NCJ Number
227300
Journal
Journal of Family Violence Volume: 24 Issue: 5 Dated: July 2009 Pages: 337-348
Date Published
July 2009
Length
12 pages
Annotation
This study examined the effect of perpetrator characteristics on fatal child maltreatment and identified empirically child maltreatment perpetrator class profiles.
Abstract
Results of logistic regression revealed that being a biologically unrelated caregiver was the perpetrator characteristic that was most strongly predictive of fatal child maltreatment. Although preliminary analysis indicated that having a history of juvenile justice involvement was also a significant predictor, the findings in this study were tentative and the effect of this variable should be examined in the future. In addition, the results of this study did not show a significant effect of perpetrator victimization during childhood on committing a fatal child assault later in life. In the past, risk factors for child maltreatment fatalities have not been adequately explored, with a small number of studies focused on predictors and correlated of child death as a result of neglect or abuse. This study examined characteristics and profiles of 196 child maltreatment perpetrators in Florida, including 126 who committed fatal assaults during 1999-2002. The following research questions were examined: (1) what perpetrator characteristics were associated with fatal child maltreatment; (2) could discrete subgroups or classes of child maltreatment perpetrators be identified using latent class analysis; and (3) how did these classes compare in terms of risk for fatal child maltreatment? Tables, figure, and references