Melissa R. Nadel’s research while affiliated with Abt Associates and other places

Diversion programs are increasingly being implemented as an alternative to more severe sanctions, especially within juvenile justice. The civil citation program in Florida is unique in that it diverts juveniles away from the justice system at the earliest decision point of arrest. However, despite its growing use in a number of states, there is little research on the program's implementation and outcomes, namely, it remains unknown if the program is being applied consistently across communities and for juveniles within those communities. Drawing from the larger sociology of punishment, race, and social control literature, and the associated theories of labeling and social threat, this study employs statewide data from the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice to explore the community and individual determinants of civil citation's use. Consistent with the theoretical arguments of labeling and social threat, the multilevel analysis finds that community and individual characteristics, in particular race, impact the likelihood of receiving civil citation. Implications for future research, theory, and policy are discussed.

Despite a growing body of research on prison visitation, very few studies have examined visitation among committed juvenile offenders. As a result, we have little understanding of how youth experience visits and why some never receive them. This article fills these gaps. Using surveys collected from 1,202 youth released from residential facilities in Florida, we found that among youth who were visited, they had positive experiences with visits and that families went to great lengths to visit. For those youth who were not visited, the most common barrier was distance from home. However, some youth were not visited because they refused visits or because families withheld visits as punishment. Moreover, despite the possibility that lack of visitation is harmful, we found that most not-visited youth had positive perceptions of their future success. Policy implications and directions for research are discussed.

The rise of mass incarceration necessitated increased investment in prisons. This increase occurred alongside of policy maker calls for greater government accountability and reliance on evidence-based practices. Despite advances in the understanding of “what works” to reduce crime and recidivism, a notable gap in research exists: What is the evidence that prison architecture influences inmate behavior or reentry outcomes? This article seeks to address that gap and argues that (1) prisons are designed to achieve specific goals, (2) there is minimal empirical evidence that variation in architecture achieves these goals, and (3) the theory by which architecture achieves these goals is inconsistent and unclear. Implications of this assessment for research, theory, and policy are discussed.

Objectives The primary objective of this study is to assess potential variation across Florida’s counties of their implementation of civil citation and the outcomes associated with that implementation. Methods Interrupted time-series analysis is used to determine whether the trends in juvenile arrests and the total delinquent population referred to the juvenile justice system (either through arrests or through civil citation) were significantly affected by the implementation of civil citation in each county. Results There were immediate and gradual diversion effects of the civil citation program in a number of Florida’s counties. As a result, there is evidence of successful implementation with a few cases of net widening. Conclusions While there was variation between counties in their implementation of civil citation, overall, Florida’s civil citation program was found to provide a diversion from arrest rather than a net-widening outcome. The study concludes with the identification of county-specific factors that characterized the local jurisdictions that were able to successfully overcome the major impediments associated with diversion and other reform programs’ implementation fidelity.

Purpose : With over 700,000 mentally ill inmates are held in U.S. jails and prisons, this study provides a comprehensive assessment of the effect of mental illness among released prisoners on a series of re-entry recidivism outcomes. Methods : Using a cohort of 200,889 inmates released from Florida prisons from 2004 to 2011, several recidivism outcomes are examined among 40,145 individuals with a mental health diagnosis and 10,826 with a serious mental illness are compared with inmates without a mental illness diagnosis. We control for a host of factors known to influence recidivism outcomes using binary logistic regression for one, two, and three year follow-up periods and survival analysis to assess the timing to recidivism. Results : Inmates diagnosed with any type of mental illness are significantly more likely to recidivate and among inmates with a mental illness, those diagnosed with a serious mental condition are significantly more likely to recidivate than those with a less serious mental illness diagnosis. Conclusions : Policies and practices need to ensure that in-prison and community mental health systems have sufficient resources and capacity to adequately address the needs of inmates with mental health issues to reduce the likelihood of these individuals re-offending and ultimately returning to prison.

While a considerable amount of research recognizes a link between politics and criminal justice administration and policy, minimal literature is concerned with the impact of election cycles on punishment outcomes. Recent studies find incarceration is used as a tool for gaining political power. Therefore, the election period, especially when the incumbent faces opposition, could have a substantial effect on sentencing outcomes. Previous research has examined this phenomenon on a national and state level, but has rarely considered local political influences on elections. In this study, we examine the effect of local state attorney elections on punitiveness in punishment decisions, specifically through filing rates, conviction rates, prison admission rates, and average prison sentence lengths. As it is well established that criminal justice sanctions disproportionately affect minorities, we also examine the potential amplification of this disparity during the election cycle. A fixed-effects panel design was used to assess the effect of the State Attorney election periods in Florida and the presence of an electoral opponent on conviction and sentencing outcomes from 1995 to 2010. The results lend partial support to the hypothesis that the election cycle affects criminal justice outcomes.