Criminal Legal Contact Among Youths Aging Out of Care - CANCELLED

• In Event: Vulnerability and Punishment

Abstract

Research suggests that children placed in foster care who “age out” of care – i.e., remain in care until they reach the age of majority without a permanent family placement - have high rates of criminal legal contact as adults. However, little is known about how the risk of criminal legal engagement varies within the population of children who age out of care. This is an important oversight because children’s trajectories in foster care vary widely in terms of their timing, duration, placement type, reasons for removal from their families, and type of exit from foster care. To address this gap in the literature, this paper draws on the National Youth in Transition Database (NYTD), a longitudinal dataset following youths who age out of foster care (via emancipation, reunification with their families, and other), and the foster care histories (AFCARS) and child protective histories (NCANDS) of these children from National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS). This paper contributes to the literature on the life trajectories and outcomes of children who age out of foster care by identifying the characteristics of children’s child welfare trajectories that are associated with different risks of criminal legal contact.

Authors

• Daniela Kaiser, University of California, Irvine

• Colleen Janczewsk, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

• Joshua Mersky, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee