By David Bewley-Taylor,  Matthew Wall, Jack Tudor, and Alison Ritter 

Background

The Global Drug Policy Index (GDPI) is an instrument that attempts to comparatively evaluate national drug policies at a global scale. This paper assesses the validity and reliability of this new Index, speaking to the wider question of whether such a comparative evaluation can be achieved in a methodologically robust manner.

Method

We review the validity of the Index through analysis of the conceptual logic of the GDPI. Construct validity is assessed using Cronbach’s alpha statistics alongside exploratory factor analysis (EFA). The reliability of the Index is assessed using uncertainty analysis where we systematically analyse how Index rankings vary across simulations with randomly perturbed weighting schemes. In addition, we explore the reliability of experts’ assessment of policy implementation, reporting on a common vignette undertaken by all country-expert evaluators.

Results

The analysis of conceptual validity is a reproduction of the logic supporting the contention that the project’s underpinning normative document (a report produced by the UN system coordination Task Team on the Implementation of the UN System Common Position on drug-related matters) represents a solid starting point of what will be a sustained, iterative research process to develop a valid conceptual and operational basis for comparative evaluation of national drug policies. The empirical analysis of construct validity reveals that operationalising the Common Position creates a set of variables with a coherent multidimensional structure that is amenable to aggregation into an overall index. While the performance of states under simulations of different weighting schemes was highly consistent, country expert evaluation in developing state codes on policy implementation can be inconsistent, even when they are provided with a common description designed to capture variance on their rating scale. Cronbach’s alpha indicates that the variables encompassed by the GDPI measure a coherent construct, while EFA results provide support for three of the a priori dimensions used in the creation of the Index.

Conclusions

We conclude that the GDPI project demonstrates that robust comparative evaluation of drug policy at a global scale is possible. However, we also reveal that this project will necessarily be subject to continuous refinement – especially when it comes to standardising expert country evaluations. We outline practical challenges and suggestions for future work in this direction.

International Journal of Drug Policy Volume 143, September 2025

By The Office of the General Counsel, United States Sentencing Commission - USSC

The Commission’s legal staff publishes this document to assist in understanding and applying the sentencing guidelines. The information in this document should not be considered definitive or comprehensive. In addition, the information in this document does not necessarily represent the official position of the Commission on any particular issue or case, and it is not binding on the Commission, the courts, or the parties in any case. To the extent this document includes unpublished cases, practitioners should be cognizant of Fed. R. App. P. 32.1, as well as any corresponding rules in their jurisdictions.  

Washington, DC: USSC, 2025. 65p.

By Sarah Anegg, Daniela Doerfler, Wolfgang Bicker, Serena Paola Gonzalez Barias, Florian Heinzl, Jakob Schwazer, Sabine Eder, Ksenia Krögler-Halpern, Christine Sam, and Karin Windsperger 

Drug-Facilitated Crimes (DFCs) involve criminal offenses where the victim's intoxicated state plays a central role. The substances used, often central nervous system depressants, are challenging to detect, leading to a high rate of undiagnosed cases. As a result, DFCs remain a form of violence that is weakly characterized. This cross-sectional study analyzed 1104 violence-related cases presented to the Children and Victim Protection Center (CAVPC) at a tertiary hospital. Of these, 12.2 % were suspected to be DFCs between 2014 and 2019, while 38.5 % were suspected to be DFCs between 2020 and 2023 (p < 0.001). This suggests a 544 % increase in the volume of DFC-related cases between the two time periods. Victims were predominantly female (86.4 %) and aged 20–30 years, though a concurrent rise in male victims, from 3.5 % in 2014–2019–15.1 % in 2020–2023 was also observed (p = 0.01). Perpetrators were primarily male (96.2 %), acted alone, and were known to the victim in 51.9 % of the cases. The crimes, which predominantly occurred in private settings between 2014 and 2019, increasingly took place in public spaces between 2020 and 2023 (p = 0.01), where alcohol was present, and peaked on weekends (especially Saturdays) and during late-night and early-morning hours. Most victims exhibited signs of amnesia (91.8 %) and physical injuries (58.4 %). Alarmingly, only 38.5 % of victims sought help within 12 h, significantly reducing the chances of detecting certain substances. Cannabinoids, cocaine, diphenhydramine, paracetamol and lidocaine were the most commonly identified substances in blood and urine. These findings highlight the urgent need for action, including implementing preventive measures, raising awareness, and reducing stigma – an approach that could help address the growing global public health concern of DFCs.

