NCJ Number
179071
Date Published
July 1999
Length
131 pages
Annotation
This report describes progress made over the last 12 months in the Reintegrative Shaming Experiments (RISE) in Canberra, Australia.
Abstract
The study's aim is to compare the effects of standard court processing with the effects of a diversionary conference for four kinds of offense categories: drunk driving (over .08 blood alcohol content) at any age; juvenile property offending with personal victims (under 18 years old); juvenile shoplifting offenses detected by shop security staff (under 18 years); and youth violent offenses (under 30 years). There are three central hypotheses of the experiments; first, both offenders and victims find conferences to be fairer than court; second, there will be less repeat offending after a conference than after court; and third, the public costs of providing a conference are no greater than the cost of processing offenders in court. This study reports that the additional data analyzed continue to confirm the first of these hypotheses. Although the report does not contain data on the second hypothesis, relevant data on the first and largest offense category (drunk driving) will be available in the near future. All possible first-wave interviews have been completed, and the majority of the 900 cases have had the specified 2-year period post-random assignment in which to reoffend. Researchers believe that giving RISE offenders this length of time to reoffend will enhance the reliability of the findings and the likelihood of detecting a difference in the effects of the two treatments. Cases in the remaining experiments are nearing completion, and a sizable proportion of participants have had their second-wave interview, which occurs 2 years after post-random assignment. This report does not contain cost information; however, such an analysis is well underway and will be the subject of a separate report in the coming months. Extensive tables