AndreaBozzo/ceres-open-data-index huggingface dataset:
Post-Incarceration Partner Violence: Examining the Social Context of Victimization to Inform Victim Services and Prevention, 5 U.S. States, 2008-2015

Do post-incarceration partner violence experiences in justice-involved couples conform to the most widely used evidence based typology of partner violence in the general population (Johnson, 2008)? What aspects of social context at the individual, couple/family, and community levels shape post-incarceration partner violence experiences? Do couple/family-level social context factors mediate the observed relationship between the identified community-level influences and experiences of partner violence?  What social context factors at the individual, couple/family, and community levels do members of justice-involved couples see as shaping their experiences of partner violence?
Victim advocates and criminal justice system personnel have long recognized the importance of context in guiding victim services and criminal justice system responses to violence, yet little evidence exists to guide such approaches. Despite the very high prevalence of post-incarceration partner violence observed in the first study to rigorously measure it (the Multi-site Study on Incarceration, Parenting, and Partnering), little is known of the social contextual factors that shape violent victimization in justice-involved couples. The Post-Incarceration Partner Violence: Examining the Social Context of Victimization to Inform Victim Services and Prevention study addressed this
gap by assessing the role of contextual factors that empirical and theoretical
work suggests could affect partner violence in this vulnerable population. This secondary analysis study drew on longitudinal data from the MFS-IP
dataset and other public sources to develop an actionable understanding of the social contexts that influence the observed high prevalence of violence in a sample of couples that have contact with the criminal justice system but are disconnected from formal service delivery systems or other sources of help. The researcher conducted a theory-driven typology analysis to describe the social context of post-incarceration partner violence at the couple level, and utilized quantitative modeling and in-depth qualitative analysis to assess
the individual-, couple/family-, and community-level contexts that shape
partner violence. 

Tags: child-welfare, communities, criminal-justice-system, intimate-partner-violence, parental-influence, victimization, violence
Organization: Department of Justice
School Climate Enhancement and Bullying Prevention in Southern Illinois, 2016-2019

The study assesses school climate and bullying across 45 schools in 20 rural districts and 5 counties of Southern Illinois. Investigators also evaluated the effectiveness of a low-cost, component-based intervention that focused on improving classroom management, playground monitoring, and school-wide disciplinary procedures. This mixed-methods study incorporated hierarchical linear modeling, with mixed-effects longitudinal models for repeated outcomes. The project design incorporated random assignment, with multiple pre- and post-intervention assessments.
Major categories of variables include: students' feeling of safety in school areas; students' history of involvement in or observation of bullying; staff opinion and experience of bullying prevention methods; school policies on bullying; staff completion of training workshops; and demographics.
The units of analysis are individuals and schools.

Tags: bullying, public-schools, school-violence
Organization: Department of Justice
A Multiple Perspectives Analysis of the Influences on the School to Prison Pipeline in Virginia, 2013-2015

This study consists of both qualitative and quantitative investigation of the influences on the school to prison pipeline. The quantitative study, the one included in this release, brings together four large datasets maintained by the Virginia Department of Education (DOE; Discipline Crime and Violence [DCV]), Department of Criminal Justice Services (DCJS; School Safety Audits and School Climate Data), and Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ; Juvenile Referrals and Intakes). These datasets were used to compare what characteristics (individual or building level) either increase or decrease the odds that a student will become involved with the criminal justice system, as a result of school behaviors. The qualitative study involved in-depth individual interviews with 34 educational stakeholders across Virginia, who are involved in the discipline process in the schools (e.g. administrators, counselors, School Resource Officers). The analysis of these interviews found that the themes in how school discipline is differentiated from law enforcement in the schools, and the efforts that schools communities are making to keep children in the classroom and out of the courtroom. Individuals are the unit of analysis. The sample includes the following vulnerable populations: children, minorities, institutionalized persons, and persons with disabilities.

Tags: discipline-of-children, juvenile-justice, racial-disparities, schools, special-education
Organization: Department of Justice
Linking Theory to Practice: Examining Geospatial Predictive Policing, Denver, Colorado, 2013-2015

This research sought to examine and evaluate geospatial predictive policing models across the United States. The purpose of this applied research is three-fold: (1) to link theory and appropriate data/measures to the practice of predictive policing; (2) to determine the accuracy of various predictive policing algorithms to include traditional hotspot analyses, regression-based analyses, and data-mining algorithms; and (3) to determine how algorithms perform in a predictive policing process.
Specifically, the research project sought to answer questions such as:

What are the underlying criminological theories that guide the development of the algorithms and subsequent strategies? 
 What data are needed in what capacity and when? 
 What types of software and hardware are useful and necessary? 
 How does predictive policing "work" in the field? What is the practical utility of it? 
 How do we measure the impacts of predictive policing? 
 