Forensic Science International Volume 374, September 2025, 112552

By Kristin Finklea

In policy discussions around drug trafficking and elevated overdose deaths related to illicit opioids and other drugs, some observers have looked to the tools border officials have in place to help detect and stop the flow of illicit drugs into the United States. More specifically, attention has turned to the use of nonintrusive inspection (NII) equipment to scan commercial and private vehicles crossing into the country for illicit drugs and other contraband.  
Congressional Research Service; September 2025. 3p.

By Rebecca Gambler  

DHS is responsible for securing the nation’s borders against the trafficking of drugs. This includes illicit fentanyl, which continues to be the primary cause of overdose deaths in the U.S. The James M. Inhofe National Defense Authorization Act for FY 2023 requires DHS to, among other things, establish a program to collect data and develop measures to assess the effectiveness of efforts to detect and deter illicit fentanyl, including its analogues and precursor chemicals, from being trafficked into the U.S. The Act includes a provision for GAO to review the data collected and measures developed by DHS’s program. This report examines (1) DHS data on seizures of illicit fentanyl, its precursor chemicals, and production equipment from FY 2021 through 2024; (2) DHS efforts to combat the trafficking of these items into the U.S.; and (3) the extent DHS has assessed the effectiveness of its efforts. GAO analyzed DHS, CBP, and HSI documents and data on fentanyl-related seizures and investigations for FY 2021 through 2024. GAO also interviewed DHS, CBP, and HSI officials, including CBP and HSI field officials during visits to four locations. What GAO Recommends GAO recommends that DHS (1) establish a statutorily required program to collect data and develop measures to assess efforts to combat fentanyl trafficking into the U.S., (2) ensure the entity it tasks with establishing the program has access to needed information, and (3) develop performance goals and measures for its strategic goals. DHS concurred with the recommendations.  

Washington, DC: United States Government Accountability Office  - GAO, 2025. 58p.

By Sunita Patel

During the tenure of President Barack Obama, scholars and advocates viewed the best route for federal court review of police practices to be consent decrees negotiated between municipal police departments and the Special Litigation Section in the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice (DOJ) pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 14141.1 DOJ fact-finding reports and settlements, like the one in Ferguson, Missouri, exposed egregious practices and sought a culture shift by decrees in police departments across the country. The DOJ Process sometimes also bolstered mobilization to achieve police reform already underway outside the court. Today, the current Administration has taken an official position against using 28 U.S.C. § 14141 authority in favor of potentially unconstitutional exercises of police discretion. Although the federal executive branch is no longer a driving force behind police reform litigation, the institution of policing is no less harmful to Black and Brown communities. Thus, the questions motivating this Article are: “What can legal advocates do now? How can communities and their lawyers mobilize within the legal process?” Without the DOJ’s involvement, injured communities interested in court intervention may turn to section 1983 impact litigation, and what legal scholarship terms public law, public interest, or structural reform litigation. Rather than seek monetary damages against particular officers for abusive conduct against individual plaintiffs, structural reform litigation seeks redress from police departments and municipalities for their law enforcement practices and policies. Its goal is to achieve an injunction against, or change in the policies or practices of, a governmental entity. These are cases typically brought as class actions. Legal scholars have pointed to conservative judicial appointments and Supreme Court doctrine as causes for the shrinking of liberal structural reform litigation. Scholars’ views range from “[t]he courthouse door is closed,” to “procedure and doctrine make it really difficult to obtain substantive review of civil rights and constitutional harms”.

