, school difficulties, harassment, and trouble finding stable housing -Community notification laws allow states to disseminate information about convicted sex offenders to the public -Now though, states and the federal government rely on the Internet as the primary means of notification

How Jurors Are Selected in Capital Cases: "Death Qualification."

-During jury selection in cases in which the prosecutor seeks a death penalty, prospective jurors are required to answer questions about their attitudes toward capital punishment. called death qualification. -More precisely, prospective jurors are excluded if their opposition to capital punishment would "prevent or substantially impair the performance of [their] duties as juror[s] in accordance with [their] instructions and [their] oath" -Three-fourths of the death-qualified juries found the defendant guilty, as did only 53% of the juries with excludable jurors. "Mixed" juries took a more serious approach to their deliberations, and were more critical of witnesses and better able to remember the evidence. - They interpret evidence in a manner that favors the prosecution and devalue evidence that seems to favor the defense

Experimental Studies of the Effects of Pre-Trial Publicity

-First, pre-trial publicity may bias jurors' interpretations of the evidence to which they are exposed at trial. If pre-trial publicity about the defendant is negative, jurors evaluate trial testimony—even ambiguous testimony—in a manner adverse to the defendant yet consistent with the publicity -. Second, jurors exposed to publicity come to believe, wrongly, that the pre-trial information was actually presented as part of the evidence at trial. This is a source monitoring error: jurors are mistaken about the source of their information -. Finally, pre-trial publicity often elicits emotional responses that are associated with jurors' verdicts. In one study, jurors who were exposed to anti-defendant information pretrial were angrier after the trial than jurors not exposed to this information, and as anger increased, so did guilt ratings -Presentation of publicity via television had a greater biasing impact than the same information presented in print, but the combined effects of TV and newspaper has the greatest impact -To this point, we have considered the effects of specific pre-trial publicity, showing that case-specific information made available prior to trial can affect the sentiments of jurors in that trial. But jurors can also be influenced by generic prejudice—that is, prejudice arising from media coverage of issues not specifically related to a particular case but thematically relevant to the issues at hand. -Racial and ethnic stereotypes are the most common forms of generic prejudice

Updating Civil Case Comparisons.

-For many types of cases, including contracts, property damage, civil rights, and labor disputes, plaintiffs' win rates were equivalent regardless of who decided -differences emerged in two types of cases— products liability and medical malpractice—where plaintiffs had more success with judges (48% win rate) than with juries (28% win rate). Researchers attributed these differences to selection effects (bias occurring when random assignment is not achieved, and selection of respondents impacts results) by which the selection of cases tried by juries differed in important ways from those tried by judges. Because defense lawyers expected juries to be biased in favor of plaintiffs, they tended to settle cases in which the plaintiff had a strong case -judges and juries did not differ substantially in punitive damages

The Purposes of Punishment

-General deterrence. The punishment of an offender and the subsequent publicity that comes with it are assumed to discourage other potential lawbreakers. - Individual deterrence. Punishment of the offender is presumed to keep that person from committing other crimes in the future. 3. Incapacitation. If a convicted offender is sent to prison, society can feel safe from that felon while he or she is confined. . 4. Retribution. Society believes that offenders should not benefit from their crimes; rather, they should receive their "just deserts," or "that which is justly deserved." 5. Moral outrage. Punishment can give society a means of catharsis and relief from the feelings of frustration, hurt, loss, and anger that result from being victims of crime; it promotes a sense of satisfaction that offenders have paid for what they have done to others. 6. Rehabilitation. One goal in sentencing has always been to help offenders recognize the error of their ways and develop new skills, values, and lifestyles so they can return to normal life and become law abiding. 7. Restitution. Wrongdoers should compensate victims for their damages and losses. Typical statutes require that defendants pay for victims' out-of-pocket expenses, property damage, and other monetary losses. Restitution is often a condition of probation

Intellectual Disability

-In 2002, the Supreme Court acknowledged that applying the death penalty to people with intellectual disabilities does not further the legitimate goals of deterrence and retribution and declared that it was cruel and unusual punishment, in violation of the Eighth Amendment, to execute them (Atkins v. Virginia, 2002). -Interpretation of this ruling was left to the states, which took different approaches. Florida, for example, took a "bright line approach," deeming an IQ score of 70 "subaverage." (An IQ score of 100 is considered average.) So, according to Florida law, an offender with an IQ score of 71 is not intellectually disabled -Indeed, the manual that accompanies the IQ test interprets point scores within confidence intervals to account for measurement error, and the 95% confidence interval—a range within which we can be 95% sure that the actual score rests—for an IQ score of 70 is between 67.5 and 72.5.) The Supreme Court agreed with Hall, noting that an IQ test has a standard error of measurement that should have been considered in his case (Hall v. Florida, 2014)

Attorney Effectiveness in Voir Dire

-In a study of attorney effectiveness, experienced trial attorneys used juror selection strategies that were not different from than those used by inexperienced college and law students who were asked to evaluate mock jurors. Trial attorneys did not appear to think any more accurately when making personality judgments than did nonprofessionals. Even when asked to perform a more realistic task—rating jurors from the videotapes of a previous voir dire— attorneys did no better than chance in detecting jurors who were biased against them -like all of us, they are affected by their assumptions and expectations about other people. -This result is an example of behavioral confirmation processes that occur when someone's (e.g., an attorney's) perception of another person (e.g., a prospective juror) causes that person to behave in a manner consistent with the perceiver's expectation -This relatively poor performance by attorneys during jury selection has been analogized to biased hypothesis testing in scientific endeavors

Jurors' Understanding of Expert Testimony

-In accident cases, they may describe the nature and causes of various claimed injuries. In commercial cases, they may detail complex financial transactions and contractual arrangements. In criminal cases, they may describe procedures used to gather and test forensic evidence such as blood, fingerprints, DNA, and ballistics -jurors are affected by peripheral details only when they do not fully understand the content of the expert's testimony. Even then, jurors can rely on other members of the jury with more sophisticated knowledge or experience -In fact, jurors tend to underutilize expert testimony when it involves scientific information such as DNA or other forensic science evidence. As a result, they may have difficulty distinguishing between reliable scientific evidence and "junk science." -. Jurors even have difficulty evaluating the validity of scientific research when sensitized to the flaws of the methodology by an opposing expert

Challenges for Cause and Peremptory Challenges.

-In any trial, each side can claim that particular jurors should be excluded because they are inflexibly biased or prejudiced or because they have a relationship to the parties or the issues that creates an appearance of bias. These exclusions are known as challenges for cause -In criminal cases, judges often inquire about whether prospective jurors have been crime victims and may excuse those who say that their own victimization experiences would affect their ability to be fair jurors -After a prospective juror has raised a concern about the ability to be fair and impartial (or after one of the attorneys has done so), the judge will typically ask the juror whether he or she can be impartial. Then the judge decides -not very accurate -Each side may also exclude a designated number of prospective jurors "without a reason stated, without inquiry, and without being subject to the court's control" (Swain v. Alabama, 1965). This procedure is known as a peremptory challenge -When the parties in a lawsuit play a role in selecting the people who decide the outcome, they may be more satisfied with that outcome -allow the attorney to begin to indoctrinate prospective jurors and influence those who ultimately will make up the jury -jurors' race seemed to factor into the exercise of peremptory challenge

Mental Illness.

-In its amicus curiae brief to the Supreme Court, the APA distinguished factual understanding from rational understanding. According to one of the authors of this book who consulted on the APA brief (Heilbrun), "factual understanding is about information. Rational understanding allows us to place that information in a meaningful context, without gross interference caused by certain symptoms of severe mental illness, or very serious impairment of intellectual functioning" -

Can Jurors Disregard Inadmissible Evidence?

-Inadmissible evidence is evidence that is presented in court but is unrelated to the substance of the case. Research indicates that a judge's admonition to disregard inadmissible evidence is relatively ineffective -Psychologists have explained this phenomenon using reactance theory which suggests that instructions to disregard evidence may threaten jurors' freedom to consider all available information -Jurors' overreliance on evidence they are admonished not to use may also reflect a cognitive process described in thought suppression studies. In a now-classic study, Professor Daniel Wegner found that asking people "not to think of a white bear" increased the tendency to do just that -Jurors' decisions could also be influenced by many other irrelevant factors including pretrial publicity; the personal style and credibility of attorneys; the order of presentation of evidence; and the gender, race, age, physical appearance, and attractiveness of the litigants and other witnesses

Do Jurors' Demographic Characteristics Predict the Verdicts?

-Indeed, many attorneys actively select (or, rather, deselect) jurors on the basis of demographic information. -But though demographic characteristics of jurors and juries are sometimes related to their verdicts, the correlations are weak and inconsistent from one type of trial to another -in trials that involve issues such as sexual assault, domestic violence, and sexual harassment, women are more likely than men to convict but not in other cases -wealthy jurors are somewhat more likely than poorer jurors to assume that criminal defendants are guilty, particularly in trials involving theft, burglary, and fraud. -jurors of higher status are regarded as more influential because of what others believe about their competence -men are generally perceived by other jurors as more influential than women -high-SES (socioeconomic status) mock jurors are less harsh than low-SES jurors on civil defendants

Oregon Treatment Foster Care (OTFC)

-It involves placing juveniles with specially trained foster parents rather than in residential placement. Like MST, this intervention uses a team approach. The OTFC team includes a case manager and therapists, as well as foster parents who are available 24/7 over the 6-12 months usually needed. OTFC is designed to provide close supervision (including supportive relationships with adult mentors and reduced exposure to negative peers) within consistent limits. -Those in the OTFC group were less likely to be incarcerated and more likely to complete treatment over a two-year follow-up period. It also decreased recidivism and substance abuse -OTFC is also a relatively cost-effective intervention.

Functional Family Therapy (FFT)

-It is provided by a single therapist, who has a caseload of 12-15 cases, with weekly sessions over an average period of three months. As the name implies, it is family focused and is often delivered in the home (Alexander et al., 1998). Quality assurance/treatment integrity is addressed by careful training of therapists, yearly on-site consultation, ongoing telephone consultation, feedback from families, and weekly supervision -The recidivism rate for those receiving FFT was 50% lower than it was in the comparison group -FFT was effective in reducing youth behavioral problems—but only when the therapists adhered to the treatment mode

The Influence of Prior-Record Evidence

-Once jurors hear evidence about a defendant's prior criminal record or prior criminal charges, they may no longer be able to suspend judgment about that defendant and decide his or her fate solely on the basis of evidence introduced at trial -If defendants opt to testify, then prosecutors may be able to question them about certain types of prior criminal involvement in order to impeach their credibility as witnesses. In that circumstance, the judge may issue a limiting instruction to the effect that evidence of a defendant's prior record can be used for limited purposes only: to gauge the defendant's credibility but not to prove the defendant's propensity to commit the charged offense -defendants with prior criminal records have three bad choices: take a plea bargain regardless of actual guilt, go to trial but do not testify, or testify and risk the possibility that jurors will learn about a prior record and be more likely to convict

How Jurors Think

-Jurors are expected to evaluate and weigh the evidence presented by both sides in a trial in order to determine the "facts," that is, what actually happened sometime in the past - Jurors then consider those facts in light of the relevant law, as explained by the judge, and in terms of the standard of proof. - In a criminal trial, they must ask themselves whether the prosecutor proved her case "beyond a reasonable doubt" -in a civil trial, whether the plaintiff proved his claims "by a preponderance of evidence - dual-process models of information processing capture individual jurors' thought processes as they attend to and evaluate evidence presented during a trial. They all propose two ways in which people process information—either by rationally and deliberately evaluating the content of the information or by reacting to it quickly and intuitively, without careful analysis. The former requires motivation, effort, and ability; the latter does not -cognitive- experiential self theory. when people rely on emotion, intuition, or stereotypical thinking from past events, they are using an experientially based system that is unconscious and effortless. The experiential mode is the default mode of processing, and jurors will shift to cognitive processing only if the importance of careful analysis is stressed to them. When they do think rationally about the evidence, they tend to become more lenient toward criminal suspects because they are alerted to possible reliability issues with the evidence

