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RUNNING HEAD: Juvenile Court Drug Program

Effectiveness of

Juvenile Court Drug Programs

With Regard to Recidivism

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Summary

Based on the continuing concern over the rising drug offenses of juveniles in light of the stabilization and even decrease of other juvenile offenses, extensive research has been conducted, and pilot programs implemented in states throughout the United States. One idea which has shown theoretical promise is using JDC (juvenile drug courts) which are designed to provide “wrap-around” services intended to reach the core of the problem and reduce the criminal behavior and recurring behaviors involved in substance abuse. Prior to this investigation scientific analytic results had been considered too few to be of use. The purpose of this study is to examine the outcomes in one of the first juvenile drug courts in Kentucky which was begun in 2003. The JDC is located in the city of Lexington in Fayette County Kentucky. The results of the success of the program were favorable, however, the pall of a lack of funding hung over the program at the time of the study.

The study of juvenile court drug programs

In 2007, there were 10 % of juveniles that were represented because of drug crimes. The juvenile court has reported that 11% of the cases were reported as drug affiliate cases. There were previous studies that may show the direct relation between criminal behavior and drug crimes. Drug arrest has increase in adults; a harsh approach toward the adult criminal justice system has great success for drug offenders. Juvenile drug courts are form after the adult drug courts.

It is obvious that that juvenile’s drug offender need a more stable and guarded process to lessen their offenses.

It became obvious in the early years of increased juvenile drug offenses that juvenile drug offenders required a more stable, directed and protect process if decrease of offenses was going to be successful for offenders, and the idea of the drug court was a good one. The drug court utilizes an idea called wrap-around services which had previously been so successful with reducing the recidivism of adults. This study of the JDC in Lexington, Kentucky was undertaken to examine the outcomes of the implementation of the adaptations of the wrap-around procedures and services to see if the new model was succeeding. These adaptations stemmed from an in depth theoretical perspective application to basically understand why children do what they do with hopes of applying these theories to the JDC.

Without attempting to answer the question of why children act the way they do, the question that the study hoped to answer was can a web of conventional social norms be woven to help prevent the behaviors (social interaction theory) or provide a base of norms which children can choose to conform to (social control theory). These conventional social norms that were applied to the JDC were based on the comprehensive wrap-around service idea of criminal activity reduction.

Overall, JDCs have been created countrywide since offenses for drug abuse have risen while other offenses for juveniles have either leveled out or decreased over the past ten years. This problem was the reason the courts were established and the reason for this study was to provide evidence as to the success or failure of the programs.

Study Design

The research design used for this study was a “pre-experimental, post-test only” design. Pre-experimental designs generally refer to one group analysis, with both pre and post-test design (PPA 696 Research Methods, n.d.). However, this study was strictly post-test design. The pre-experimental design was chosen based on the data available from the Administrative Office of the Courts, and was chosen since it is concerned with answering “how” questions (how many, how much, etc.). The data was collected between March 2005 and June 2010. The population was all JDC participants therefore there were no samples needed.

Identify an operational definition used by the researchers.

One operational definition used was to define the primary goal. The primary goal of the program was defined to “decrease recidivism in criminal offending and use of illegal substances among” the participants of the JDC.

Provide one example of inductive logic and one example of deductive logic presented in the results.

Unfortunately the JDC in Kentucky was not continued after 2010. We may consider it to be an example of deductive reasoning that if the results of this study which show program savings compared to traditional criminal justice system approaches were shown to the legislature, it would sway the policymakers and the program would be funded in the future.

Since the results showed that recidivism had been decreased, it was inductively implied that the program was the cause of the success. This use of inductive logic is erroneous and the researcher mentions that the findings may be limited by the implication.

Identify whether the research study is a quantitative or qualitative design. Explain your answer.

This study was quantitative in its scope since the results were generalized from data collected from a population, and had nothing to do with understanding the underlying causes, motivations or reasons for the problem. This may be true, but was not proven by the results. The study may have generated some speculation that the program was a solution to recidivism for juvenile drug offenders, but it was entirely statistical in its results.

Identify the methodology, population, sampling methods, and return rate, if applicable.

The population was all the drug offenders in the juvenile justice system over a period of almost five years. Because the data from every participant was used, there was no sampling since the population was used. The data was gathered from official sources of the Administrative Office of the Courts in Lexington, Kentucky (Fayette County).

What were the findings of the study?

Overall, while the program was successful for 45 out of 117 participants. This is considered to be a success since it shows that a program can be used to achieve positive results for juvenile offenders. In addition, the primary objective of decreasing recidivism for criminal offending and use of illegal substances was effective. One surprising result was that during the study period only female participants encountered any new convictions, substantiating the reports that female delinquency is on the rise (Hayden, p. 16).

The author implies that the successes achieved in this study were due to the “intense supervision and wrap-around services provided”, and the results achieved demonstrate that successful programs do exist.

Describe the author’s conclusions and recommendations.

While the researcher concludes that the primary objective was gained, he also felt compelled to mention that this study was not rigorous. He thought that the comparison should be one treatment compared to another. That, of course would not have been possible since all offenders were participants in the same program. He adds that the conclusions might be too general, and indicates that the data was inconsistent and incomplete, but that he had no choice since he was required to use the data provided by the AOC.

Although he deducts that this study and this program would be useful in showing savings to the tax-payer, he admits that there were no cost benefits examined. It was nice to see his conclusion that those involved at the practical level should “celebrate” the successes of the juvenile drug court and to leave an admonition that policymakers should “take a look at public policy and funding priorities”. This made the analyst a little more human.

In your opinion, could the study have been done differently or improved? Detail your response.

This study could have been done in cooperation with other programs in other counties or states. This would certainly increase the amount of data for analysis. It is silly to think that adolescents in Kentucky who are drug abusers are much different from adolescents elsewhere. This would have made a much more powerful study. Unfortunately this kind of inter agency cooperation is not usually funded or defined.

Investigations of specific interventions could have been used to determine cause or relationship. Using the “programs” as an umbrella for interventions leaves out the possibility that some work better than others.

Again, to make the study more powerful would be to show the financial gains that this program would bring. Discussing criminal justice theory is not as effective as showing how one approach will not only help the adolescent offender, but save the government funds.

Conclusion Since the creation of the part of juvenile court which handles offenders was created, it has been a suspicion that rehabilitation of children is not identical to that of adults. The removal of young offenders from the adult population was a giant step in providing the authorities a broad opportunity to prevent recidivism by given the adolescents another role model to emulate. The analysis of the success of the wrap-around services for adolescent offenders has not been studied properly or at great length. Not all states provide alternative programs to prevent recidivism, and those that do are woefully under-funded or cut due to budget considerations.

References

Hayden, Arthur, Evaluation of the Lexington (Fayette County) Kentucky Juvenile Drug Court Program, Internet Journal of Criminology, ISSN 2045-6743 (online) (2012). Retrieved August 2012 from http://www.internetjournalofcriminology.com/Hayden_Evaluation_of_Fayette_County_Kentucky_Juvenile_Drug_Court_Program_IJC_May_2012.pdf

PPA 696 Research Methods, (n.d.). Retrieved August 2012 from http://www.csulb.edu/~msaintg/ppa696/696preex.htm