Route From the Successful Experiment to Policy Formation Falling Rocks, Bumps, and Dangerous Curves (From Evaluation and Criminal Justice Policy, P 81-102, 1981, Ronald Roesch and Raymond R Corrado, ed. - See NCJ-85275)

• NCJ Number: 85278
• Author(s): E Seidman
• Date Published: 1981
• Length: 22 pages
• Sale Source: Sage Publications, Inc
• Publication Type: Program/Project Evaluation
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: Originally presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Criminology, 1980, San Francisco, California.

Annotation

The evolution of a juvenile diversion project in Illinois is described to illustrate how a project is influenced by its setting and the resulting difficulties in moving a project from the experimental stage of official adoption by criminal justice agencies.

Abstract

The juvenile diversion project was intended solely for youths for whom the police had already used a warn and release option and for whom the juvenile officer felt that no choice existed but to file a petition for court action. Thus, the program provided a true alternative to adjudication. The project's goal was to keep the youths out of further involvement with the criminal justice system. The first year was mainly a pilot study in which relationships, agreements, and working procedures were established in consultation with local police officers. In the second year, 37 youths who had been apprehended by the police were randomly assigned to either a college student who worked with the youth on a one-to-one basis or to a 'treatment as usual' condition instead of juvenile court referral. The college students were given training and supervision in relationship, child advocacy, and behavioral contracting skills. The experimental group and highly significant declines in police contact, offense seriousness, and juvenile court referrals when compared with the controls before, during, and both 1 and 2 years after the program's conclusion. During the third year, the interventions were divided and assigned to different youths to determine their relative effectiveness. The project was then transferred to the local juvenile justice system. Its subsequent changes were due to changes in juvenile justice decisionmakers and resulting changes in the types of youths served and decisions made regarding these youths. The project illustrates the difficulties involved in attempts to generalize from results of a single project conducted in a particular setting. Figures and a list of 20 references are provided.