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PubMed1976

Reported consequences of decriminalization of consensual adult homosexuality in seven American states.

This article reports results of a survey of police officials, prosecuting attorneys, and members of homosexual groups in the seven states that had decriminalized private homosexual behavior between consenting adults. Despite the dire predictions of many, the responses indicate that, among other things, decriminalization has had no effect on the involvement of homosexuals with minors, the use of force by homosexuals, or the amount of private homosexual behavior. Additionally, decriminalization reportedly eased somewhat the problems of the homosexual community and allowed the police to devote more time to the investigation of what generally are regarded as more serious criminal offenses.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

[Is violence of psychiatric patients a real danger for "open door psychiatry"?].

The public opinion frequently attributes a dangerous behavior to the severe mentally disturbed. Is there really an overrepresentation of the mentally sick among violent delinquents? In a retrospective epidemiological study performed in the Federal Republic of Germany the personality features, mental status and criminal acts of 533 mentally disturbed violent delinquents were investigated and compared with the same data obtained in healthy violent delinquents, in mentally disturbed non-delinquents of the same diagnosis and in the general population of a responsible age. The most important results of this study are reported. The proportion of the mentally ill in the group of all violent delinquents of the decade examined (1955-1964) does not exceed the proportion of the mentally ill in the entire population so that the question asked above can clearly be answered with no. Factors increasing the risk of aggressive behavior in various groups of mental disturbances are discernible; the recognition of these factors should be followed by appropriate therapeutic measures.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1993

Orthopantomography and the determination of majority age.

The problem of determining a subject's age to ascertain whether he can be criminally charged brings to prominence all the methods of investigation which can be used to define a person's biological age. The methodologies used to determine dental age still represent today the most sensitive means of arriving at this end. Researchers in Turin in 1980 elaborated an equational formula to determine a subject's presumable age by means of orthopantomography, basing the examination on the mineralization times of 4.5, 4.7, 4.8. After thorough checks carried out on sample groups of urban inhabitants, it was noted that the phases of mineralization of the 3rd molar can provide an answer to the judicial authorities' query as to whether the subject in question has come of age. The phase of mineralization of the 3rd molar is evaluated according to the table we have proposed during a previous conference and in another paper, which establishes 12 phases of mineralization. Focusing our attention on the final 12th phase, corresponding to the complete mineralization of the tooth roots, it was noted that this was present in 93 subjects, of whom 43 male and 50 female. A check of the personal data of these subjects revealed that for the male group age was between 6875 and 9396 days (between 18 years 10 months and 25 years 9 months), whereas for the female group age was between 6711 and 9275 days (between 18 years 4 months and 25 years 5 months). In other words, none of the subjects was found to be under 18 years of age.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2002

The effect of competency restoration training on defendants with mental retardation found not competent to proceed.

The present investigation focused on the reevaluations of "competency to stand trial" (CST) of 75 criminal defendants with mental retardation (MR) who were originally found incompetent and who were referred for treatment. The effect of competency restoration training was examined. Site of training was also investigated. Because habilitation facilities are specially designed to help individuals with MR, it was suspected that training at habilitation centers would have a greater effect on restoration of defendants with MR than the training at state hospitals. Results showed that significantly more defendants did not gain competency following training than those who did. Analysis revealed that (a) higher IQ and (b) being African American rather than Caucasian American were predictive of restoration. When discriminating factors were held constant, site of training did not significantly affect competency restoration. Possible explanations for this finding were discussed.

Crime↗
PubMed1993

The Missouri child fatality study: underreporting of maltreatment fatalities among children younger than five years of age, 1983 through 1986.

Estimates of the incidence of child maltreatment fatalities vary widely; most experts believe they are underreported. To investigate the suspicion that fatal maltreatment was underreported in Missouri preschool children, a statewide, population-based study was conducted using nine data sources. The study cases included the 384 children younger than age 5 who died from 1983 through 1986 and whose death certificates were coded with an external cause (injury) or whose deaths were substantiated as abuse or neglect fatalities by the Missouri Division of Family Services. Each fatality was categorized as one of the following: definite maltreatment, probable maltreatment, possible maltreatment, non-maltreatment, or inadequate information. Of the 121 cases classified as definite maltreatment, only 47.9% had codes consistent with maltreatment on their death certificates. The Division of Family Services had substantiated 79.3% of definite maltreatment cases as abuse or neglect fatalities. The Federal Bureau of Investigation Uniform Crime Reports database reported only 38.8% of these cases as homicides. In 37.2% of the cases, there was at least one criminal conviction. Child maltreatment fatalities are drastically underreported as such in Missouri because of inadequate investigations, lack of information-sharing between investigators and agencies, and reporting systems that fail to capture the contribution of maltreatment as a cause of death. Missouri has created a statewide system of child fatality review panels and a child fatality surveillance system to address the problems documented in this study.