104 Minnesota Law Review 2257 (2020), 

By Sunita Patel

Scholars and activists are urging a move away from policing and towards more care-based approaches to social problems and public safety. These debates contest the conventional wisdom about the role and scope of policing and call for shifting resources to systems of care, including medical, mental health, and social work. While scholars and activists in favor of reducing society’s reliance on police recognize the co-constitutive relationship between policing and care work, they have not sufficiently grappled with the explicit overlapping mechanisms of carcerality. Surveillance and criminal enforcement permeate medical centers delivering care to low-income patients. Using numerous government records related to the U.S. Veterans Affairs Police Force (VAPF), this Article describes how the VAPF criminalizes low-income and sometimes Black or Latinx veterans with disabilities stemming from U.S military service. These populations are among the most medically vulnerable populations in the United States. It argues that care workers and health institutions become dependent on police to address harm and safety, and proposes alternatives grounded in anticarceral care to reduce reliance on police. In doing so, this Article shows just how difficult it will be to remove police from institutions because it requires rethinking care, not only policing. At the same time, this thick descriptive account provides a guide for how to reduce society’s reliance on police in institutional contexts. This Article assesses the multiple intersections between U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) healthcare and embedded policing as a metaphorical healthcare policing web. Part I maps the process of assimilating policing into the VA, providing a primer on the agency and its patients. It explains the convergence of order maintenance, disability management, and workplace safety regulations that built the embedded policing infrastructure in place today. Part II explains how police influence clinical decisions and the care environment through Disruptive Behavior Committees, criminal enforcement, and workplace threat assessments, thereby altering the institutional culture. Part III draws lessons from the VA and proposes a list of potential solutions, adopting an abolitionist ethic for decoupling care from policing and embedded police from institutions

UCLA Law Review, Vol. 69, 2022,

By Sunita Patel

Policing has become a permanent fixture within other institutions and occurs in more ways and places than are often recognized. For race-class subjugated communities, this means policing has inserted itself into every facet of life, from education and health care to mass transit and housing. Police serve as instruments of control in many spaces and connect the bureaucratic management of safety inside formal institutions of care, learning, and public services. Police connect these safety services to ordinary street policing and wellness checks in the home.This Article provides a framework for analyzing policing within institutional settings. I examine K–12 schools, emergency departments, mass transit, veterans health care, public housing, and universities and colleges. This Article describes six features of transinstitutional policing. The first three — red flagging, street policing, and wellness checks — show how policing the public relies upon police presence within formal institutions. The second three — networked information, bureaucratic conflict and cooperation, and vulnerable privacy — tie surveillance of the public to transinstitutional policing. This framework highlights the susceptibility of institutions to the logics of policing and the ways policing undermines noncarceral and socially valuable institutional goals. This Article frames an emerging literature as a transinstitutional approach of studying policing across and between multiple institutional domains. Examining policing through a transinstitutional lens offers a deeper understanding of the corrosive influence of policing on spaces of learning, care, and public services. The punitive and carceral aspects of these settings become amplified and more visible when the institution of policing takes hold. The features analyzed here have made it easy for police leaders and bureaucratic administrators of these institutions to resist police reform, even though the locations I study are places where advocates and institutional clientele contest policing and broader carceral control. Part I provides a continuum of embedded policing and explains why I focused on these particular institutions. Parts II and III provide the six-feature framework. Part IV offers an analysis of how we got here and draws out lessons learned to further understand transinstitutional policing.

By Aya Gruber  

Sex crimes are the worst crimes. People generally believe that sexual assault is graver than nonsexual assault, uninvited sexual compliments are worse than nonsexual insults, and sex work is different from work. Criminal codes typically create a dedicated category for sex offenses, uniting under its umbrella conduct ranging from violent attacks to consensual commercial transactions. This exceptionalist treatment of sex as categorically different rarely elicits discussion, much less debate. Sex exceptionalism, however, is neither natural nor neutral, and its political history should give us pause. This Article is the first to trace, catalog, and analyze sex exceptionalism in criminal law in the United States. Through a genealogical examination of sex-crime law from the late eighteenth century to today, it makes several novel contributions to the debate over how criminal law should regulate sex. First, this Article casts doubt on the conventional account that rape law’s history is solely one of sexist tolerance, an account that undergirds contemporary calls for broader criminal regulations and higher sentences. In fact, early law established rape as the most heinous crime and a fate worse than death, but it did so to preserve female chastity, marital morality, and racial supremacy. Sex-crime laws were not uniformly underenforced but rather selectively enforced—a tool used to entrench hierarchies and further oppressive regimes from slavery to social purity. Second, this Article employs this history to suggest that it is past time to critically examine whether sex crimes should be exceptional. Indeed, in the 1960s and 1970s, the enlightened liberal position was that rape law should be less exceptional and harmonized with the law governing “ordinary” assault 

