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1 – 10 of over 2000
Article
Publication date: 4 December 2017

Jennifer Cossyleon, John Orwat, Christine George, Don Stemen and Whitney Key

The Cook County State Attorneys’ Deferred Prosecution Program (DPP) is a pre-trial diversionary program that accepts first-time, non-violent defendants charged with a felony…

Abstract

Purpose

The Cook County State Attorneys’ Deferred Prosecution Program (DPP) is a pre-trial diversionary program that accepts first-time, non-violent defendants charged with a felony crime. The purpose of this paper is to document the development, implementation, and program patterns of the DPP to better understand the program’s scope and reach in diverting defendants from traditional criminal prosecution.

Design/methodology/approach

The approach to evaluating Cook County’s DPP is primarily qualitative. Through interviews with program administrators and current and former participants, the authors document the process of creating and implementing such DPP that aims to avoid a felony conviction altogether. The authors provide program participant patterns to shed light on the program’s scope and reach in diverting defendants from traditional felony prosecution.

Findings

Using data from staff, administrators, and program participants, the authors found that the DPP was developed and implemented through supportive leadership who instilled a culture of collaboration and buy-in. Expanding the program could include increasing the capacity of DPP to include additional participants or having a DPP incorporated into each branch court, instead of the centralized system under which it currently operates. Increasing the capacity and scope of the program could both further decrease criminal court caseloads and most importantly avoid a higher number of stigmatizing felony convictions for first-time non-violent defendants.

Practical implications

DPPs are cost effective and can be easily implemented within existing systems. Collaboration and buy-in from all stakeholders are crucial to the program’s success. DPP offers opportunities for expansion. Increasing the capacity and scope of the program could both further decrease criminal court caseloads and most importantly avoid a higher number of stigmatizing felony convictions for first-time non-violent felony defendants.

Originality/value

The main goals of DPP were two-fold. The first was to minimize the level of resources allocated for non-violent offenders in the criminal justice system by diverting such defendants out of the criminal justice system early in the process and reducing the recidivism rates of program participants. The second aimed to provide an option for eligible defendants to avoid a felony conviction, thereby avoiding the collateral consequences associating with a felony conviction.

Details

Journal of Criminological Research, Policy and Practice, vol. 3 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2056-3841

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 31 January 2020

Marilú Pereira Castro and Tomas Aquino Guimaraes

The purpose of this paper is to identify dimensions that can influence the innovation process in justice organizations.

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to identify dimensions that can influence the innovation process in justice organizations.

Design/methodology/approach

This study uses a qualitative approach. Data were collected through a semi-structured interview script. In all, 23 in-depth interviews were undertaken with lawyers, public defenders, judges, prosecutors and public officials from the five regions of Brazil. These data were analyzed using content analysis techniques.

Findings

The perceptions of the interviewees show that the process of innovation in justice organizations can be influenced by five dimensions: Institutional Environment (institutional level), Leadership (organizational level), Organizational Resources (organizational level), Cooperative Relations (interorganizational level) and Innovative Behavior (individual level). These dimensions may promote or restrict innovation.

Originality/value

The results indicate that there are growing efforts to introduce innovations designed to improve the performance and service delivery of justice organizations. However, there is resistance to innovation because these organizations are highly institutionalized and consequently seek stability and absence of change.

Details

Innovation & Management Review, vol. 17 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2515-8961

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 9 August 2023

Thalia Anthony and Vicki Chartrand

Over the past decade, criminology in Australia, Canada and other settler colonies has increasingly engaged with activist challenges to the penal system. These anti-carceral…

Abstract

Over the past decade, criminology in Australia, Canada and other settler colonies has increasingly engaged with activist challenges to the penal system. These anti-carceral engagements have been levelled at its laws, institutions and agents. Following a long history of criminology explicating and buttressing penal institutions, the criminological gaze slowly transitioned in the 1970s to a more critical lens, shifting focus from the people who are criminalised to the harms of the apparatus that criminalises. However, the focus remained steadfastly on institutions and dominant players – until much more recently. The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed the strength of activist organisations and grassroots movements in affecting change and shaping debates in relation to the penal system. This chapter will explore the role of activism in informing criminological scholarship during the pandemic period and how criminologists, in turn, have increasingly recognised the need to build alliances and collaborations with grassroots activists and engage in their own activism. The chapter focuses primarily on Australian and Canadian criminology and its growing imbrication with the prison abolition movement, especially in the shadow of ongoing colonial violence. It considers how activist scholars, including ourselves, attempt to build movements for structural change in the criminal system and beyond.

