NCJ Number
177502
Journal
Journal of Criminal Justice Volume: 27 Issue: 2 Dated: March/April 1999 Pages: 127-141
Date Published
1999
Length
15 pages
Annotation
Findings are presented from an empirical analysis of the congruence of predictors for release-on-recognizance (ROR) and failure-to-appear (FTA) across the four largest boroughs of New York City.
Abstract
The study used the 1992 New York City data from the National Pretrial Reporting Program (NPRP). The NPRP periodically collects and tabulates information about the criminal history, pretrial processing, adjudication, and sentencing of felony defendants in 75 of the largest counties in the United States. For this study, only data from the four largest New York City boroughs were used. This sample consisted of 1,637 cases (6,811 cases when weighted). Two dependent measures were examined in the study: the type of pretrial release (ROR or no ROR) and pretrial outcomes (FTA or no FTA). The independent measures included demographic characteristics such as gender, race, and age at arrest. These factors were used to measure the extent to which non-crime elements affected decisions by judges to ROR and their consequent influences on FTA's. Prior convictions were also included as predictors, specifically defendants' prior felonies, prior misdemeanors, prior violent felony convictions, and prior drug felony convictions. There were three salient findings: the incongruence between some predictors of ROR and those of FTA's; the interactions between some of the predictors and type of release that resulted in varying FTA patterns within categories of predictors; and the contextual nature of pretrial release decisions and of FTA. 6 tables, 7 notes, and 27 references