Involuntary Commitment

-Kansas v. Hendricks -Kansas had recently passed a Sexually Violent Predator (SVP) Act, allowing for the involuntary commitment of offenders suffering from a "mental abnormality" that would make them likely to commit predatory acts of sexual violence. A Kansas judge determined that Hendricks was a SVP and committed him to a psychiatric hospital where he stayed for 10 years prior to release. In Kansas v. Hendricks, the U.S. Supreme Court deemed the SVP Act to be constitutional -The U.S. Supreme Court has also said that individuals subjected to SVP laws must be unable to control their behavior and thus, likely to commit future sexually violent crimes (Kansas v. Crane, 2002)

Psychological Consequences of Imprisonment

-Many inmates show a particular pattern of coping mechanisms in response to high levels of prison stress. They may become hypervigilant in order to deal with the significant risks to their personal safety, learn to project a "tough-guy veneer," socially isolate themselves and suppress any signs of emotion, and become generally distrustful of others -some evidence suggests that assigning an individual to a higher-security prison actually increases that individual's risk for reoffending -Over time, a gradual process takes place in which prisoners adjust to their environment. Sociologist Donald Clemmer called this process prisonization -

Justifications for the Death Penalty

-Most justifications for the death penalty reflect retributive beliefs (e.g., "an eye for an eye") -Proponents of this position suggest that (1) the death penalty accomplishes general, as well as specific, deterrence; (2) highly publicized executions have at least a short-term deterrent effect; and (3) murderers are such dangerous people that allowing them to live increases the risk of injury or death to other inmates and prison guards.

Mandated Treatments for Sex Offenders

-Offenders sentenced to prison are required to participate in offender treatment programs or give up hope of parole; offenders offered probation are required to participate in counseling sessions. -Treatment programs that focus on an offender's risk of reoffending and responsiveness to treatment have been successful in reducing recidivism -Some treatment programs have effectively reduced sexual offending by suppressing offenders' sex drive. This pharmacological approach, sometimes called chemical castration, involves administering hormones to reduce testosterone levels and thereby lower sex drive, sexual arousal, and sexual fantasizing -California was the first state to pass a law requiring repeat child molesters (pedophiles) to be treated with hormones as a condition of parole

Jurors' Personality and Attitudinal Characteristics as Predictors of Verdicts

-Personality characteristics are relatively stable patterns of behavior that describe "how people act in general" Attitudinal characteristics are evaluative reactions toward someone or something that are exhibited in feelings, beliefs, and intended actions -Personality and attitudinal variables are somewhat better predictors of verdict decisions than are demographic factors -People with an authoritarian personality tend to adhere to traditional values, identify with and submit to powerful figures, place less emphasis on civil liberties, and tend to be punitive toward those who violate established norms. In terms of the legal system, authoritarian jurors are more likely to vote for conviction in mock criminal jury studies -may be more powerful determinants of decisions in death penalty trials than in non-capital trials. -when highly authoritarian jurors encounter a defendant who symbolizes authority, their usual tendency to punish the defendant is reversed (like a police officer) -The Need for Cognition refers to a person's inclination to engage in and enjoy effortful cognitive work -can distinguish those jurors who scrutinize the evidence carefully and examine its weaknesses from jurors who accept trial testimony at face value and have little desire to pore over the evidence -, jurors high in Need for Cognition were attentive to the validity of the research -Jurors with higher levels of Trust in the Legal System were more likely to convict, probably because they had faith that the defendant was the actual perpetrator and that he or she had engaged in illegal conduct -The relationships are less strong in civil cases and, in both contexts, probably depend upon the type of case

conflicting rights

-Pre-trial publicity highlights tensions between two cherished rights protected by the U.S. Constitution: freedom of the press as guaranteed by the First Amendment, and the right to a speedy and public trial before an impartial jury, as guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment -More commonly, it happens when local news media, online postings, and press releases disseminate information about a crime or the parties involved that is inflammatory, biased, emotion-laden, or factually erroneous -in Rideau v. Louisiana (1963), the Court decided that the dissemination of news that included information strongly pointing to the defendant's guilt violated his rights. -(Mu'Min v. Virginia, 1991), the Supreme Court held that if prospective jurors claim they can be impartial, defendants do not have a constitutional right to ask them about the specifics of their exposure to pre-trial publicity. -They might experience evaluation apprehension, whereby they provide the answers that they perceive the judge wants to hear, regardless of whether their responses are truthful

how juries deliberate

-Prior to deliberations, jurors who were told that the photos were inadmissible were as likely to convict as jurors who were told the photos could be considered, demonstrating the powerful biasing effect of inadmissible evidence. But after deliberations, convictions dropped significantly in the inadmissible evidence condition and were comparable to the control condition. Group discussion reduced the influence of inadmissible evidence, probably because jurors reminded each other of the mandate not to consider that evidence. -jurors discuss general procedures, elect a foreperson, and begin discussion; open conflict in which jurors actively try to persuade others to see things their way; and reconciliation or resolution, when jurors strive to guarantee that the chosen verdict is acceptable to everyone. -Informational social influence occurs when some compelling information, data, or interpretation convinces a juror that her personal perspective was incorrect or incomplete, and that it makes sense to change her mind. In doing so, she can state publicly, and believe privately, that she has reached the correct decision. -By contrast, normative social influence occurs when a juror simply goes along with the group's decision in order to be conciliatory. So whereas a juror might state publicly that he agrees with a certain verdict, privately he thinks otherwise -In a verdict-driven deliberation, jurors take a straw poll very early in their discussion. This vote reveals the general sentiment of the group and establishes the factions that see things in different ways. From here on, the deliberations involve each faction attempting to gain support from members of other factions by arguing that their interpretation of the evidence is the appropriate one. - By contrast, in an evidence-driven deliberation, jurors do not take an early vote. Instead, they review crucial pieces of evidence in order to reach an agreed-upon consensus about how to interpret that evidence. As you might suspect, evidence-driven deliberations last longer, but are ultimately more satisfying for jurors -jurors create narrative explanations of the evidence that they bring to the deliberating table. Then, by means of a process termed "story sampling"