Stanford Law Review, Vol. 75, 2023

By Erica Zunkel and Alison Siegler

While state drug law reform is moving apace, federal drug law reform has moved much more slowly. Many, including the Judicial Conference of the United States and the United States Sentencing Commission, have urged Congress to enact substantive federal drug law reform for years. But Congress has not acted. As a result, the federal system continues to single out drug offenses for harsh treatment at the bail stage and the sentencing stage—the front end and back end of the federal mass incarceration crisis. In this paper, we argue that federal judges have a critical role to play in future federal drug law reform in light of Congress’ long-standing failures to meaningfully change the laws. At the front end, judges should encourage the release of more people on bail by closely scrutinizing prosecutors’ motions for temporary detention and giving little weight to the Bail Reform Act’s presumption of detention. Data shows that the statutory drug presumption is overbroad and does a poor job of determining who is a risk of flight or a danger to the community. At the back end, judges should issue categorical policy disagreements with the drug sentencing guidelines and the career offender sentencing guideline using the Supreme Court’s blueprint in Kimbrough v. United States. Judges should issue sentences below these guidelines because they are not based on empirical evidence, over-punish drug offenses, and result in racial disparities. At both ends, judges should rest their decisions on the evidence that the drug presumption, the drug sentencing guidelines, and the career offender sentencing guideline are flawed. While judicial action is not a cure for Congressional inaction, it would send a clear message from one co-equal branch of government to another that substantive reform is urgently needed 

By Alison Siegler & William Admussen 

For decades, it was virtually impossible for a criminal defendant to challenge racial discrimination by the police or prosecutors. This was because in United States v. Armstrong, 517 U.S. 456 (1996), the Supreme Court set an insurmountable standard for obtaining discovery in support of a selective prosecution claim. Equating the roles of prosecutors and law enforcement officers, lower courts applied this same standard to claims alleging racial discrimination by the police. This high standard led courts to deny discovery and stifle potentially meritorious claims. Recently, criminal defendants have initiated a wave of challenges to “fake stash house” operations, in which federal law enforcement agencies like the ATF and the DEA approach people—overwhelmingly people of color—and induce them to rob a nonexistent drug stash house. Defense attorneys have argued that these practices constitute racially selective law enforcement and that Armstrong’s strict standard should not apply to the police. Three federal courts of appeals responded by recognizing that the differences between prosecutors and law enforcement officers merit lowering the discovery standard for defendants alleging racial discrimination by the police. This Article is the first to describe and defend this important development in equal protection jurisprudence. We argue that other courts should similarly craft a lower discovery standard.

Recognizing that federal courts hear only a fraction of race discrimination claims, this Article embraces the spirit of federalism and proposes an innovative state-level solution: a state court rule lowering the insuperable discovery standard to which most states still cling. This Article draws on a recent Washington state court rule aimed at preventing racial discrimination in jury selection to propose that state courts adopt a similar rule setting a new discovery standard for racially selective law enforcement claims. Such a rule would ensure that state-level equal protection claims are not blocked at the discovery stage, thus enabling courts to adjudicate those claims on the merits.

115 Northwestern University Law Review 987 (2021)

By David Olson, Don Stemen, and Patrick Griffin

Illinois is a mostly urban state. It’s also, of course, a mostly rural state—it all depends on what you’re counting.

