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- Federal Resources
Federal Resources
Special Feature: Youth Violence
The NCJRS has developed a Special Feature on youth violence, which contains publications and resources on topics related to youth violence and youth violence prevention, including gun violence, school violence, and gangs.
Special Feature: Campus Safety
The National Criminal Justice Reference Service created special feature on topics related to campus safety, which includes publications and resources about crime, safety, violence prevention, and substance abuse.
Teen Dating Violence: How Peers Can Affect Risk & Protective Factors
This brief (PDF, 24 pages) draws on NIJ-funded research, as well as broader literature, to illustrate the ways teens shape each other’s relationship experiences and decisions to enter and leave romantic relationships that turn violent.
Violence by Gang Members, 1993-2003
This brief from the Bureau of Justice Statistics discusses national crime rates, violent assaults, and the percentage in which a gang or gang member was identified as the perpetrator. Rates of gang violence are given by gender, race, and age.
Understanding Teen Dating Violence
In this interview, Dr. Peggy Giordano of Bowling Green State University describes her research on teen dating violence and how it changes over time. Dr. Giordana conducted a longitudinal study following 1,200 youth from age 13 into young adulthood and found conflict in key areas of a relationship can increase the risk of violence.
Young Offenders: What Happens and What Should Happen
This bulletin examines policies that affect young offenders who cross over from the juvenile to the criminal justice system, with a focus on adolescence and early adulthood.
“Through Our Eyes: Children, Violence, and Trauma” Video Series and Resources
This video series aims to educate child-serving professionals about the significance of exposure to violence, the lasting effects of this exposure, ways to protect children, and how to alleviate harm from exposure. The accompanying resource guide contains information about hotlines, organizations, websites, public awareness products, training, and publications that can help professionals as they work to make homes, schools, and communities safer for children.
SART Toolkit: Resources for Sexual Assault Response Teams
SARTs, or sexual assault response teams, can help victims of sexual assault through the maze of governmental and community agencies they interact with to receive assistance. The SART Toolkit can help communities considering developing a SART program or communities that have an established coordinated response but want to improve it.
Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s Internet Crimes Against Children Task Forces Arrest More Than 1,000 Child Predators in Operation Broken Heart
Sixty-one members of the ICAC Task Force, funded by OJJDP, arrested 1,140 child predators from 41 states during Operation Broken Heart. This was a two-month, nationwide coordinated investigative operation to intensify efforts to identify and arrest child sexual predators during the months of April and May 2015.
OJJDP Updates National DMC Data to Statistical Briefing Book
. The OJJDP Statistical Briefing Book added new features to its National Disproportionate Minority Contact (DMC) DatabookThis application presents the national DMC data for the juvenile justice system and their Relative Rate Index Matrices that quantify levels of racial disparity introduced at various decision points within the system. This update provides data through 2013 and makes available new features, including DMC tables for combinations of gender and race for juvenile court stages, and tables comparing males to females for juvenile arrest and court stages.
OJJDP News @ a Glance, May/June 2015
The May/June 2015 issue of OJJDP News @ a Glance includes a top story and video message from OJJDP Administrator Robert L. Listenbee that highlight OJJDP’s efforts to address and prevent youth violence and victimization. The issue also includes features on National Missing Children’s Day, the Coalition for Juvenile Justice Conference, and the OJJDP-sponsored National Law Enforcement Training in Child Exploitation.
Online Training: Building Resiliency in Child Abuse Organizations
This one-day online training identifies the five core elements of resiliency and explores how the organizational resiliency model can be implemented in victim service agencies through policies, supervisory techniques, and trainings. Continuing education unit (CEU) is offered for this training.
CJCA Toolkit for Reducing the Use of Isolation
Prepared by the Council of Juvenile Correction Administrators (CJCA) with support from OJJDP through the Center for Coordinated Assistance to the States, this toolkit presents an overview of the issue of isolation in correctional and detention facilities (PDF, 33 pages). It also includes a summary of the research on the negative impacts of isolation and guidance for reducing the use of isolation.