The project's primary phases included: (1) employing report card strategies to analyze, review and evaluate available data sources, software and analytic methods; (2) reviewing the literature on predictive tools and predictive strategies; and (3) evaluating how police agencies and researchers tested predictive algorithms and predictive policing processes.

Tags: crime-mapping, crime-prediction, forecasting-models, police-departments, police-reports
Organization: Department of Justice
Teacher Victimization: Understanding Prevalence, Causation, and Negative Consequences in a Large Metropolitan Area in the Southwestern United States, 2016-2017

This two-year longitudinal research examined the prevalence of seven different types of teacher victimization, its negative consequences among victimized teachers, and predictors of aggression directed against teachers. The research, using a stratified multistage cluster sampling design, surveyed 1,628 middle and high school teachers in 14 school districts, located in a large metropolitan area in the southwest region of the United States. Two waves of the longitudinal research collected 1) teachers' socio-demographic factors, 2) teacher classroom management styles, and 3) school climate factors which are related to teacher victimization. Also, the data contained characteristics of victimization, school responses to teacher victimization, and negative consequences of teacher victimization.

Tags: aggression, high-schools, middle-schools, school-violence, teachers, victimization
Organization: Department of Justice
A Group Randomized Trial of Restorative Justice Programming to Address the School to Prison Pipeline, Reduce Aggression and Violence, and Enhance School Safety in Middle and High School Students, North Carolina, 2014-2018

The project's overarching goals are to improve the knowledge and understanding of school safety and violence, and to enhance school safety programs through rigorous social and behavioral science research. This research project will meet these goals by implementing and evaluating a restorative justice school safety initiative that: 1) reduces bullying perpetration and victimization, aggression, and violence, 2) enhances school safety and mental health in middle and high school students, and 3) reduces the school to prison pipeline by diverting first offenders from the juvenile justice system into Teen Courts. In meeting this objective, we will implement and evaluate an innovative school safety initiative that includes a comprehensive school-based needs assessments using the School Success Profile-Plus (SSP+) student reporting system. In addition, Teen Courts will be implemented in schools to emphasize restorative justice, keep first time offenders out of the juvenile justice system, and reduce the school to prison pipeline. We will evaluate the efficacy of this restorative justice initiative for promoting school safety and reducing violence, by conducting a rigorous experimental trial of 24 middle- and high-schools that are randomly selected to either conduct SSP+ assessments and receive school-based Teen Courts (n=12) or to conduct SSP+ assessments without Teen Court programming (n=12).

Tags: bullying, restorative-justice, school-safety-and-security, teen-court-program
Organization: Department of Justice
Improving Hot Spot Policing through Behavioral Interventions, New York City, 2012-2018

This project aimed to develop new insights into offender decision-making in hot spots in New York City, and to test whether these insights could inform interventions to reduce crime in hot spots. There were two phases to the project. In the first phase a set of hypotheses were developed about offender decision-making based on semi-structured interviews with individuals who were currently incarcerated, formerly incarcerated individuals, individuals currently on probation, and community members of high crime areas with no justice-involvement. These interviews suggested several factors worthy of further testing. For instance, offenders believed they were less likely to get away with a crime if they knew more about the officers in their community. That is, when police officers were less anonymous, offenders were less likely to go forward with a crime.
In the second phase a field intervention was developed and conducted to test whether reducing officer anonymity might deter crime. Through a randomized controlled trial (RCT) while working with NYPD neighborhood coordination officers, who work in New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) developments, it was tested whether sending information about officers to residents in housing developments would deter crime in those developments.

Tags: community-policing, offenders, police-citizen-interactions, police-community-relations, police-officers, public-housing
Organization: Department of Justice
Process Evaluation of the Demonstration Project to Address  Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children in Atlanta-Fulton County, Georgia, United States 2006-2009

In the fall of 2002 the Juvenile Justice Fund (JJF), a nonprofit organization whose mission is to positively impact the lives of youth and their families who come into contact with the juvenile court, received an award from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) to plan a collaborative response to address commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) in Atlanta-Fulton County. In 2004 the JJF received a second OJJDP award to continue its work with community members, including over 18 government and nonprofit agencies from the social service, educational, law enforcement, court, prosecution, child advocacy arenas. The demonstration project in Atlanta-Fulton County focused on the collaborative activities of various government agencies, nonprofits, faith-based organizations, and individuals from two counties (Fulton and DeKalb) who met on a regular basis to coordinate their efforts and to exchange information on sexual exploitation of children. The goals of the multiyear project were to: (1) enhance community awareness of commercial sexual exploitation of girls; (2) improve information and data sharing across agencies; (3) train professionals; and (4) improve delivery of care to child victims of commercial sexual exploitation. This study, funded by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ), was designed to document the nature and extent of commercial sexual exploitation (CSE) of children in Atlanta-Fulton County as well as the surrounding counties, and to conduct a process evaluation of the demonstration project. Data used in the study include quantitative results from a survey of professionals in Fulton, DeKalb, and Gwinnett Counties and quantitative data obtained from the Child Abuse Case Tracking Information System (CACTIS), a database that was designed to promote data and information sharing among agencies involved in the demonstration project. Primary source qualitative data were also obtained from semi-structured interviews conducted with professionals involved in the project demonstration project, clients of the project (including both youths and their guardians), and homeless youths in Atlanta-Fulton County.

