The long arm of the gang: Disengagement under gang governance in Central America
This article proposes a new theoretical model of gang disengagement based on a comparative case study with MS-13 and Barrio 18 gangs in Central America. It is based on 112 in-depth interviews with former gang members in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. The article identifies three forms of gang disengagement: religious conversion, secular pass, and walking away. Two factors, the gang's organizational structure and its territorial reach, mediate in the choices gang members have when leaving an institutionalized gang. The specific combination of these factors makes some disengagement modes more likely than others. The a...
Source: Criminology - September 18, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Jos é Miguel Cruz,
Jonathan D. Rosen,
Yemile Mizrahi Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research
“The roughest form of social work:” How court officials justify bail decisions
AbstractGrowing research has analyzed quantitative patterns of bail decisions and outcomes, but we know far less about how court officials justify their bail decisions. To enhance understanding of how bail decisions —and their resulting pretrial outcomes—are generated, we interviewed 104 judges, prosecutors, and public defenders in a northeastern state. Court officials in our study reported three primary justifications at bail: ensuring defendants return to court, preventing crime, and lessening harm. The f irst two justifications have been suggested in the literature, but the latter is novel and encompasses two second...
Source: Criminology - September 17, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Alix S. Winter,
Matthew Clair Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research
“Even though we're married, I'm single”: The meaning of jail incarceration in romantic relationships
AbstractJail incarceration substantially transforms romantic relationships, and incarceration may alter the commitment between partners, thereby undermining or strengthening relationships. In this article, we use in-depth interviews with 85 women connected to incarcerated men (as current or former romantic partners) to explore how women articulate relationship changes that stem from their partner's jail incarceration, a common but understudied form of contact with the criminal legal system. We identify three interrelated and mutually reinforcing processes, which are shaped by and shape a partner's commitment to the relatio...
Source: Criminology - August 17, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Kristin Turney,
Katelyn Rose Malae,
MacKenzie A. Christensen,
Sarah Halpern ‐Meekin Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research
Issue Information
(Source: Criminology)
Source: Criminology - August 12, 2023 Category: Criminology Tags: ISSUE INFORMATION Source Type: research
Labeling effects of initial juvenile justice system processing decision on youth interpersonal ties*
AbstractThe juvenile justice system can process youth in myriad ways. Youth who are formally processed, relative to being informally processed, may experience more public and harsh sanctions that label youth more negatively as “deviant.” Drawing on labeling theory, the current study evaluates the relative effect of formal justice system processing on the interpersonal dynamics of youth peer networks. Using data from the Crossroads Study, a multisite longitudinal sample of first-time adolescent offenders, the current s tudy applies augmented inverse probability weighting and generalized mixed-effects models to estimate ...
Source: Criminology - July 27, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Zachary R. Rowan,
Adam Fine,
Laurence Steinberg,
Paul J. Frick,
Elizabeth Cauffman Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research
Criminal record stigma, race, and neighborhood inequality
This article examines how housing providers use criminal records to screen tenants in the rental housing market and whether it varies by type of neighborhood. I conduct an online correspondence audit to test discriminatory behaviors and find an adverse criminal record effect on housing opportunities. Many housing providers disqualify all tenants with a criminal record, even without information about the severity or timing of offenses. The criminal record effect is significantly stronger in gentrifying neighborhoods and in neighborhoods where the proportion of Black residents is dwindling. Tenant screening emerges as a cent...
Source: Criminology - July 16, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Laura M. DeMarco Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research
Correctional officers and the use of force as an organizational behavior
AbstractDuring the past 30 years, bureaucratic managerialism has reshaped how prison staff maintain order. Policies and graduated disciplinary models have replaced coercive methods, reducing disciplinary use of force by prison staff against incarcerated people. Managerialism, however, disguises deep problems in the interpretation and enforcement of use-of-force policies. Drawing on 131 semistructured interviews with Canadian correctional officers (COs), I show how managers and prison staff interpret and negotiate policies to justify using force to maintain order. Although COs frame policies and management supervision as si...
Source: Criminology - July 5, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: William J. Schultz Tags: ARTICLE Source Type: research
How to overcome the cost of a criminal record for getting hired
AbstractMany theories emphasize how employment is protective against criminal recidivism, yet a criminal record is a major barrier for getting hired. We asked 591 managers to make hypothetical hiring decisions between two applicants whose key difference was the presence or absence of a criminal conviction. In addition, we randomly manipulated the education, references, wage, or experience of the applicant with the criminal record to identify which manipulations can offset the cost of the record on an applicant's probability of being selected. We found that, when credentials were the same, the applicant with a criminal reco...