Abstracting and Indexing↗
PubMed1981

Investigation of incest: opportunity to motivate families to seek help.

Incest, like other forms of sexual abuse, is a criminal act that society treats ambiguously. Victims are doubly victimized by being subjected to disbelief on the part of those who should protect them. Presented here is a modelfor investigation that not only leads to protection for the victim and prosecution for the perpetrator, but guides the family to take steps toward resolving their problem.

Child↗
PubMed1978

Plasma catecholamines, stress and aggression in maximum security patients.

Investigations into the stress response of patients committed to a special hospital for criminally deviant offences have identified a group of sympathetically hypoactive patients who excrete more noradrenaline and less adrenaline in the urine than either the remaining hospital population or control subjects, during conditions of stresser anticipation. Further investigation of these patients has shown that similar differences in plasma catecholamines exist, and that the group of patients characterised by this imbalance tend to have been committed for the most physically violent crimes.

Adolescent↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Prior convictions of child molesters.

Both the stereotypes held by investigating officers and the clinical literature assume that child molesters have distinct characteristics. these are generally expected to be reflected in a prior offence history of assaults on children and sexually deviant behaviour. A further assumption is that there is an escalation of offending, less serious crimes being precursors to more serious ones. To test these assumptions the criminal convictions, if any, prior to the offence were examined for all 416 detected offenders who had committed sexual offences upon children aged between 5 and 12 years, in the Lancashire Police area, during 1987, 1988 and 1989. Of the 183 (44%) of offenders who had previous convictions, 72 involved indecency, 17% of the total sample. Only 9 (2%) of offenders had an exclusive conviction history in respect of indecency. Previous convictions for theft, burglary and violence were all much more frequent. The results also do not generally support the hypothesis that serious offenders have progressed from less serious offences against children. A criminal opportunist model is proposed as of more value for guiding investigations than the existing stereotypes.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1988

Criminalization of the mentally ill: Part II. Initial detention.

In 1939 Penrose explained the correlation between crime and mental illness in terms of an administrative rather than an etiological link. Penrose's theory encompasses the idea that social standards for defining aberrant behaviour change as do the administrative facilities designed to control such behaviour. Social groups cope with individuals who display undesirable behaviour in one of two ways. They define the behaviour as incompetent and invoke the mental health system or they define the behaviour as criminal and employ the jail. Penrose documented an inverse relationship between these facilities whereby the population of mental hospitals increases as the population of jails decreases, and vice versa, depending on the prevailing laws, funding or stage of development of either system. The actual size of the population requiring institutional care, however, remains stable forcing individuals to transmigrate from one system to the other in order to obtain institutional support. Over the past two decades, increasing numbers of mentally ill have found their way into jails, however, little systematic evidence has been produced to document the process followed by these individuals as they move through the justice-correctional system, or how their psychiatric needs are met. The authors have conducted a prospective longitudinal investigation to document the transmigration of mental patients through the criminal justice system and have followed a cohort of individuals arrested in the City of Calgary during the month of October, 1984. Arresting officers were asked to complete a special study form to identify individuals who, in their perception, displayed mentally disordered behaviour during the arrest.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Adolescent↗
PubMed1980

Law and the quality of life.

The use of sophisticated methods of criminological investigation and fact determinations, coupled with advances in forensic sciences and in criminal law and with the extensive procedural safeguards and mechanisms available to prosecutors and defense attorneys alike are, more often than not, taken for granted. Yet, it was not long ago that our legal system functioned on relatively rudimentary procedures, and the tools available to investigate crime and to determine factual matters were little more than very basic scientific principles crudely adapted to the needs of the criminologist. Criminology itself is both a relatively new concept and a distinct branch of forensic sciences. This paper will examine some of the more interesting historical developments in the fields of jurisprudence, criminology, and forensic sciences in order to gain an insight into the contemporary quality of our legal system.

Criminal Law↗
PubMed2004

The influence of Afrocentric facial features in criminal sentencing.