Our statewide evaluation of the Pretrial Fairness Act (PFA) attempts to capture and document the law’s implementation and impact across Illinois. Of course, the changes the law brings, abolishing cash bail and imposing broad new restrictions on pretrial detention, are being implemented at the county level, and as evaluators we recognize that every individual county is unique. But if we’re going to provide a comprehensive and accurate picture of the way the new law is working throughout Illinois, we have to find efficient ways to combine counties for purposes of analysis. One useful way is to group them broadly into 20 urban counties—mostly clustered into the upper right-hand corner of the map but distributed here and there across Illinois—and 82 rural counties that encompass most of the state’s geographic area. Both are “Illinois.” Both need to be taken into account.Because so much of criminal justice case volume is generated in Illinois’ urban areas, where close to 90% of the population resides, state-level statistics necessarily describe urban, not rural realities. 

For some purposes, statewide “grand totals” are useful. But relying solely on them to assess the impact of the PFA in Illinois means overlooking or distorting what isgoing in mostof the state’s courthouses, jails and communities. That’s why real understanding of the law’s effects requires that we recognize and document county-level variations—and particularly the ways that individual rural counties’ PFA experiences may differ, both from one another and from typical urban experiences.

This research brief, exploring rural/urban differences in PFA implementation and impact so far, summarizes and expands on a presentation by the Center for Criminal Justice at the American Society of Criminology Annual Conference in November 2024. It is based primarily on information from three sources:

• Data provided by the newly launched Office of Statewide Pretrial Services (OSPS), concerning pretrial case-handling, assessment, and outcomes in the 78 counties (6 urban and 72 rural) in which the agency operates. (Note that the urban county data we analyzed did not include Cook County, which is not served by OSPS. We will be issuing a separate report in 2025 describing what we're learning about Cook County's experience with the PFA.)

• Jail population data from jails across the state, as reported to the Jail and Detention Standards Unit of the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC).

• Insights gleaned from 21 confidential interviews conducted with judges, prosecutors, defenders, and other criminal justice stakeholders in a range of rural counties, both before and after the PFA took effect statewide.

Chicago: Loyola University at Chicago, Center for Criminal Justice, 2024. 13p.

By David Olsen, Patrick Griffin, Lucy Einstein, Molly Halladay-Glynn, and Bella Lira ·

During the early 1990s, violent crime in the United States reached its highest levels since the Federal Bureau of Investigation started keeping records.

One significant policy response at the federal level was the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994—popularly known as the “1994 Crime Bill”—which expanded funding for law enforcement, stiffened federal penalties for violent crimes, banned assault weapons, and made a host of other changes aimed at addressing and reducing violence. One of the most consequential components of the Crime Bill established the Violent Offender Incarceration and Truth-in-Sentencing (VOI/TIS) Incentive Formula Grants Program, which not only provided massive federal funding for new and expanded state prison construction, but set aside much of it for states that toughened up and reformed their criminal sentencing laws by adopting “Truth in Sentencing.”

Truth in Sentencing (TIS) laws mandate that those sentenced to prison for certain serious crimes actually remain imprisoned for all or a substantial portion of the court-specified sentence, no matter what early release or “good time credit” mechanisms might otherwise be employed to promote good discipline and encourage rehabilitative efforts in prison.

Illinois was one of many states that responded to the new federal funding incentives set up by the Crime Bill, enacting TIS legislation and eventually receiving a total of $124 million through the VOI/TIS grant program from 1996 through 2001.  Illinois’ original TIS scheme required that 100% of a court-imposed sentence be served following conviction for First Degree Murder, 85% for a range of other serious offenses, and 85% for specified offenses when they result in great bodily harm. TIS in Illinois was expanded to cover other offenses in 2005, 2007, and 2010.

The Legacy of Truth-In-Sentencing in Illinois

The dramatic wave of violent crime that prompted the original 1994 Crime Bill receded long ago, but the effects of the incentives created by the Crime Bill remain to this day. Many of these lasting effects were documented in a 2009 Loyola University analysis of the first ten years of Truth in Sentencing, which found among other things that TIS had greatly increased the time required to be served in prison under court-imposed sentences but did not have any significant influence on the extent and nature of disciplinary incidents in Illinois’ prisons. In fact, people subject to TIS had patterns of disciplinary infractions similar to those not subject to TIS. 

