NCJ Number
238057
Journal
Justice Policy Journal Volume: 6 Issue: 2 Dated: Fall 2009 Pages: 1-29
Date Published
2009
Length
29 pages
Annotation
This article reports on a project to collect and analyze publicly available demographic data related to not yet adjudicated ('active') homicide cases charged in one large and diverse California County.
Abstract
Much of the desired data, although legally publicly available, turned out to be impossible or practically impossible to obtain. The obstacles encountered seemed mostly related to bureaucratic overload, indifference, and most importantly, the absence of a systematic data collection and analysis infrastructure in the criminal justice system for tracking active cases. Despite gathering or attempting to gather numerous documents from various criminal justice organizations for 121 active homicide cases, after approximately 1 year of continued efforts by several people with considerable experience in law, criminal justice research, and records requests, the authors were only able to state the race of 25 percent of the defendants and 36 percent of the victims in these 121 cases. The authors propose legislation to facilitate data collection on homicide cases. (Published Abstract)