Details

The Emerald International Handbook of Activist Criminology
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80262-199-0

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 15 March 2011

Anton Yanagisawa

The purpose of this paper is to raise concern and discussion about poverty. This paper explores the difficulties of defining poverty and its origins.

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to raise concern and discussion about poverty. This paper explores the difficulties of defining poverty and its origins.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper utilizes research from psychological and sociological literature to analyze differing schools of thought regarding poverty. A macro‐level perspective of poverty is defined and compared to a micro‐level perspective of poverty. The lack of conformity concerning these opposing schools of thought often impedes the development of solutions for poverty.

Findings

What society believes to be true about poverty will influence how society treats poverty. Some solutions to poverty may only perpetuate the problems of the impoverished depending on how poverty is operationally defined and its origins understood. Literary research is used to support a hypothesis that poverty exists in function to society to insure a readily available, low wage, labor force.

Social implications

The provided information regarding the impact of poverty on society and the individual could aid in the development of government and corporate solutions. Solutions for poverty could be enhanced and employed more accurately by examining the viewpoint of this author.

Originality/value

This paper is of importance for mental health practitioners, corporations, and government branches interested in treating the social effects of poverty.

Details

International Journal of Social Economics, vol. 38 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0306-8293

Keywords

Content available
Book part
Publication date: 18 April 2009

Abstract

Details

Access to Justice
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-84855-243-2

Article
Publication date: 20 September 2022

Hasan Yousef Aljuhmani, Bashar Ababneh, Lawrence Emeagwali and Hamzah Elrehail

Although prior researchers have consistently established a significant relationship between different strategic stances and organizational performances across different research…

Abstract

Purpose

Although prior researchers have consistently established a significant relationship between different strategic stances and organizational performances across different research contexts, the mechanisms underlying this link remain unclear. This study attempts to fill this gap in the literature by testing the mediating effect of the use of strategic performance measurement systems (SPMS) on the relationship between strategic stances (prospector, defender, and reactor) and organizational performance in the public sector.

Design/methodology/approach

This research is based on data collected by surveying 224 managers at public organizations in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) and conducts an analysis using structural equation modeling (SEM).

Findings

The study findings show that prospector strategy is positively associated with organizational performance through the use of SPMS. The reactor strategy was negatively related to organizational performance through the use of SPMS. The defender strategy shows mixed results in terms of its effect on the use of SPMS and organizational performance.

Research limitations/implications

The results obtained here provide strong evidence of the vitality of the use of SPMS for efficiency and effectiveness as a mediator between prospector strategy and organizational performance. To extend this position, future researchers could incorporate other contingent variables, such as structural autonomy, or use experimental design methods during economic austerity in the aftermath of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) global pandemic.

Originality/value

This study represents an attempt to address public administration literature' general calls for grounded research that spells out to practitioners how different strategic stances are likely to affect the use of SPMS to achieve organizational performance levels in the public sector. The present study extends the public administration literature by examining the unexplored linkage of the use of SPMS through which strategic stances influence organizational performance in major public sector organizations.

Details

Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Administration, vol. 16 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1757-4323

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 3 August 2011

Sarah Whetstone and Teresa Gowan

Purpose – Since the mid-20th century, drug addiction in America has increasingly been redefined as a disease and diagnosed as a widespread yet treatable disorder. The…

Abstract

Purpose – Since the mid-20th century, drug addiction in America has increasingly been redefined as a disease and diagnosed as a widespread yet treatable disorder. The idiosyncrasies of addiction as a disease, however, have tended to block the journey of the addict from stigmatized moral failure to therapeutic reprieve. Centering in on the process of the “court-led diagnosis” of addiction, this qualitative case study uses ethnography and interviewing at a county drug court and one of its “partner” therapeutic communities to examine the process in detail, from the first negotiations between treatment and court personnel over the eligibility of the client, to the gradual inculcation of an addict identity by means of intensive cognitive education and behavioral modification.

Methodology/approach – Qualitative: ethnography and interviews.

Findings – We demonstrate that a shift from moral judgment to therapeutic sympathy is particularly unlikely for the fast-growing mass of criminal offenders whose diagnosis is spearheaded by the state in the form of the therapeutic jurisprudence of the drug court. For this group, the emphasis on the need for comprehensive resocialization and the close cooperation between the intimacies of therapeutic “rehab” and the strong arm of criminal justice “backup” not only maintains, but intensifies, moral tutelage, and stigmatization.

Social implications – The convergence of drug treatment and criminal justice tends to produce yet another stigmatizing biologization of poverty and race, lending scientific validity to new forms of criminalizing and medicalizing social hardship.