How Capital Jurors Use Instructions

-Several studies indicate that jurors do not adequately comprehend the instructions they receive about mitigating factors because, like other types of judicial instructions, mitigation instructions are couched in legal jargon and are unusually lengthy -Jurors have particular difficulty understanding how to evaluate mitigating evidence presented during the sentencing phase of a capital case -declarative knowledge (their understanding of legal concepts) and procedural knowledge (their ability to know what to do in order to reach a sentencing decision) -The modifications to the instructions involved (1) simplifying the language of the instructions, (2) presenting the instructions in a flowchart format so that jurors could understand the progression of decisions they were expected to make, (3) giving jurors the chance to review and practice using the instructions in a mock case so that they would gain some experience prior to the real trial, and (4) offering corrections to common misconceptions that jurors have about aggravating and mitigating circumstances

Peremptory Challenges: No Exclusion on Account of Race or Gender

-The decision regarding race was triggered by the case of James Batson, a Black man convicted of second-degree burglary by an all-White jury. During the voir dire, the prosecuting attorney used four of six peremptory challenges to dismiss all the Black persons from the venire. In Batson v. Kentucky, decided in 1986, the Court held that Batson was denied his Fourteenth Amendment right to equal protection by the prosecution's dismissal of Black members of the panel. -In Powers v. Ohio (1991), the Court held that a White defendant could also complain about the exclusion of Blacks because the principle of representativeness was violated by the arbitrary exclusion of any racial group. -When a defense attorney believes that the prosecution's peremptory challenge was motivated by racial factors, he or she initiates a so-called Batson challenge, and the judge then asks the prosecutor for an explanation. The prosecutor typically advances a race-neutral explanation for the challenge—for example, that the prospective juror has a brother in prison or has filed a lawsuit against the police. The judge then determines whether the explanation is genuine, taking into account the other jurors who were not challenged by the attorney. For example, if a prosecutor stated that she dismissed a Black juror because he had been robbed, the judge would want to know why she had not dismissed a White juror who also had been robbed (tend not to be effective) -but it is not very hard to do because of casuistry, defined as fallacious reasoning in order to justify questionable behavior -social judgments: the considered decision that incorporates information about categories such as race and gender -one were the Batson challenge worked Timothy Foster

Juvenile Court Dispositions

-The majority of young people whose cases are adjudicated in juvenile court are found to be delinquent and moved to the sentencing or dispositional phase of the case. -Dispositional hearings typically combine adversarial procedures and attention to the particular needs— social, psychological, physical—of the child. They include recommendations by probation officers and social workers, reports of social and school histories, and discussions with the offender and his or her family, probation staff, and other professionals. Issues of substance abuse, family dysfunction, mental health needs, peer relationships, and school problems may be addressed. -The goals of juvenile court dispositions—ensuring public safety and addressing children's needs—are reflected in the options available to juvenile court judges. These include (1) commitment to a secure facility; (2) probation, sometimes with intensive supervision; (3) referral to a group home or other lower security residential placement; (4) referral to day treatment or a mental health program; or (5) imposition of a fine, community service, or restitution. -In 2007, nearly 60% of juvenile offenders were sentenced to probation, and 25% were sentenced to some sort of out-of-home placement. - Juvenile court judges are also expected to assess offenders' rehabilitative needs and personal circumstances --Supreme Court decided that mandatory life sentences for juvenile offenders are unconstitutional (Miller v. Alabama, 2012), though nonmandatory life sentences for juveniles remain an option across the United States

The Death Penalty: The Ultimate Punishment

-The modern history of capital punishment in the United States began in 1972 when the U.S. Supreme Court effectively abolished the death penalty on the grounds that it constituted "cruel and unusual punishment" (Furman v. Georgia , 1972) -if a defendant is charged with one of these crimes, the trial is conducted in two phases. The jury decides the guilt or innocence of the defendant in the first phase (the "guilt phase"). If the defendant is found guilty, then the second phase, or "sentencing phase," of the trial is held. -During this phase, the jury hears evidence of aggravating factors (elements of the crime, such as killing in an especially brutal or heinous manner, that make the defendant more likely to receive a death sentence) and mitigating factors (elements of the defendant's background or the crime, such as experiencing mental illness or acting under duress at the time of the offense, that make life imprisonment the more appropriate verdict). Before reaching a sentencing decision, jurors hear instructions from the judge on how to weigh the aggravating and mitigating factors. -More than 80% of executions have occurred in southern states, and Texas alone accounts for more than one-third of them

The Role of Psychologists in Jails

-There is a much higher rate of severe mental illness in jail than in the general population -Screening, evaluation, classification ■ Diversion (helping to determine whether a pretrial inmate might meet criteria for a community-based program such as drug court or mental health court) ■ Suicide prevention ■ Crisis intervention -■ Case management services/reentry (liaison with community treatment providers, planning for release, assistance with housing and transportation) ■ Coordinating volunteers (teaching, mentoring, tutoring, guiding release) ■ Teaching life skills ■ Group therapy for inmates and their families

Utilitarian Approaches

-They are intended to accomplish a useful outcome, such as compensating the victim, deterring crime, or incapacitating or rehabilitating the defendant -Though the original purpose of prisons was to rehabilitate (many prisons are still called correctional institutions), high recidivism rates indicate that prisons have not been very effective at rehabilitating offenders -Martinson's advocacy of another utilitarian approach—deterrence—led to a "get-tough" attitude toward offenders, and to increasingly punitive measures such as the three-strikes laws -But after nearly 40 years of this "get-tough" approach with no reduction in recidivism, the pendulum began to swing back slowly in the direction of rehabilitative policies. -Psychologists now know that rehabilitation can be effective when it is tailored to an offender's age, race, criminal history, religion, and other personal attributes. Unfortunately, many institutions continue to offer only one-size-fits-all interventions.