Source: Criminology - June 28, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Mateus R. Santos,
Chae M. Jaynes,
Danielle M. Thomas Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research
System management and compensatory parenting: Educational involvement after maternal incarceration
In this study, we present the first analysis of variation in school- and home-based educational involvement by maternal incarceration history, pairing survey and interview data to connect macro-level group differences with micro-level narratives of mothers ’ involvement in their children's education. Our survey data demonstrate that children of ever-incarcerated mothers experience increased school-based educational involvement by their primary caregivers, regardless of whether the caregiver is the mother herself. Our interview data point to compensa tory parenting as a key motivating factor in educational involvement, wh...
Source: Criminology - June 27, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Amelia R. Branigan,
Rachel Ellis,
Wade C. Jacobsen,
Anna R. Haskins Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research
Racial and ethnic differences in the consequences of school suspension for arrest
This study uses six waves of data from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1997 (N = 8,634) to examine how the relationship between suspension and subsequent arrest differs for White, Black, and Hispanic students. Using a series of within-person analyses that control for time-stable personal characteristics, this study finds that suspension amplifies Black and Hispanic students ’ risk of arrest relative to that of White students. White students’ risk of arrest was not amplified by suspension and, in some models, was diminished. This study's findings underscore the importance of understanding the labeling process a...
Source: Criminology - June 24, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Benjamin W. Fisher,
Alex O. Widdowson Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research
Revisiting the relationship between age, employment, and recidivism
AbstractEmployment theoretically serves as a source of informal social control that can promote desistance from crime (Sampson& Laub, 1993). Findings from studies assessing the effects of employment, however, have been mixed. In a seminal study, Uggen (2000) reanalyzed data from the National Supported Work (NSW) Demonstration Project and found that employment significantly reduced the rate of recidivism among individuals aged 27 and older but had no impact on younger individuals. We reproduce and replicate Uggen's (2000) findings with data from four distinct employment programs: The National Supported Work Program (1975 ...
Source: Criminology - June 6, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Holly Nguyen,
Kyle J. Thomas,
Jennifer J. Tostlebe Tags: ARTICLE Source Type: research
Settling institutional uncertainty: Policing Chicago and New York, 1877 –1923
AbstractWe show how both the Chicago Police Department and the New York Police Department sought to settle uncertainty about their propriety and purpose during a period when abrupt transformations destabilized urban order and called the police mandate into question. By comparing annual reports that the Chicago Police Department and the New York Police Department published from 1877 to 1923, we observe two techniques in how the police enacted that settlement:identification of the problems that the police believed themselves uniquely well equipped to manage andauthorization of the powers necessary to do so. Comparison of ide...
Source: Criminology - May 26, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Johann Koehler,
Tony Cheng Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research
Coerced work during parole: Prevalence, mechanisms, and characteristics
AbstractCoerced work on parole occurs when people are required to work under the threat of criminal legal repercussions. In the face of barriers to “good” work for people after prison, coercion helps to funnel parolees into positions at the bottom of the labor market. Parolee workers in these positions experience issues common to precarious, low-wage work (low pay, hazardous working conditions, and labor law violations), as well as heightened vulnerability to predatory employers and exposure to parole-prohibited activities. Because of the threat-backed requirements to work, however, parolees must choose to either acc...
Source: Criminology - May 22, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Dallas Augustine Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research
Issue Information
(Source: Criminology)
Source: Criminology - May 6, 2023 Category: Criminology Tags: ISSUE INFORMATION Source Type: research
The “STICKINESS” of stigma: Guilt by association after a friend's arrest
This study expands on labeling theory and the concept of “stickiness” by assessing whether a friend's arrest increases the likelihood of one's police contact. Using a sample of rural youth (N = 13,170), I find that a friend's arrest is associated with an increase in the likelihood of one's first arrest the next year after accounting for other predicto rs of police contact. Based on my theoretical framework, I interpret this finding as “guilt by association.” In addition, ending relationships with friends who have been arrested does not significantly impact this relationship. This study concludes that police contact...
Source: Criminology - May 6, 2023 Category: Criminology Authors: Erin Tinney Tags: ARTICLE Source Type: research
