Crime and Justice

Publications on Crime/Justice

NIJ's Multi-Site Evaluation of Adult Drug Courts will report on a mediation analysis to empirically test theoretical pathways to desistance. The analysis considers the theoretical mechanisms through which drug court practices are meant to impact outcomes and how such pathways can be operationalized. A path model is proposed that delineates how drug-court practices affect modifications in behaviors and attitudes, and how these changes affect outcomes. Proposed mediators include changes in: perceived risk and reward (deterrence), perceived legitimacy, and motivation to alter one's behavior. The analysis will suggest the pathways that are most crucial to desistance and the most effective drug-court components that impact these pathways.

The Multi-Site Adult Drug Court Evaluation compares outcomes between offenders in 23 drug court and six comparison sites. Such a research design poses several potential threats to validity, including selection bias (do drug court and comparison offenders vary in background), attrition bias (do offenders retained for follow-up interviews vary from the original baseline samples), and site-level bias (are the drug court and comparison sites comparable in ways other than drug court status). In addition to outlining the analytic strategy, simple outcomes are reported comparing drug court and comparison sites with respect to criminal re-offending, incarceration, and other psychosocial outcomes.

Several studies have found that drug courts reduce recidivism rates, but few studies have focused on the effect of drug courts on substance abuse. Substance abuse treatment approaches used in drug courts are identified based on data from participant surveys and process evaluation of the 23 participating drug courts. Baseline data for 1100 drug court participants and 600 comparison offenders is reported as descriptive analyses. However, the focus is on reporting substance abuse impacts, including 1) the trajectory of recovery and whether drug courts work in terms of reducing drug use, and 2) for whom drug courts are most effective.

The 16th annual Fact Book is a comprehensive data source for indicators of child well-being in the District of Columbia. It tracks the progression of child well-being over time, as well as differences in child well-being across wards and races/ethnicities. It is organized to reflect the six citywide goals for children and youth in DC: children are ready for school; children and youth succeed in school; children and youth are healthy and practice healthy behaviors; children and youth engage in meaningful activities; children and youth live in healthy, stable, and supportive families; and all youth make a successful transition to adulthood.

The National Neighborhood Indicators Partnership (NNIP) is a collaborative effort of the Urban Institute and local organizations in more than 30 cities that operate recurrently updated information systems with neighborhood level data and work to ensure the data will be applied effectively in policy development and community building. This collection of brief case studies describes the local partners’ successes in using neighborhood indicators to improve their communities in several areas, including neighborhood development, housing, children and schools, crime and prisoner reentry, health and service delivery.