Residency Restrictions

-They establish a "buffer zone" in which sex offenders may not live around schools, parks, and even bus stop -an estimated 79-93% of sexual offenses are committed by a person known to the victim, raising questions about the effectiveness of these laws. -Residency restrictions result in other problems: they seriously reduce housing options in communities where nearly all residential properties are within the buffer zones and result in the clustering of sex offenders in more rural areas, making access to treatment more difficult and destabilizing offenders -policies that entail registration, notification, and residency restrictions, though well-intended, exemplify crime control theater: legal policy that appears to address illegal acts, but are reactionary and unsupported by empirical analysis

Inevitability of Juror Bias

-a juror's predisposition to interpret and understand information based on past experience -People make assumptions about others to understand what happened in the past and to predict what will happen in the future -One judgment is an estimate of the probability of commission—that is, how likely it is that the defendant actually committed the crime. Most jurors base their estimates of this probability on the strength of the evidence, but as we have noted, extralegal factors and jurors' previous beliefs and experiences also have an impact on how they interpret the evidence -A second judgment by the criminal juror concerns reasonable doubt. Judges instruct jurors in criminal cases that they should deliver a not-guilty verdict if they have any reasonable doubt of the defendant's guilt -thoughts of death penalty -According to the notion of pre-decisional distortion, these jurors will distort their evaluation of the evidence in a direction that supports their verdict choice. -sympathy hypothesis. All the data pointed to the same conclusion: that the general public is "quite suspicious of, and sometimes downright hostile to, civil plaintiffs" "When people are injured, they often try to blame others for their carelessness."

The Story Model

-core cognitive process involved in juror decision-making was construction of a story or narrative summary of the events in dispute -As they listen to the evidence, they form a schema, or mental structure that aids in the processing and interpretation of information -According to the model, jurors actively construct stories by considering three sources of information: the evidence presented during the trial, their personal experience in similar situations, and their broad knowledge of the elements of a story. -They suspected that because of life experiences and beliefs, African Americans could more easily construct a story about police misconduct and police brutality than could White Americans. Thus, African Americans were more likely than Whites to accept the "defense story" that a racist police detective planted incriminating evidence on Simpson's property -They found that stories were easy to construct when the evidence was presented in a temporal order that matched the occurrence of the original events ("story order") but harder to construct when the evidence was presented in an order that did not match the sequence of the original events ("witness order") -For example, mock jurors were most likely to convict a criminal defendant when the prosecution evidence was presented in story order and the defense evidence in witness order. They were least likely to convict when the prosecution evidence was presented in witness order and the defense evidence in story order.

Drug Courts in Corrections

-drug offenses involved in about 60% of the federal cases and 30% of the state-level cases that are part of this increase -Neither punishing drug offenders by incarcerating them for long periods (the public safety approach) nor providing treatment while conceptualizing drug addiction as a disease (the public health approach) has been particularly effective in reducing the prevalence of drug abuse and drug-related crime. About 70% of drug offenders reoffend within three years of release from prison -Drug courts provide judicially supervised drug abuse treatment and case management services to nonviolent drug-involved offenders, taking them out of the standard "prosecution/conviction/incarceration" process. -Drug court clients in one study were rearrested within three years at a rate of 33%, compared with 47% of those with drug problems on probation as usual

Multisystemic Therapy (MST).

-focuses on multiple "systems": the individual, family, peer, school, and social networks as they relate to identified problems and risk factors for offending. It delivers services based in the home, school, or elsewhere in the community, with three to four therapists working in a team. - The training of therapists and supervisors in MST is highly standardized, and the MST procedures are very specific. -Therapists are available 24/7, working to prevent problems or crises in the youth's life from having a major impact. Consequently, the rate of engaging and retaining families in treatment is very high; over the three to six months of direct service usually needed for MST, the retention rates are as high as 98% ( -1) improving both self-reported and observed family relations and (2) decreasing youth behavior problems and time spent with deviant peers. It has also been shown to reduce recidivism by 43% and decrease placements outside the home by 64% over a 59-week period among juveniles charged with serious offenses -There is also evidence that MST is effective with delinquent youth in Great Britain and Dutch youth with severe and violent antisocial behavior -There is also evidence that MST is effective with juveniles with substance abuse or dependence

Mental Health Courts in Corrections

-handle both felony and misdemeanor offenders -Despite local differences, most mental health courts feature (1) a specialized docket for selected offenders, (2) judicial supervision of clients, (3) regularly scheduled hearings, and (4) specific criteria that must be met if an individual is to remain in, and complete, the program -For instance, Moore and Hiday (2006) reported that those who completed mental health court were rearrested at a rate about one-fourth that of those in criminal court after one year—and those who did not complete mental health court were rearrested at about the same rate as the criminal court clients -

The Impact of Injury Severity on Liability Judgments

-jurors also consider the severity of an injury or accident, sometimes referred to as outcome severity, when judging a defendant's liability. -But in their simulation of an automobile negligence case, Greene and her colleagues found that the defendant was perceived to be more negligent when the plaintiff suffered more serious injuries -Why would people assign more responsibility to an individual as the consequences of his or her conduct become more serious? One explanation is defensive attribution an explanation of behavior that defends us from feelings of vulnerability. As the consequences of one's actions become more severe and more unpleasant, we are likely to blame a person for their occurrence, because doing so makes the incident somehow more controllable and avoidable -As in criminal cases, jurors' emotional state during a trial can affect their judgments in civil cases. For example, jurors who are angered by evidence of wrongdoing and harm to others feel more sympathy for a plaintiff and less sympathy for a defendant

Effects of Extralegal Information

-jurors are affected by irrelevant information such as the defendant's background or appearance, what they read in the newspaper or see online, and other sources of extraneous details, all of which constitute extralegal factors. -. In one study, Black jurors rated White defendants as more aggressive, violent, and guilty than Black defendants, and White jurors were harsher on Black defendants than on White defendants, but only when the crime was not racially charged. When the crime was racially charged, the defendant's race did not influence White jurors' verdicts -the race-based results in the context of aversive racism, a social-psychological concept that proposes that most White jurors are motivated to avoid showing racial bias and, when cued about racial considerations (e.g., when the crime was racially charged or when jurors were instructed to avoid prejudice), they tend to render colorblind decisions. But without those explicit reminders to be objective, subtle racial biases influence their decisions -According to the liberation hypothesis when the evidence in a case clearly favors one side or the other, juries will decide the case in favor of the side with the stronger evidence. But when the evidence is ambiguous jurors are "liberated" and allowed to rely on their assumptions, sentiments, and biases. In this situation, extralegal evidence affects verdict

