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PARENTS' INVOLVEMENT IN THE YOUTH JUSTICE SYSTEM: RHETORIC AND REALITY
 
Michele Peterson-Badali and Julia Broeking
Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto
 
The Youth Criminal Justice Act views parents as playing a critical role in both preventing and addressing youths' criminal behaviour. However, the lack of specifically defined goals for parental involvement, in combination with potentially conflicting messages regarding parents' roles, may result in confusion for parents, youth, and those who work in the system, confusion that may, in turn, reduce the efficacy of parents' involvement. Through in-depth, semi-structured interviews with justice system officials (N = 41) who work with parents and young people, supplemented by direct courtroom observation of parents, we explored the reality behind the rhetoric of parental involvement. Results indicated that, despite the fact that parental involvement can have an important impact on legal outcomes for young people, and while there may be some improvement in parental involvement post-arrest under the YCJA, parents are often not involved in ways that are seen as effective and meaningful. Two kinds of conflict are seen as contributing significantly to the gap between policy and practice: interpersonal conflict between youth and their parents and conflict between the two roles that parents are expected to play - simultaneously socializing youth and promoting their legal interests in an adversarial system. Recommendations for addressing the barriers to effective parental involvement are discussed.
 

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BLAMING THE PARTS INSTEAD OF THE PERSON: UNDERSTANDING AND APPLYING NEUROBIOLOGICAL FACTORS ASSOCIATED WITH PSYCHOPATHY
 
Lauren F. Freedman and Simon N. Verdun-Jones
School of Criminology, Simon Fraser University

This article examines the implications of the body of research that asserts that psychopaths have neurobiological irregularities that are manifested by learning and fear-processing deficits as well as neurotransmitter abnormalities. While this research suggests that psychopaths may have many neurobiological irregularities, the present article focuses on abnormalities related to the amygdala and orbitofrontal cortex of the brain, in addition to those related to neurotransmitters. It is argued that these irregularities influence the conduct of psychopaths and help to explain their propensity to engage in antisocial behaviour. Further, it is argued that these factors should mitigate the degree of criminal responsibility that is attributed to the actions of psychopathic offenders.
 

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GUNS, GANGS, AND THE UNDERCLASS: A CONSTRUCTIONIST ANALYSIS OF GUN VIOLENCE IN A TORONTO HIGH SCHOOL
 
William O'Grady, Patrick F. Parnaby, and Justin Schikschneit
University of Guelph

Using data gathered from local press coverage, this article examines how the shooting death of 15-year-old Jordan Manners at a Toronto high school was framed. In particular, we seek to explain why the media's initial attempt to contextualize the event vis-à-vis the tragedy of past school shootings eventually gave way to an interpretive frame rooted in ideological presuppositions about Toronto's underclass. We argue that when the media are confronted with a "must cover" event but lack essential information, the tendency is to adopt pre-existing, consonant frameworks. We conclude by exploring the socio-political significance of such essentializing frames vis-à-vis crime in poor communities inhabited mainly by people of colour.
 

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MODELLING POLICE OFFICERS' JUDGEMENTS OF THE VERACITY OF SUICIDE NOTES
 
Brent Snook and Jamison C. Mercer
Memorial University of Newfoundland
 
We examined the extent to which the decision-making process employed by police officers when making judgements regarding the veracity of suicide notes could be modelled accurately by the Matching Heuristic (MH). Thirty-six officers each read 30 randomly selected suicide notes and were asked to decide whether each was genuine or fake. Results indicate that the fast and frugal MH model is an accurate approximation of the officers' decision making. However, the officers performed at chance levels with respect to the absolute accuracy of their decisions. The implications of these findings for modelling professionals' decisions and potential police training programs are discussed.
 

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DIURNAL MOVEMENTS AND THE AMBIENT POPULATION: AN APPLICATION TO MUNICIPAL-LEVEL CRIME RATE CALCULATIONS
 
Martin A. Andresen
School of Criminology, Simon Fraser University
 
Crime rates are often used to inform the public regarding their risk of criminal victimization. However, these crime rates are themselves at risk of misinforming the public. Recent research has used alternative crime rate calculations to show that these calculations are quite sensitive to the choice of population at risk, but this research has been undertaken only at the neighbourhood level, not at the municipal level. In this paper, municipal-level crime rates are calculated using conventional and alternative means to show the sensitivity of the crime rate. It is shown that because of our diurnal movements throughout metropolitan areas, municipalities gain and lose significant populations. And because of these changing populations, municipal-level crime rates must be calculated, and interpreted, with caution.
 
 

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