Do Reentry Courts Reduce Recidivism? Results from the Harlem Parole Reentry Court -- NEW
By Zachary Hamilton
A growing number of jurisdictions nationwide are seeking to adapt the drug court model to returning ex-offenders. First conceived by Jeremy Travis in 2000, the Reentry Court model was created to address the risks and needs of returning offenders during the riskiest time of reintegration the period immediately following release. In a first-ever rigorous test of a specialized reentry court, the Center found that the Harlem Parole Reentry Court produced a significant reduction in re-convictions for new crimes, yet also led to increased parole revocations for technical violations. While these results indicate a promising court model, policy implications regarding "supervision effects" (seen in higher technical revocation rates) are discussed as well.
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Annual Report: 2009
Highlights of the Center for Court Innovation's accomplishments in 2009.
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A National Portrait of Domestic Violence Courts
By Sarah Bradley, Melissa Labriola, Samantha Moore, Chris O'Sullivan, and Michael Rempel
This study explores the goals, policies, and practices of criminal domestic violence courts nationwide. Based on in-depth visits to select sites and a national survey completed by 129 domestic violence courts, results point to strong national convergence around the fundamental goals of victim safety and offender accountability. However, the study identifies other goals about which there is less agreement (e.g., offender rehabilitation or case processing efficiency) and reveals wide variations in court policy and practice. The ultimate goal of the study is to lay the groundwork for future information exchange and cross-learning among these courts.
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A National Compendium of Domestic Violence Courts
By Staff of the Center for Court Innovation
This compendium serves as a companion document to A National Portrait of Domestic Violence Courts. The compendium provides contact information for 208 criminal domestic violence courts in the United States as of December 2009. These courts handle criminal domestic violence cases on a separate calendar or assign criminal domestic violence cases to one or more dedicated judges or judicial officers.
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Responding to Human Trafficking: Lessons from an Experiment in the Bronx
By Liberty Aldrich and Robyn Mazur
With funding from the State Justice Institute, the Center for Court Innovation sought to test whether it was possible to create a court screening tool capable of efficiently identifying victims of trafficking and engaging them in needed services. This short report summarizes the implementation of this experiment and offers lessons for other jurisdictions interested in improving their response to trafficking.
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Lessons from the Battle over D.A.R.E.: The Complicated Relationship between Research and Practice
By Greg Berman and Aubrey Fox
An examination of the controversy over D.A.R.E., one of the most well-known and widespread crime prevention programs in the country, which has thrived despite research showing less-than-inspiring results. To its critics, D.A.R.E. is a cautionary tale of how criminal justice programs can live on despite evidence of failure. To its defenders, D.A.R.E. is a case study of resilience in the face of adversity. This paper unpacks the complicated relationship between research and practice, drawing lessons for future programming.
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The Drug Court Model and Persistent DWI: An Evaluation of the Erie and Niagara DWI/Drug Courts
By Amanda Cissner
An impact evaluation of two hybrid DWI/drug courts designed to address the issue of persistent driving while intoxicated (DWI). The results suggest that DWI court participants have slightly lower re-arrest rates than a matched comparison group; but the differences are small and non-significant. The evaluation reports other positive outcomes for court participants, including low rates of alcohol use during the period of program participation and high program completion rates.
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Expanding the Community Court Model: Testing Community Court Principles in the Bronx Centralized Courthouse
By Shani Katz
A report examining the impact of Bronx Community Solutions on sentencing in its first year of operation. The program model involves applying community court principles and practices to misdemeanor cases in a large, centralized courthouse (the Bronx Criminal Court). Results indicate that after implementation, the Court made significantly greater use of alternative sanctions, including community service and short-term social services, while making less use of jail sentences and, on the other end of the spectrum, less use of sentences such as fines or time served that lack any ongoing obligation.
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Youth Justice Board Toolkit
By Members of the Youth Justice Board
The Toolkit is modeled after the Youth Justice Board program, which is dedicated to bringing the voices of young people into policymaking. The Toolkit contains curriculum and other resources for schools, after-school programs, and not-for-profit organizations that are interested in engaging young people in local policy development.
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Two Decades of Specialized Domestic Violence Courts: A Review of the Literature
By Samantha Moore
An overview of the research literature on specialized domestic violence courts, this paper provides a summary of the current state of the field, an analyses of domestic violence court characteristics and goals, and a review of major research findings concerning court impacts on case processing, stakeholder coordination, informed decision-making, offender accountability, recidivism, victim safety, and victim services.
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Children and Trauma:An Evaluation of the Bronx Child and Adolescent Witness Support Program
By Mia Green
An exploratory study testing the effects of court-based assessment and intervention services for child witnesses to violent crime. Findings are based on structured pre- and post-treatment assessments with participants ages 11 to 15 and with the caretakers of participants ages 3 to 10. Although based on a small sample of cases, the results point to a reduction in trauma symptoms from baseline to follow-up.
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First-year Law Students in the Courtroom
By Michelle Zeitler
This report presents a three-year evaluation of the Touro Law Center's Court Observation Program, which requires first-year law students to study and witness courtroom practice in both state and federal courthouses in Suffolk County, New York, with the goal of facilitating early practical exposure to the court system. Overall, court stakeholders, faculty, and students alike expressed high levels of satisfaction with the program. Students' descriptions of their career goals changed after program participation (expressing a greater desire to practice in a courtroom), and their ratings of the importance of pro bono work and overall confidence in the courts increased.
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Improving Outcomes Through Better Data Tracking
By Christine Sisario
An article that describes how New York is adapting technology from problem-solving courts statewide.
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A Comparison of Two Prosecution Policies in Cases of Intimate Partner Violence
By Robert Davis, Donald Farole, Jr., Chris O'Sullivan, and Michael Rempel
A study comparing recidivism rates, victim satisfaction, and costs of filing all domestic violence cases with the court vs. declining
to file cases when the victim opposes prosecution. Published in Criminology and Public Policy, Volume 7, Issue 4 (November 2008),
and available from Wiley InterScience online
here .
The same journal issue also includes an editorial
introduction and two commentaries on the study, written by other experts in the field. The complete research report
on the same study is available for immediate download
here .
Batterer Programs and Beyond
By Michael Rempel
An article that both critically examines the research literature related to each of two goals that are commonly ascribed to court-ordered batterer programs: rehabilitation and offender accountability. The article also considers the prospects for several new directions in sentencing, including judicial monitoring, community service, and heavy fines. The article concludes by recommending that, whether or not courts continue to rely on offender programs, they also seek to incorporate more comprehensive and systematic approaches to offender monitoring and sanctioning for noncompliance. Published in Violence against Women in Families and Relationships: Volume Three: Criminal Justice and the Law, eds. Evan Stark and Eve S. Buzawa, Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2009. Available on Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/Violence-against-Women-Families-Relationships/dp/0275998525
Teens Educating about Community Health: Examining the Efficacy of an HIV/Substance Abuse Peer Education Program
By Rachel Swaner
This report summarizes findings from a six-year process and impact evaluation of a teen peer education program related to HIV and substance abuse. After an intensive 10-week training program run out of the Red Hook Community Justice Center, the teen participants ran educational workshops for their peers throughout Brooklyn. The evaluation finds that after the intervention, participants gained significantly greater knowledge than a matched comparison group of the risks associated with HIV and substance abuse. Participants also showed a lower propensity for sexual experimentation and unprotected sex and less stereotypical attitudes regarding sex, race, gender, and sexual preference than the comparison group; but the program did not appear to influence attitudes related to alcohol, cigarettes, and drugs.
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Avoiding Failures of Implementation: Lessons from Process Evaluations
By Amanda Cissner and Donald Farole, Jr.
Part of a multi-faceted inquiry into failure undertaken by the Center for Court Innovation and the U.S. Department of Justice's Bureau of Justice Assistance, this paper examines failures that occur during the implementation of a new initiative, seeking to identify common sources of failure and to develop a basic list of considerations that may help practitioners avoid future pitfalls.
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Problem-Solving and the American Bench: A National Survey of Trial Court Judges
By Donald Farole, Jr.
This journal article presents an abridged version of the Center for Court Innovation's nationwide survey of more than 1,000 randomly selected trial court judges concerning their attitudes and practices with respect to problem-solving. Published in Vol. 30, No. 1 (2009) of the Justice System Journal, which gave its permission to reprint the article here.
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Strong Families, Safe Communities: Recommendations to Improve and Expand New York Citys Alternative to Detention Programs
By Members of the Youth Justice Board
Written by the teenage members of the 2008-2009 Youth Justice Board, this report proposes 10 specific recommendations to strengthen and expand juvenile Alternative to Detention (ATD) programs in New York City and help young people and families involved in the juvenile justice system. The Youth Justice Board, which consists of New York City young people 14 to 18 years old, spent several months researching the City's ATD programs—interviewing over 30 juvenile justice and court professionals, conducting focus groups of justice system-involved youth and observing Family Court proceedings and ATD program operations. During the 2009-2010 program year, the Youth Justice Board will work with system stakeholders to encourage the implementation of the ideas contained in this report.
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Race, Bias and Problem-Solving Courts
By Robert V. Wolf
In order to ensure that problem-solving courts work as fairly and effectively as possible with all populations, research needs to be done into the issues of race and bias. This groundbreaking paper, published in the National Black Law Journal, is an attempt to guide researchers in the right direction by highlighting key concerns that are ripe for future exploration and analysis. Published in 21 Nat'l Black L.J. 1 (2009).
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