Jurors' Willingness to Apply Their Instructions

-jury nullification, the implicit power to acquit defendants despite evidence and judicial instructions to the contrary. Throughout history, juries have occasionally ignored the law rather than enforced it, particularly when they believed the law was unjust -Jurors' Online Activities -Nine of the twelve jurors in a high-profile federal drug trial in Florida admitted to doing online research in direct violation of the judge's orders -a Kentucky murder conviction was reversed because two jurors Facebook-friended the victim's mother during the trial and an Arkansas death row inmate's conviction was tossed because a juror had tweeted from the courtroom Some courts now prohibit jurors' use of electronic devices during trials and others monitor jurors' online activities -Being restricted from accessing information online may actually impel some jurors to do just that -judges should instruct jurors about restrictions on Internet access when jurors first enter the courtroom for jury selection and at designated times throughout the trial. We suggest that judges should acknowledge jurors' desire to conduct online research and to share their experiences on social media. - Judges should explain clearly that doing so introduces inconsistencies and inaccuracies into the proceedings, and they should remind jurors that defendants have a constitutional right to a trial by an impartial jury

Jurors Rely on Relevant Evidence, Seen through the Lens of Their Emotions

-jury verdicts are incorrect in at least one out of every eight cases -evidentiary strength is the most important determinant of jurors' verdict -Differences in the strength of the evidence can have profound effects on jury verdicts: Some studies have shown a 70% increase in conviction rates as the evidence against the accused increases -as anger increases, the motivation to be fair-minded and objective decreases, and jurors become more punitive -jurors also have strong emotional reactions to seeing gruesome photographs of victims of extreme violence. In those cases, convictions increase as jurors' sense of disgust increases

Sentencing Juvenile Offenders

-not all juveniles come into the system via arrests. Some are referred by school officials, social service agencies, and even by parents. Second, there is an emphasis on rehabilitating youthful offenders, rather than simply punishing them. Finally, early in a case, juvenile justice officials must decide whether to send it into the court system or divert the offender to alternative programs such as drug treatment, educational and recreational programs, or individual and group counseling. --Juveniles who meet the criteria for transfer to adult criminal court may be sentenced under blended sentencing statutes that combine the options available in juvenile court with those used in criminal court -this means that serious and violent young offenders can stay under juvenile court jurisdiction and receive more lenient sentences than if they were transferred to adult court. But they can also be subjected to harsh sentences if they commit new offenses, violate probation, or fail to respond to rehabilitation effort -Blended sentencing schemes provide incentives to offenders to avoid the more serious consequences of an adult sentence. Prosecutors often use the threat of transfer to adult criminal court to persuade juvenile offenders to plead guilty and accept a particular blended sentence

Public Preferences for Deterrence and Retribution.

-policy capturing research technique to assess the punishment motives of ordinary people. -The specific motives for punishment that they contrasted were deterrence and retribution. . They varied different elements of the crimes described, elements that should or should not matter to respondents depending on which motive they preferred. For example, the magnitude of the harm should matter to people who are motivated by retribution, and the likelihood of reoffending should matter to those who are concerned with future deterrence. The data showed a high sensitivity to factors associated with retribution and relative insensitivity to factors associated with deterrence. In fact, people actively seek information relevant to retribution (e.g., the magnitude of the harm and the perpetrator's intent) when they know that a crime has been committed and are asked to assign punishments -Interestingly, this is not what people say about their punishment beliefs. Responding to opinion polls, people are more likely to indicate support for punishment that deters criminals than punishment that exacts retribution ( -Another retributive goal—moral outrage—allows society the satisfaction of knowing that offenders have been made to pay for the harms they caused. -shaming penalty -The modern version of shaming allows low-level offenders—shoplifters, trespassers, and traffic code violators—to avoid all or part of a jail sentence by publicly renouncing their crimes in a humiliating way. First, judges have become frustrated with revolving-door justice: a large number of offenders who are released from prison eventually return. Second, judges are aware of the longstanding problem of prison overcrowding and the high costs of incarceration. For example, men caught on surveillance cameras in the process of soliciting prostitutes in Oakland, California had their faces plastered on bus stop signs and billboards -worry that the shaming inherent in these sentences is extreme and morally repugnant -can work to an extent

Assessing Risk and Needs in Juveniles

-risk, need, and responsivity (RNR). Risk refers to the likelihood of committing future offenses, with those at highest risk receiving the most intensive interventions. Needs are the deficits (such as substance abuse, family problems, educational problems, and procriminal attitudes) that increase the risk of reoffending. These are sometimes called criminogenic needs. Responsivity involves the likelihood of a favorable reaction to the interventions, and the influences that may affect such responding -There are two specialized tools in particular that focus on the measurement of juvenile risk and needs: the Structured Assessment of Violence Risk in Youth (SAVRY) and the Youth Level of Service/Case Management Inventory. Both prompt the user to consider historical factors, such as the nature of current and previous offending, as well as contextual factors (e.g., family, school, peers) and personal factors (e.g., substance abuse, anger, impulsivity, callousness, attitudes toward intervention, offending, and authority) -Evaluating youth on the dimensions of risk and needs provides valuable information for several reasons. First, it structures the evaluation to require the psychologist to consider the influences that theory and research indicate are most strongly related to risk and needs. Second, it provides useful information for intervention planning

Sentencing disparities

-similar offenders who committed similar crimes receive different sentences. -Federal offenders are especially likely to be sentenced to prison -Convictions on two types of offenses— sex offenses and immigration-related offenses—were most likely to result in prison sentences -Offenders guilty of drug crimes constitute another sizeable portion of all federafl inmates -Racial disparities are also apparent in criminal sentencing. As of 2016, the rate of state prison incarceration was 5 times greater for African Americans and 1.4 times greater for Latinos than for Whites. -evidence-based sentencing aims to reduce incarceration rates by sentencing offenders based on risk factors for recidivism such as criminal history, education, substance abuse, and employment history. Those assessed to be at low risk are given shorter terms than those assessed at higher risk. -Critics claim that these plans unfairly target racial minorities, though a recent study comparing risk scores for Blacks and Whites found that regardless of offenders' race, one model of evidence-based sentencing strongly predicted recidivism risk -A somewhat less controversial process for reducing prison populations allows for the release of older and dying inmates prior to the completion of their terms, but is rarely used -Fiscal constraints imposed on federal and state budgets forced policymakers to confront the high cost of imprisonment and examine the cost effectiveness of various sentencing policies. One state doesn't have death penalty

Scientific Jury Selection: Does It Work Any Better?