Prior research has shown that within a racial category, people with more Afrocentric facial features are presumed more likely to have traits that are stereotypic of Black Americans compared with people with less Afrocentric features. The present study investigated whether this form of feature-based stereotyping might be observed in criminal-sentencing decisions. Analysis of a random sample of inmate records showed that Black and White inmates, given equivalent criminal histories, received roughly equivalent sentences. However, within each race, inmates with more Afrocentric features received harsher sentences than those with less Afrocentric features. These results are consistent with laboratory findings, and they suggest that although racial stereotyping as a function of racial category has been successfully removed from sentencing decisions, racial stereotyping based on the facial features of the offender is a form of bias that is largely overlooked.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2002

Understanding the abnormal by studying the normal.

OBJECTIVE: In the present paper we ask whether it is meaningful to study psychopathic traits in non-referred youths and whether this kind of research can be used to understand the development of criminal full-blown psychopathy. METHOD: We review studies that have investigated the utility of assessing psychopathic traits in non-referred samples of youths. RESULTS: Research shows that psychopathic traits in non-referred youths manifest similarly to how they are manifested among incarcerated offenders, as indicated by similarities in factor structures. Also, psychopathic traits relate similarly to frequent, violent antisocial behavior in non-referred youths as among adult and adolescent institutionalized criminal offenders. Thus, the differences between the non-referred conduct-problem youths exhibiting a psychopathic personality pattern and the incarcerated, criminal youths identified as psychopathic seem to be quantitative rather than qualitative. CONCLUSION: It is concluded that research on non-referred youth samples can provide important knowledge about the processes that underlie the development of psychopathic traits and how this development can be prevented. Implications for future research and intervention and prevention are discussed.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2004

Predicting presence of offender's criminal record from antisocial lifestyle indicators of homicide victims.

The aim of the present study is to explore the possibility of predicting the presence of a criminal record in the background of a homicide offender on the basis of victim characteristics. Eight victim characteristics, as well as the presence or absence of offender criminal record and offender violent criminal record, were coded for 502 Finnish homicides. A configural frequency analysis (CFA) showed that it was possible to predict the presence of a criminal record on the basis of the victim variables. The practical significance of the results for police investigations is discussed.

Antisocial Personality Disorder↗
PubMed1978

Female criminality and the prediction of recidivism. A prospective six-year follow-up.

A prospective, six-year follow-up investigation of 66 convicted female felons indicated that psychiatric, social, and familial factors defined and measured at the time of the index study affected the rate of criminal recidivism. Wide individual variation in the course of female criminality was observed. Prolonged supervision on parole or probation appeared to have therapeutic benefit. The most powerful predictors of recidivism were the diagnoses of drug dependence and antisocial personality, and a history of homosexuality. Familial criminality and maternal hysteria were also associated with an increased risk of serious and persistent recidivism. Educational, marital, and employment status contributed to a lesser extent, while race and type of index offense were only significant (P less than .05) when minor offenses were considered.

Adult↗
PubMed2002

The use of reliable digits to detect malingering in a criminal forensic pretrial population.

The present research is a cross-validation of previous investigation by Greiffenstein, Baker; and Gola; Greiffenstein, Gola, and Baker; and Meyers and Volbrecht on the reliable digits (RELD) method of detecting suspected malingering on the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (WAIS-R). The results support the use of the RELD method on a criminalforensic pretrial population (N = 187). Sensitivities, specificities, and incremental hit ratesfor two cut levels of the RELD method, Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2) Infrequency and the Personality Assessment Inventory Negative Impression Scales, as well as multiple combined cut scores, were comparable to those observed in previous studies that used neuropsychologically evaluated participants. The selection of which cut score or combination of cut scores is appropriate on the RELD method is also discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed2006

Physically abusive fathers and risk assessment.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study is to identify factors that predict recidivism among families in which the father is the perpetrator of physical abuse and to compare these factors to the factors that investigators believe are related to higher risk. METHOD: A case-comparison design was used to understand risk among 137 predominantly Caucasian families in which a father had injured a child. RESULTS: The multivariate analysis showed that families in which the father was unemployed (greater time at risk), had younger children, was not the biological father of all of the children, did not take responsibility for his behavior, seriously injured a child, and maltreated a child in the past were more likely to re-abuse. These factors, along with whether the mother had a criminal history, correctly predicted recurrence for 83% of the families. The investigators correctly predicted recurrence for 70% of the families. CONCLUSIONS: The investigators placed too much emphasis on some variables that were not related to recurrence, such as the mother's mental health and whether she tried to protect her children. These results may be useful in adapting assessment systems that do not take into consideration the gender of the perpetrator.

Adolescent↗