Article
Publication date: 3 July 2017

Jerrod Brown, Janina Cich and Jay Singh

Persons diagnosed with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) are more likely to come into contact with the criminal justice system than general population controls. Although…

Abstract

Purpose

Persons diagnosed with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD) are more likely to come into contact with the criminal justice system than general population controls. Although previous survey evidence has suggested that federal district attorneys are limited in their knowledge of the psycholegal impairments presented by defendants with this condition, such research has yet to have been conducted with state-specific public defenders. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Design/methodology/approach

The Dillman Total Design Method was used to disseminate an electronic survey to public defenders in Minnesota. The survey included questions designed to measure their knowledge bases on and legal experiences with FASD. Surveys were completed by 135 respondents (nMen=63; nWomen=72) with an average of 16.22 years (SD=11.34) of legal experience.

Findings

Respondents varied in their knowledge bases on the cognitive impairments, social deficits, and physical complications characteristic of FASD. Less than 20 percent of respondents reported having received training on the psycholegal impairments experienced by individuals diagnosed with FASD from arrest until the start of adjudication, during adjudication, or during incarceration. Over 95 percent of respondents reported that they could benefit from a Continuing Legal Education course on the psycholegal impairments of individuals diagnosed with FASD, and over 90 percent reported that they could benefit from being provided the findings of a screening tool for FASD in their daily practice.

Originality/value

First survey of state public defenders’ perceptions of FASD.

Details

Advances in Mental Health and Intellectual Disabilities, vol. 11 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2044-1282

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 25 August 2009

Alissa Pollitz Worden and Andrew Lucas Blaize Davies

Most criminal justice scholars agree that the past three decades have witnessed a punitive shift in criminal justice policy, public opinion, and political rhetoric. Have these…

Abstract

Most criminal justice scholars agree that the past three decades have witnessed a punitive shift in criminal justice policy, public opinion, and political rhetoric. Have these political trends also left their mark on policy approaches to due process rights? The provision of counsel to indigent defendants is a signature issue in debates over due process rights. The Supreme Court expanded dramatically the circumstances under which states were required to provide counsel in the 1960s and 1970s, though decisions about the implementation of this mandate were left to individual states. We examine the evolution of indigent defense policy, at the state and local level, over the past three decades, and ask two questions: First, did policies evolve in the directions expected by reform advocates? Second, to the extent that policies developed differently across states, how can we account for those differences? We find that refomers' optimistic projections about structure and funding have not been realized, and that adoption of progressive policies has been uneven across states. Most importantly, we find evidence that the politics of ideology and racial conflict have played a significant role in states' indigent defense policy over the past three decades.

Details

Special Issue New Perspectives on Crime and Criminal Justice
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-84855-653-9

Article
Publication date: 21 June 2021

Bernardo Oliveira Buta

In most Latin American countries, the provision of legal assistance to the vulnerable population is carried out by public defender's offices (PDOs), agencies composed of…

Abstract

Purpose

In most Latin American countries, the provision of legal assistance to the vulnerable population is carried out by public defender's offices (PDOs), agencies composed of state-paid career lawyers. The aim of this paper is to explain the cross-country variation in regarding the autonomy levels of Latin American PDOs.

Design/methodology/approach

A scale to measure autonomy was built allowing access to the autonomy of sixteen different PDOs. Data were gathered through content analysis of the statutes that organize the PDOs and analyzed through qualitative comparative analysis (QCA).

Findings

The results demonstrate different levels of autonomy among Latin American PDOs. Furthermore, conditions related to institutional and social contexts, such as levels of income, human development, democracy, and the complexity of the political systems, presented sufficient relationships for high levels of autonomy.

Research limitations/implications

It was not possible to interview representatives of the PDOs analyzed. This could help the interpretation of the legislation applied to PDOs, as well as the observation of regulations that may not have come to the knowledge of researchers. Thus, analyses were made according to what was observed in the legislation of each country. It is also noteworthy that this research covered only nationwide PDOs, not involving subnational PDOs. In addition, the data have only internal validity, and cannot be extrapolated to the population.

Practical implications

The creation of a scale to measure the autonomy of public agencies stands out as an original comparative data set of PDOs covering a large amount of Latin American countries.

Social implications

This study was able to characterize the institutional arrangements of sixteen national PDOs, allowing broad comparison between legal aid agencies for the vulnerable population in a region of the world that still suffers from high levels of poverty.

Originality/value

The article presents possible explanations on the variations of PDOs' level of autonomy, showing PDOs' idiosyncrasies, whose autonomy is influenced also by social context variables, in view of the nature of their mission. It should be noted that factors related to the social context are not widely considered by the literature on autonomy of public agencies.

Details

International Journal of Public Sector Management, vol. 34 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0951-3558

Keywords

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