NCJ Number
210858
Journal
Corrections Today Volume: 67 Issue: 5 Dated: August 2005 Pages: 80-83
Date Published
August 2005
Length
4 pages
Annotation
This article describes the work of the W. Haywood Burns Institute in helping local jurisdictions to reduce the unnecessary detention of juveniles and eliminate disproportionate minority confinement (DMC).
Abstract
Participating jurisdictions begin the Burns Institute process by forming a representative governing body that includes high-level representation from key agencies in the juvenile justice system as well as representatives from community groups, parents, and juveniles. This board is the key decisionmaking body responsible for ensuring that all steps in the planned reform are completed. The jurisdiction is then encouraged to hire a full-time local site coordinator to lead the process locally. The first step in reform efforts is to collect baseline data on DMC. This requires analyzing local juvenile crime data by race, gender, offense, time, and location via police data on juvenile arrest and/or probation data on youths in detention. A community profile is then developed to show which segments of the community have the most juveniles in detention. This helps in identifying community strengths and deficits that should be enhanced or remedied. Upon completion of the community profile, the jurisdiction creates a system flow chart to illustrate the process by which juveniles move through the entire juvenile justice system, analyzing the risk assessment instrument by race, defining a local target population that contributes minority youths to detention, and conducting an analysis of the case review. The Burns Institute has worked with the Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative (JDAI) of the Annie E. Casey Foundation to construct a risk assessment instrument that focuses on detention decisiomaking free of bias so as to reduce DMC. 4 notes