Bushway & Piehl (2001)
What is the result of the decision of multiple actors in a system?
Sentencing outcome
Judges and juries have to decide the length of a defendant’s prison term based on what?
Uncertain and partially contradictory evidence
What is the second role of risk assessment in sentencing?
Role 2: To inform decisions regarding the supervised release of lower-risk offenders.
In our textbook, Spohn states that "Unlike the death penalty, which can be imposed only for first-degree murder and a handful of other offenses, a jail or prison sentence is an option in most criminal cases." In most jurisdictions, sentences of one (1) year or more are served where?
State prison
In May 1983, which state voted to apply sentencing guidelines statewide and what courts did these guidelines apply to?
Maryland & Circuit courts
In the legal domain, several rules and prescriptions exist to minimize irrelevant influences on decision making. What defines the set of criteria that needs to be met before a given deed qualifies as a crime?
The penal code
What risk factors in recidivism are considered unchangeable?
Fixed marker example: gender
Variable marker: age
What is a primary alternative to incarceration that releases an offender back out into the community and imposes a set of conditions that must be abided by?
Probation
Guidelines providing a minimum and a maximum that allow for a judge to select a sentence within that range are called what?
Use of judicial discretion
According to Englich et. al (2002), negative information receives more attention and seems to obtain priority in processing. What is the cause of this?
Negative words are detected more easily than positive words (Dijksterhuis & Aarts, 2003)
Monahan & Skeem (2016) state that “Political advocates who agree on little else have coalesced in proposing that the way to unwind mass incarceration in America without jeopardizing the country’s historically low crime rate” is to do what?
Make risk assessment much more prominent in sentencing criminal offenders
In Study #2 of Englich et. al (2002), what type of offender was the participants asked to determine a sentence for?
A woman who had shoplifted items from a grocery store for the 12th time
According to Bushway & Piehl, there are six studies of judicial departures in sentencing outcomes in guideline jurisdictions. What do five of these studies show?
Evidence for racial discrimination by the judges
Englich et. al (2002) found that “actual bail decisions were found to depend on” what?
Whether the prosecution requested conditional bail or opposed bail (Dhami, 2003)
Risk Assessment in Federal Sentencing:
Prison staff would assess each prisoner upon admission to develop a case plan for risk reduction or - for low-risk offenders - for productive activity (e.g., prison jobs). Inmates who successfully comply with their case plan would earn up to __% reduction in their prison term, while low-and-moderate-risk offenders would be eligible for having up to __% of their prison term spent in home confinement. What are the two percentages?
33% & 10%
What must occur during court trial in order to reach sentencing?
A conviction
Theorists Ulmer (2000) and Kramer and Ulmer (1996) argue that legal factors such as criminal history and crime severity are used informally by judges as a way of doing what?
Assessing blameworthiness and protecting the community
In Study #1 of the Englich et al article, participants were approached by what person and regarding what information?
They received a phone call from a journalist questioning sentencing guidelines
According to Monahan & Skeem (2016), there are four (4) persistent problems of risk assessment in sentencing. Name two of them.
Problem 1: Conflating Risk and Blame is a Category Error
Problem 2: The Virtual Impossibility of Making Individual Inferences from Group Data is a Canard
Problem 3: Reducing Risk is More Difficult than Assessing Risk Among Adult Offenders
Problem 4: Disparities Potentially Associated with the Use of Risk Assessment in Sentencing are a Significant Concern
According to Monahan & Skeem (2016), what are the three theories of sentencing?
1. Retributive theory (just deserts)
2. Utilitarian theory (crime control)
3. Hybrid theory (limiting retributivism)