-some critics claim that it subverts the criminal justice system because it favors the wealthy over individuals of modest means and creates a perception among the public that the system is rigged. Others claim that it is ineffective -, consultants (and some attorneys) dispute these claims, pointing out that public defenders have benefitted from their services and touting the value of professional training and experience: -Although the procedure seemed to work, the success rate may have been inflated by the following factors: (1) Many of the more widely discussed cases involved weak or controversial evidence against defendants. (2) Attorneys who made the extra effort to enlist jury consultation resources may also have been more diligent and thorough in other areas of their case preparation -study where Horowitz determined that neither approach was superior for all four trials: traditional methods were superior in cases in which there were weak links between demographic, personality, and attitudinal factors (e.g., in a murder case), whereas scientific methods were superior when those associations were strong (e.g., in a drug sale case). -Juries recommended the death sentence in 61% of the trials in which consultants were not used by the defense but in only 33% of the trials in which they were used.

How judges and juries compare

-study where judges answer Two questions (1) What was the jury's verdict? (2) Did the judge agree? -In criminal and civil trials, the judges reported that their verdict would have been the same as the jury's actual verdict in 75% of the cases -In most of these discrepant decisions, the jury was more lenient than the judge

Judicial and Legislative Reforms

-the U.S. Supreme Court and the Congress established the requirement that the pool from which a jury is selected must be a representative cross-section of the community -First, the government believed that if the pools from which juries were drawn represented a broad cross-section of the community, the resulting juries would be more heterogeneous. The courts assumed that this diversity would produce various benefits—for example, that minority group members might discourage majority group members from expressing prejudice -Another assumed benefit was that heterogeneous juries would be better fact finders and problem solvers. Heterogeneous groups are more likely than homogeneous groups to evaluate facts from different points of view and to have richer discussions -study results: the mixed-race groups had longer, more thorough deliberations and were more likely to discuss racially charged topics such as racial profiling. -Second, White jurors on racially mixed juries mentioned more factual information and were more aware of racial concerns than were their counterparts on all-White juries. -A follow-up study suggested that White jurors in diverse groups may actually process information differently than those in all-White group -Juries should reflect the standards of the community -murder of Rodney King and police acquitted by all white jury sparked debate - A study in Washington state revealed that nearly half of all qualified jurors, and three-quarters of Latino and Asian American prospective jurors, ignored the jury summons, -some people worry about language proficiency and others doubt their ability to serve or anticipate they would not be treated with respect by court personnel -Another concern is that people will often go to great length to avoid serving on a jury, and some have concocted creative ways to escape jury service

Determinants of Sentencing: Relevant and Irrelevant

-the severity of the offense and the offender's prior record -Males are more likely than females to be sentenced to prison and serve longer sentences for property and drug offenses. But women are just as likely as men to be sentenced to prison for committing a violent offense -To manage the information overload, judges may rely on well-honed stereotypes and attributions about the case and the defendant's characteristics to aid their decisions - According to the focal concerns theory of judicial decision-making, judges focus on three main concerns in reaching sentencing decisions: (1) the defendant's culpability, (2) protection of the community (emphasizing incapacitation and general deterrence), and (3) practical constraints and consequences of the sentence, including concerns about disrupting ties to children and other family members -among Texas offenders who were convicted of three violent crimes in 1991, offenders who victimized females received substantially longer sentences than those who victimized males ( -A meta-analysis of the effects of race on sentencing decisions synthesized 71 separate studies and showed that African Americans were sentenced more harshly than Whites who committed comparable crimes (Mitchell, 2005). The disparity is larger for drug offenses -Defendants who plead guilty are often given a reduced sentence,

Juvenile Corrections

-there are certain characteristics shared by programs that are successful in reducing the rates of violence, antisocial behavior, and risky health behavior in adolescents: ■ They are derived from sound theoretical rationales. ■ They address strong risk factors (such as substance abuse, family problems, and educational problems). ■ They involve long-term treatments, often lasting a year and sometimes much longer. ■ They work intensively with those targeted for treatment and often use a clinical approach. ■ They follow a cognitive behavioral strategy. ■ They are multimodal and multicontextual (they use different kinds of interventions and deliver them in different contexts, such as home and school). ■ They focus on improving social competency and other skill development strategies for targeted youth and/or their families. ■ They are developmentally appropriate. ■ They are not delivered in coercive institutional settings. ■ They have the capacity for delivery with fidelity (meaning that services are delivered as intended). Likewise, there are common elements of programs that appear to be ineffective: ■ They fail to address strong risk factors. ■ They are of limited duration. ■ They aggregate high-risk youth in ways that facilitate contagion (i.e., the incarcerated youth are influenced by the antisocial behavior modeled by their peers). ■ Their implementation protocols are not clearly articulated. ■ Their staff are not well supervised or held accountable for outcomes. ■ They are limited to scare tactics (e.g., Scared Straight) or toughness strategies (e.g., classic boot camps). ■ They consist largely of adults lecturing at youth (e.g., the classic drug abuse resistance education program D.A.R.E.)