Tags: child-prostitution, counseling-services, group-homes, homelessness, process-evaluation, sex-trafficking, sexual-exploitation, status-offenses, truancy, youths-at-risk
Organization: Department of Justice
Drugs and Police Response:  Survey of Public Housing Residents in Denver, Colorado, 1989-1990

This data collection is the result of an evaluation of the
NEPHU program, conducted by the Police Foundation under the
sponsorship of the National Institute of Justice (NIJ). In August
1989, the Bureau of Justice Assistance supported a grant in Denver,
Colorado, to establish a special Narcotics Enforcement in Public
Housing Unit (NEPHU) within the Denver Police Department. The goal of
the Denver NEPHU was to reduce the availability of narcotics in and
around the city's public housing areas by increasing drug arrests.
NEPHU's six full-time officers made investigations and gathered
intelligence leading to on-street arrests and search warrants. The
unit also operated a special telephone Drug Hotline and met regularly
with tenant councils in the developments to improve community
relations. The program worked in cooperation with the Denver Housing
Authority and the uniformed patrol division of the Denver Police
Department, which increased levels of uniformed patrols to maintain
high visibility in the project areas to deter conventional crime.
Using a panel design, survey interviews were conducted with residents
in the Quigg Newton and Curtis Park public housing units, focusing on
events that occurred during the past six months. Respondents were
interviewed during three time periods to examine the onset and
persistence of any apparent program effects. In December 1989,
interviews were completed with residents in 521 households. In June
1990, 422 respondents were interviewed in Wave 2. Wave 3 was conducted
in December 1990 and included 423 respondents. In all, 642 individuals
were interviewed, 283 of whom were interviewed for all three waves.
Because of the evaluation's design, the data can be analyzed to reveal
individual-level changes for the 283 respondents who were interviewed
on all three occasions, and the data can also be used to determine a
cross-section representation of the residents by including the 359
"new" persons interviewed during the course of the evaluation.
Information collected includes years and months lived in the
development, assessments of changes in the neighborhood, whether the
respondent planned to stay in the development, interactions among
residents, awareness of anti-drug programs, ranking of various
problems in the development, concerns and reports of being a victim of
various crimes, perceived safety of the development, assessment of
drug use and availability, assessment of police activity and
visibility, and personal contacts with police. The unit of analysis is
the individual.

Tags: deterrence, drug-law-enforcement, drug-law-offenses, drug-offenders, program-evaluation, public-housing
Organization: Department of Justice
Alcohol Availability, Type of Alcohol Establishment, Distribution Policies, and Their Relationship to Crime and Disorder in the District of Columbia, 2000-2006

The purpose of the study was to investigate the relationship between alcohol availability, type of alcohol establishment, distribution policies, and violence and disorder at the block group level in the District of Columbia.  This study developed and tested a grounded comprehensive theoretical model of the relationship between alcohol availability and violence and disorder. The study also developed a geographic information system (GIS) containing neighborhood crime and demographic and physical environmental characteristics at the block group level for 431 block groups in the District of Columbia. The principal investigator calculated density measures of alcohol availability and distribution practices and aggregated characteristics of neighborhoods to examine the relationships of those measures to crime and violence. The project used data from various sources to create multiple variables measuring the physical, social, economic, and cultural characteristics of a given area in addition to the density of alcohol-selling establishments by type and incidence of criminal activity.  This study examined the influence of alcohol outlets on four outcomes: (1) aggravated assault incidents, (2) calls for service for disorderly conduct, (3) calls for services for social disorder more broadly defined, and (4) calls for service for a domestic incident.  The dataset for this study contains a total of 103 variables including crime variables, Census variables, alcohol outlet variables, neighborhood structural constraints variables, motivated offenders variables, and physical environment variables.

