Poster #44 - The Role of Procedural Justice on Re-Offending Within a Diverse Sample of Juvenile Offenders

• In Event: Poster Session 07

Abstract

Research on adults shows that negative attitudes toward law enforcement are associated with greater offending (Tyler, 1990). Studies of procedural justice (PJ) and legitimacy among adolescents have produced mixed results – some supporting and others failing to show support for the importance of these two constructs (Bolgers & Walter, 2019; Augustyn, 2015). We examined the factor structure of PJ and legitimacy variables to identify the factors that predict re-offending among serious juvenile offenders. And given the mounting evidence on structural racism within law enforcement and the paucity of studies on racial/ethnic differences in the effects of perceived procedural justice, we also examined race/ethnic differences in PJ through the lens of Critical Race Theory.

Participants (1,114 male offenders, Mage=16.54; 44% Black, 36% Latino, 20% White) were interviewed every six months for 36 months, followed by four yearly assessments. Analyses controlled for the proportion of time youth spent in controlled settings and yearly/6-month assessment interval length.

EFA suggested a six-factor structure that included police legitimacy, court legitimacy, juvenile justice bias, fair treatment of their case, fair treatment by the police, and fair treatment by the judge. We next examined the trajectories of youth offending over age (Table 1). Overall, participants experienced a decline in offending over age, -1.88, p < .001. However, this decline was only significant among Latino participants (-2.06, p < .05).

Finally, we tested the role of PJ variables in predicting offending by entering lagged PG measures into the model of offending over age (Table 2). Initially, each PJ variable was entered one at a time. Next, a combined model included all significant PJ variables. Results of these analyses suggest that youth perceptions of police legitimacy and juvenile justice bias, and not their personal experiences, predicted youth offending. Higher police legitimacy scores and lower juvenile justice bias scores predicted lower offending (b=-.66, p<.001 for police legitimacy and b=.60, p<.001 for juvenile justice bias). These effects, however, varied by race/ethnicity. For White participants, the police legitimacy, court legitimacy, and juvenile justice bias each had an independent effect in predicting offending (b=-.78, p<.05; b=-1.13, p<.05; and b=.70, p<.05 for each effect respectively). For Black participants, only the juvenile justice bias predicted offending (b=.65, p<.01). For Latino participants, only police legitimacy predicted offending (b=-1.09, p<.001).

Our results suggest a multifactor structure for the perceived PJ construct and demonstrate that the more abstract police legitimacy and juvenile justice bias variables could be more important in predicting future offending than the variables that capture personal experiences with the police and the system. Importantly, our findings suggest that isolated efforts to improve the perceptions of procedural justice (e.g., policy changes and training initiated within an isolated locality) may not have the desired effect, unless they are also mirrored with changes across the overall juvenile justice system. That is, individuals who personally experience fair treatment by the police may still be negatively affected by their perceptions of the legal system being unfair or biased.

Group Authors

Kim-Chi Pham, University of Denver, Kim-Chi.Pham@du.edu (presenter)
Rachel Harr, University of Denver, Rachel.Harr@du.edu
Julia Dmitrieva, University of Denver, Julia.Dmitrieva@du.edu

Authors

• Kim-Chi Tran Pham, University of Denver
  Presenting Author

• Rachel E Harr, University of Denver

• Julia Dmitrieva, University of Denver