NCJ Number
178806
Journal
Corrections Compendium Volume: 24 Issue: 8 Dated: August 1999 Pages: 1-23
Date Published
August 1999
Length
7 pages
Annotation
The Philadelphia Department of Human Services (DHS) has developed a juvenile justice evaluation-based information system that supports a more informed and rational decision-making approach to policy development and that includes a classification model to identify juveniles at high risk of becoming chronic offenders.
Abstract
Major policy goals of the DHS regarding chronic juvenile offenders are fairly straightforward. They include increased efficiency of resource allocation, improved matching of juveniles and programs, and improved public safety. The DHS has taken into account research on ways of predicting chronic juvenile delinquency and recidivism predictors or offending frequency. An evaluation of the DHS approach identified a cohort of 1,363 early offender juveniles with one prior arrest or no prior arrests who entered the juvenile justice system during a 1-year period from 1995 to 1996. Chronic juvenile offenders were defined as juveniles who accumulated at least 3 arrests by the end of the 2-year follow-up period. Among the early juvenile offenders 7.9 percent became chronic offenders. The most important predictor of chronic juvenile delinquency was age at first arrest. An assessment of the impact of program interventions and neighborhoods on case outcomes revealed that the proportion of high-risk juveniles who actually became chronic offenders was no higher for nonresidential programs than for other more restrictive and more expensive institutional placements. Implications and limitations of the evaluation findings are discussed. 28 references, 1 table, and 3 figures