Retributive Approaches

-they involve looking back at the offense and determining what the criminal "deserves" as a consequence of committing it. These goals are retribution (sometimes called "just deserts") and moral outrage, a close cousin of retribution -But in studies that measured people's agreement with various sentencing policies, people tended to agree with all of them (Anderson & MacCoun, 1999)! Furthermore, people are sometimes unaware of the factors that influence their preferences -An alternative research design involves considering the length of sentences that judges actually order and working backward from these sentences to identify the underlying motives (i.e., just deserts/retribution, deterrence, incapacitation). But this method can be fallible, too. -Finally, other researchers have presented vignettes to respondents, varying the nature of the crime and details about the offender, and then measuring respondents' sentencing preferences

Assessing and Diverting Offenders

-those charged criminal offenses (or charged with offenses but diverted from standard prosecution) will be assessed at some time, to gauge their risk and rehabilitation needs. In the prison system, this is called classification. The "risk" assessed at that stage is typically the risk of escape or misconduct within the prison, as these have direct implications for the security level of the prison to which this individual is assigned. -e Level of Service/Case Management Inventory -LS/CMI total scores have been associated with (1) propensity for rules violations and assigned levels of supervision; (2) outcomes such as program outcome status, recidivism, and self-reported criminal activity in probation settings; (3) parole outcome; (4) the success of halfway house placements; and (5) maladjustment (

Jury Selection Begins in the Community: Forming a Panel, or Venire

-venire: as officials assemble a panel of prospective jurors -To encourage representativeness, U.S. Supreme Court cases going back to 1880 (Strauder v. West Virginia) have forbidden systematic or intentional exclusion of religious, racial, and other cognizable groups (members of which, because of certain shared characteristics, might also hold unique perspectives on selected issues) from jury panels. - But as recently as 50 years ago, the composition of most venires was homogeneous, with middle-aged, well-educated White men generally overrepresented

Jury Selection Continues in the Courtroom: The Voir Dire Process

-voir dire: process by which potential jurors are asked questions to attempt to uncover any biases -The most limited form of voir dire involves a small number of questions asked in yes-or-no format only by the judge and features group rather than individual questioning of prospective jurors -But implicit biases— beliefs are borne of experiences and attitudes that predispose us to think in a certain way and of which we are unaware—make it difficult for jurors to accurately know their own predilections so the limiting can be ineffective -could be because of the social desirability effect, -Extended voir dire has several advantages in uncovering biases and has open-ended questions -But extended voir dire can take a long time, so most courts tend not to favor it. Typical voir dire procedures involve a compromise between the limited and extended versions; both the attorneys and the judge pose questions to a group of prospective jurors, and then they ask brief follow-up questions of selected individuals

Remedies for the Effects of Pre-Trial Publicity

1. Continuance. The trial can be postponed until a later date, with the expectation that the passage of time will lessen the effects of the prejudicial material. But although continuances may decrease jurors' reliance on factual pre-trial publicity, they do not dampen jurors' recall or use of emotionally biasing information 2. Expanded voir dire. But expanded voir dire may be of limited usefulness. Jurors may not recognize their own biases, and can hide their true feelings from an examiner if they so choose. They may also be hesitant to self-disclose in a public courtroom. They found that the impact of pre-trial publicity actually increased, rather than decreased, when jurors were questioned about their exposure prior to trial 3.Judicial instructions. A fairly simple remedy for the biasing effects of pre-trial publicity is an instruction from the judge telling jurors to ignore what they learned about the case prior to trial and admonishing them to base their decision on the evidence. . In one mock jury study, participants learned that a defendant was charged with killing his estranged wife and a neighbor. the jurors read articles about the murders and some also read an article in which the defense attorney complained about the negative publicity. Mock jurors could follow the instruction only when they were given some reason to suspect that the pre-trial information was biased. -these three remedies appear to be largely ineffective. Unless they have some reason to discount or ignore pre-trial publicity when it is first encountered, most people will use it to help them interpret subsequent information and to make various pieces of information "fit" together in a coherent theme. Therefore, once the idea of a guilty perpetrator is established, it may become an organizing principle for the processing of additional information about the person. Safeguards that attempt to remove an existing bias may never work as well as trying to find jurors who never had a bias to start with.

Jury Reform

Note-taking Increased compensation More streamlined process (less waiting) Simplifying juror instructions Discussion during trial

Reentry

The managed return to the community of an individual released from prison. Also, the successful transitioning of a released inmate back into the community. -The priorities for reentry begin with the goal of reducing the risk of reoffending -The custody phase involves measuring offenders' risks, needs, and strengths upon entry to the correctional facility and providing interventions designed to reduce risk, address needs, and build strengths. -The release phase includes inmate release preparation, with a parole plan for supervision, housing, employment, drug testing, and other considerations, and release decision-making, regarding the parole decision. -The community supervision/discharge phase involves supervision and services, revocation decision-making (including graduated sanctions in response to infractions), and discharge and aftercare when community correctional supervision is terminated -

Classification

assessment of the level of risk of criminal recidivism, institutional misconduct, and escape or noncompliance

parole

conditional release from prison of a person convicted of a crime

bench trial

court proceeding in which the outcome is decided by a judge rather than a jury -African Americans and Hispanics showed less support for a jury trial than Whites, - Minority group members may doubt that a jury is composed of a cross-section of the community who would be able to grasp their situations and understand their perspectives. Thus, judges appear to be the less risky choice

probation

freedom from incarceration following criminal conviction

adjudication of delinquency

legal determination that a juvenile is culpable of an offense

damages

money awarded to a person injured by the unlawful act or negligence of another

Serving on a jury

one out of three Americans will serve as a juror at some point in their lives -A trial by jury is the only right to appear in both the main body of the U.S. Constitution (Article 3) and the Bill of Rights (Sixth Amendment for criminal cases and Seventh Amendment for civil cases). - The U.S. Supreme Court underscored the importance of the jury by stating that "[t]he guarantees of jury trial in the state and federal constitutions reflect a profound judgment about the way in which the law should be enforced and justice administered" (Duncan v. Louisiana, 1968, p. 149). -More recently, the Supreme Court acknowledged the preeminent role of juries in our legal system when it announced that nearly any contested fact that increases the penalty for a crime must be determined by a jury (Blakely v. Washington, 2004)

criminal conviction

outcome of prosecution that concludes in a judgment that the adult defendant is guilty

liable

responsible or answerable for some action