Tags: alcohol, alcohol-abuse, alcohol-consumption, crime, crime-patterns, drinking-behavior, neighborhood-characteristics, neighborhood-conditions, neighborhoods, violence
Organization: Department of Justice
Evaluation of the Bureau of Justice Assistance's Indian Alcohol and Substance Abuse Demonstration Programs, 2002-2006

The purpose of this study was to determine whether the Lummi Nation's Community Mobilization Against Drugs (CMAD) Initiative successfully achieved its four stated goals, which were to reduce illicit drug trafficking, reduce rates of substance use disorder and addiction, prevent drug abuse and underage drinking among youth, and mobilize the community in all aspects of prevention, intervention, and suppression of alcohol and drug use, drug abuse, and drug trafficking. The study also aimed to evaluate whether the outcomes of the demonstration project had application for other tribal communities confronting similar public safety issues related to substance abuse. Qualitative information from focus group interviews was collected. Six focus groups were held with individuals representing the following populations: service providers, policy makers, adult clients and family members, youth, traditional tribal healers, and community members. In addition to the focus groups, the evaluation team conducted an interview session with two traditional providers who preferred this format. All focus groups were conducted on-site at Lummi by two trained moderators from the evaluation team. There were six different sets of questions, one for each group. Each set included 9 to 10 open-ended questions, which addressed knowledge and impact of the Community Mobilized Against Drugs (CMAD) Initiative; issues or problems with the Initiative; how the community viewed its actions; the importance and inclusion of a cultural perspective (traditional healers and others) in implementing various aspects of the CMAD Initiative; and how the Initiative had affected work and networking capabilities, policy making decisions, and/or treatment. Participants were also asked to think about what they would like CMAD to address and about their perceptions and definitions of some of the service barriers they may be experiencing (clients, community, and/or youth). All of the focus groups were openly audio taped with full knowledge and agreement of the participants.

Tags: alcohol-abuse, community-involvement, crime-control, crime-prevention, drug-abuse, drug-education, drug-related-crimes, drug-traffic, drug-treatment, indigenous-peoples, law-enforcement, program-evaluation, substance-abuse, substance-abuse-treatment, trea
Organization: Department of Justice
Operation and Structure of Right-Wing Extremist Groups in the United States, 1980-2007

The purpose of this study was to address some of the gaps in what is known about right-wing terrorism by (1) comparing right-wing extremist "advocates" with "implementers", and (2) identifying internal processes related to organizational planning and group roles by focusing on how right-wing extremist groups recruit new members.  Using a wide variety of secondary sources, the principal investigator collected data beyond what was available in the AMERICAN TERRORISM STUDY, 1980-2002 (ICPSR 4639) and constructed an alternate database, the Right-Wing Terrorist Recruitment (RWTR) database, that related to terrorist recruitment and individual-level risk factors.  The research team collected data on a total of 112 persons from 16 right-wing extremist (RWE) groups.  In order to analyze the recruitment process, the principal investigator developed a new codebook that included a greater number of variables designed to measure different dimensions of the recruitment process. Some of the variables the investigator included were already in the American Terrorism Study dataset, however, the variable categories were revised. Other variables were included in light of prior terrorism studies and related scholarship such as research in the areas of social movements and new religious movements. The investigator also designed variables to measure the structural characteristics of the recruitment process.  The dataset includes a total of 82 terrorist recruitment and individual-level risk factor variables.

Tags: extremism, offender-profiles, radicalism, terrorism, terrorist-attacks, terrorist-profiles, terrorists
Organization: Department of Justice
Compstat and Organizational Change in the United States, 1999-2001

The purpose of the study was to determine how Compstat programs were being implemented across the United States by examining the diffusion of Compstat and factors associated with its implementation. Another goal of the study was to assess the impact of Compstat on line or patrol officers at the bottom of the police organization.  The researchers administered a national survey on Compstat and problem solving in police agencies (Part 1) by mail to all 515 American police agencies with over 100 sworn police officers, and to a random sample of 100 agencies with between 50 and 100 sworn officers. The researchers received a total of 530 completed surveys (Part 1) between June 1999 and April 2000. The researchers distributed an anonymous, voluntary, and self-administered survey (Part 2) between December 2000 and May 2001 to a total of 450 patrol officers at three police departments -- Lowell, Massachusetts (LPD), Minneapolis, Minnesota (MPD), and Newark, New Jersey (NPD). The Compstat Survey (Part 1) contains a total of 321 variables pertaining to executive views and departmental policy, organizational features and technology, and comments about problem solving in police agencies.  The Line Officer Survey (Part 2) contains a total of 85 variables pertaining to the patrol officers' involvement in Compstat-generated activities, their motivation to participate in them, and their views on these activities.

Tags: compstat, crime-patterns, crime-statistics, decision-making, goals, organizational-structure, performance, police, police-departments, police-officers, statistical-data, trends
Organization: Department of Justice