Now a new study conducted by the Center for Criminal Justice at Loyola, analyzing Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) data through December 31, 2024, updates and expands on the 2009 report, illuminating the ways that a quarter of a century of TIS has profoundly shaped the current population of Illinois prisons.

Chicago: Loyola University, Center for Criminal Justice, 2025. 11p,

By Paul Cassell and Richard Fuwles

Cassell, Paul and Fowles, Richard, "Does Bail Reform Increase Crime? An Empirical Assessment of the Public Safety Implications of Bail Reform in Cook County, Illinois" (2020). 

Recently bail reform issues have been in the news across the country, as concerns about fair treatment of defendants and possible public safety risks from expanding pretrial release have collided. These issues involve important empirical questions, including whether releasing more defendants before trial leads to additional crimes. An opportunity to investigate this public safety issue has developed in Chicago, our nation’s third largest city. There, the Office of the Chief Judge of the Cook County Courts adopted new bail reform measures in September 2017 and reviewed them empirically in May 2019. Cook County’s Bail Reform Study concluded that the new procedures had released many more defendants before trial without any concomitant increase in crime. This article disputes the Study’s conclusions. This article explains that, contrary to the Study’s assertions, the new changes to pretrial release procedures appear to have led to a substantial increase in crimes committed by pretrial releasees in Cook County. Properly measured and estimated, after more generous release procedures were put in place, the number of released defendants charged with committing new crimes increased by 45%. And, more concerning, the number of pretrial releasees charged with committing new violent crimes increased by an estimated 33%. In addition, as reported by the Chicago Tribune, the Study’s data appears to undercount the number of releasees charged with new violent crimes; and a substantial number of aggravated domestic violence prosecutions prosecutors dropped after the changes, presumably because batterers were able to more frequently obtain release and intimidate their victims into not pursuing charges. These public safety concerns call into question whether the bail “reform” measures implemented in Cook County were cost-beneficial. And because Cook County’s procedures are state-of-the-art and track those being implemented in many parts of the country, Cook County’s experience suggests that other jurisdictions may similarly be suffering increases in crime due to bail reform.

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship. 2929,

By Dennis D. Hirsch,  Jared Ott, Angie Westover-Munoz, and Chris Yaluma

Federal and state criminal justice systems use algorithmic risk assessment tools extensively. Much of the existing scholarship on this topic engages in normative and technical analyses of these tools, or seeks to identify best practices for tool design and use. Far less work has been done on how courts and other criminal justice actors perceive and utilize these tools on the ground. This is an important gap. Judges’ and other criminal justice actors’ attitudes towards, and implementation of, algorithmic risk assessment tools profoundly affect how these tools impact defendants, incarceration rates, and the broader criminal justice system. Those who would understand, and potentially seek to improve, the courts’ use of these tools would benefit from more information on how judges actually think about and employ them. This article begins to fill in this picture. The authors surveyed Ohio Courts of Common Pleas judges and staff, and interviewed judges and other key stakeholders, to learn how they view and use algorithmic risk assessment tools. The article describes how Ohio Common Pleas Courts implement algorithmic risk assessment tools and how judges view and utilize the tools and the risk scores they generate. It then compares Ohio practice in this area to the best practices identified in the literature and, on this basis, recommends how the Ohio Courts of Common Pleas—and, by implication, other state and federal court systems—can better align their use of algorithmic risk assessment tools with core criminal justice values.

Legal Studies Research Paper No. 939, 2925

By Robert French

This Report to the Government of South Australia follows a legal examination to determine whether the State of South Australia could legislate a ban on access to social media services by children who have not attained the age of 14 and to restrict access to social media services by children between the ages of 14 and 16 by requiring parental consent to their access. The Report also considers a legislative model for achieving that end.

The examiner considered:

• How South Australia can achieve the objective of social media prohibition for children within Australia’s constitutional framework.

• The existing legislative and regulatory landscape in South Australia including effectiveness of current legislative and regulatory levers for limiting access to social media for children.