Prosecution, Transfer, and Registration of Serious Juvenile Sex Offenders
SMART released “Prosecution, Transfer, and Registration of Serious Juvenile Sex Offenders” (PDF, 31 pages), a report that examines the systems of charging, adjudication, disposition, transfer, and/or sentencing that might apply to a serious juvenile sex offender.
Child Trauma and its Effects: Implications for Police
This article describes child trauma and the negative impact it can have on development, and the implications this has for police, especially for those working in poor communities of color. The article also suggests police be trained on the high prevalence of severe childhood trauma in such communities, its effects on the developing child, and its impact on adolescent and adult functioning to increase their capacity to address this major public mental health issue.
OJJDP’s Model Programs Guide Adds Three Literature Reviews
OJJDP's Model Programs Guide, an online resource of evidence-based juvenile justice and youth prevention, intervention, and reentry programs, added three new literature reviews that address:
- Alcohol and Drug Prevention Treatment/Therapy
- Implementation Science
- Status Offenders
OJJDP Bulletin: Deterrence Among High-Risk Adolescents
OJJDP released “Studying Deterrence Among High-Risk Adolescents,” (PDF, 16 pages) the latest bulletin in the Pathways to Desistance series. This bulletin examines the link between perceptions of the threat of sanctions and deterrence from crime among high-risk adolescents. The authors’ findings show that severe punishment, such as correctional placement or a longer stay in correctional placement, does not meaningfully reduce juvenile offending or arrests among these youth.
Parents’ Guide to Gangs
The National Gang Center published an updated version of the “Parents' Guide to Gangs.” This guide provides parents with answers to common questions about gangs that can help them recognize and prevent their child’s involvement in a gang.
Second National Survey of Children’s Exposure to Violence
Children’s Exposure to Violence, Crime, and Abuse: An Update (PDF, 16 pages) presents findings from the second National Survey of Children’s Exposure to Violence (NatSCEV II), conducted in 2011. NatSCEV II gathered data about exposure to violence among a new group of 4,500 children and youth, and added new categories of crime and victimization. Findings from the NatSCEV II show that 60% of young people were exposed to violence in the past year, and more than one in 10 reported five or more exposures.
Community-Based Responses to Justice-Involved Young Adults
This bulletin proposes new institutional methods and processes for young adult justice. The authors’ primary recommendation is that the age of juvenile court jurisdiction be raised to 21, with additional, gradually-diminishing protections for young adults up to age 24 or 25.
OJJDP Releases Research on Youth's Mental Health Needs and Long-Term Outcomes after Detention
OJJDP released four research bulletins based on findings from the Northwestern Juvenile Project, which investigates the mental health needs and long-term outcomes of juvenile detainees:
- Detained Youth Processed in Juvenile and Adult Court: Psychiatric Disorders and Mental Health Needs (PDF, 16 pages)
- Perceived Barriers to Mental Health Services Among Detained Youth (PDF, 12 pages)
- Psychiatric Disorders in Youth After Detention (PDF, 20 pages)
- Violent Death in Delinquent Youth After Detention (PDF, 14 pages)
Report: Mentoring in Juvenile Treatment Drug Courts
This report provides an overview of a project in which NCJFCJ visited OJJDP-funded mentoring programs at 10 juvenile treatment drug court sites and conducted a focus group to discuss youth’s strengths and challenges.
Toolkit: Helping Victims of Mass Violence & Terrorism
This toolkit aims to help communities prepare for and respond to victims of mass violence and terrorism in the most timely, effective, and compassionate manner possible. Professionals who are responsible for planning and responding to incidents of mass violence and terrorism can use this toolkit to develop a victim assistance plan, bring key partners together to develop or continue the use of a plan, and establish and implement victim assistance protocols.
Parents’ Guide to Gangs: Now Available in Spanish
NGC has published a Spanish version of the Parents' Guide to Gangs. This resource is designed to provide parents with answers to common questions about gangs and to help them recognize and prevent gang involvement.
Report: Juvenile Court Statistics
This report draws on data from the National Juvenile Court Data Archive to describe delinquency cases handled between 1985 and 2013 and petitioned status offense cases handled between 1995 and 2013 by United States courts with juvenile jurisdiction.