NCJ Number
97090
Date Published
1984
Length
28 pages
Annotation
This manual presents descriptions of the variables and the coding information for the dataset collected by the Bureau of Justice Statistics pertaining to offender characteristics and patterns of court action and case disposition in 1981.
Abstract
Collected by individual States from existing data, the dataset includes all 298,847 cases which reached disposition during the calendar year 1981. A total of 35 variables are included. Using the individual adult offender as the unit of analysis, information is included on the arrest and level of arrest charge, date of arrest, charge filed by the prosecution, prosecutor or grand jury disposition, type of counsel, type of trial, court disposition, sentence type, and minimum and maximum sentence length. Provision of dates of disposition at each stage permits tracking of the time spent at each stage. Discussions of the data format, confidentiality issues, and offense codes are presented. Appendixes contain coding instructions, lists of data elements, and related information.