• Opportunities for legislative or regulatory reform in South Australia to prevent access to social media accounts for children under 14 and require parental consent for children aged 14 and 15.

• How actions taken in South Australia to limit social media access for children could be effectively enforced.

• How existing technology to limit access to social media such as ‘age assurance’ mechanisms could be utilised to complement legislative and/or regulatory change.

The report concludes whatever regime is established by the South Australian Government, it will not be perfect. Effecting compliance across the industry will be challenging. The legislation would apply to existing as well as prospective users of social media services. There will undoubtedly be workarounds by knowledgeable child users. However, the perfect should not be the enemy of the good. One non-legal beneficial effect of the law may be to arm parents with the proposition that it is the law not them that restricts access to social media for children in South Australia.

Adelaide: Government of South Australia, 2024  277p.

By Debra Parkes

The nearly three decades in which Beverley McLachlin was a member of the Supreme Court, including 18 as Chief Justice, witnessed a number of shifts in Canadian penal policy and in the reach and impact of criminal law. During the Harper decade (2006 to 2015) in which the federal Conservatives enjoyed a majority government led by Prime Minister Stephen Harper, criminal justice policy took a turn toward the punitive. The federal government tore a page out of the American legislative handbook and sought to “govern through crime”,1 albeit in a more restrained Canadian style.2 Criminologists Anthony Doob and Cheryl Webster have posited that pre-Harper, Canadian criminal justice policy was grounded in four pillars that enjoyed support across party lines. These pillars were that social conditions matter; that harsh punishments do not reduce crime; that the development of criminal justice policies should be informed by expert knowledge; and that changes in the criminal law should address real problems.3 These principles were cast aside, Doob and Webster argue, beginning at least in 2006 with the passage of numerous crime bills that, to name just a few, created new crimes with enhanced penalties;4 proliferated mandatory

Allard School of Law, Allard Research Commons Allard Research Commons, Faculty Publications Allard Faculty Publications, 2019, 19p.

By Kay L. Levine and Volkan Topalli

In The Process is the Punishment, Malcolm Feeley exposed the lower criminal court as a powerful institution in American life, an important counterpart to both the more glamorous federal courts and the more highly charged superior courts that preside over serious crimes within a jurisdiction. Although it typically handles only low-level criminal charges, the lower criminal court’s reach is both broad and deep; in its functioning and process it has the capacity to change the lives of many who come before it – sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse – irrespective of guilt or innocence, conviction or dismissal.

Cambridge University Press, on 22 Oct 2020, 17p.

By Christopher L. Ringwalt, 1 Dorothy C. Browne, 1 Lee B. Rosenbioomfl Gloria Ann Evans, 3 and Jonathan B. Kotch 1

This study explores the relationship between mothers" approval of corporal punishment and the degree to which they themselves were subjected to vio- lence as children. Considered as additional contributing factors are: (1) whether the mothers as children were punished by their own parents, (2) whether they perceived such punishment as unfair, and (3) the degree of parental nurture they experienced as children. The sample consisted of 330 new mothers whose mother and father both lived in the home when they were 14 years of age. Respondents were interviewed at home one to two months following their infants" discharge from the hospital. After control- ling for race and income, no relationship was found between approval of cor- poral punishment and the violence to which mothers were subjected as children. However, significant associations were found between such approval and: (1) whether mothers were punished by their parents, and (2) maternal (but not paternal) nurture. Perceptions that parental punishment was unfair failed to contribute to such approval. Altogether, parental factors in mothers" childhoods, excluding race and income, accounted for 8.9~o of the variance in approval of corporal punishment.

Journal of Family Violence, VoL 4, No. 4, 1989, 13p.

By K. Drybread

A six- year- old girl came home from a neighbor’s house with blood in her underpants. Her mother, frantic, demanded to know how it had gotten there. “Who did this to you?” she asked. The girl responded, “I don’t know.” Her mother screamed the question again and again; the girl’s answer remained the same. The mother tried a new question, “What did he look like?” Her daughter’s reply was still, “I don’t know.” After posing the new q

UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO BOULDER user on 27 January 2020, 21p.