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July 2017

Volume 59, No. 3 | Go to abstracts

Articles

Page 285

Race Matters: Public Views on Sentencing
Anne-Marie Singh, Jane B. Sprott

Page 313

Aboriginal Incarceration in Canada since 1978: Every Picture Tells the Same Story
Julian V. Roberts, Andrew A. Reid

Page 346

The Social Environment of Daily Life and Perceptions of Police and/or Court Discrimination among African, Caribbean, and Black Youth
Amy Peirone, Eleanor Maticka-Tyndale, Kenny Gbadebo, Jelani Kerr

Page 373

Visitor Inflows and Police Use of Force in a Canadian City
Rémi Boivin, Patricia Obartel

Page 397

Traitement des plaintes d’agression sexuelle envers les enfants dans le système de justice criminel québécois
Agnès Alonzo-Proulx, Mireille Cyr

 

Abstracts

Race Matters: Public Views on Sentencing

Anne-Marie Singh, Jane B. Sprott

Research consistently finds that while the public expresses concerns about sentence leniency in the abstract, when presented with a specific case, people are typically not particularly punitive (Hough and Roberts 2012). While Canadian studies have further explored the effect of various social-structural factors on sentencing preferences, absent is any empirical investigation of the role, if any, that the offender’s ethnicity plays. We explore this question using a convenience sample of adult Canadians and four vignettes (of an armed robbery), which were identical except for the racialized identity of the offender. Respondents’ sentencing choices and perceptions of offender dangerousness, culpability, and recidivism risk were elicited. Results revealed that the “black” offender was rated as being significantly more dangerous than the “white” offender and also received a significantly more punitive sentence. After controlling for the impact of the criminal record and views of dangerousness, culpability, and recidivism risk, there was still an independent, albeit very small, effect of the racialized identity of the offender on sentencing preferences. The strongest predictor of the sentence, however, was how dangerous respondents viewed the offender. Part of the desire for a harsher sentence for the black offender likely related to views of dangerousness. The implications of these findings are discussed.

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Aboriginal Incarceration in Canada since 1978: Every Picture Tells the Same Story

Julian V. Roberts, Andrew A. Reid

Sentencing in Canada is beset by many problems, yet one weakness stands above the rest: the disproportionately high rates of Aboriginal incarceration. This article documents current and historical trends in levels of Aboriginal incarceration at the provincial/territorial and federal levels since 1978. We pay particular attention to the years following two important Supreme Court judgements (in 1999 and 2012) that directed the courts to use custody with greater restraint when sentencing an Aboriginal offender. The primary data derive from the annual Adult Correctional Services survey conducted by Statistics Canada. In 2014, Aboriginal persons accounted for just over one quarter of all provincial and territorial admissions, significantly higher than the percentage recorded in 1978 (16%). In fact, over the past 20 years, all jurisdictions save one have experienced an increase in the percentage of Aboriginal admissions to provincial and territorial correctional institutions. Despite judgements from the Supreme Court and provincial courts of appeal, as well as several other remedial interventions, such as the creation of so-called Gladue courts and an alternate form of custody that would be served in the community, the problem of Aboriginal over-incarceration has worsened, not improved.

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The Social Environment of Daily Life and Perceptions of Police and/or Court Discrimination among African, Caribbean, and Black Youth

Amy Peirone, Eleanor Maticka-Tyndale, Kenny Gbadebo, Jelani Kerr

Recent deaths of African-Americans at the hands of police and the creation of the protest movement Black Lives Matter has brought public attention to claims of racial profiling and police discrimination in the United States. In Canada, concerns about racial profiling centre on the disproportionate number of visible minority, particularly African-diasporic, individuals targeted in “street checks” or “carding.” This study used multivariate block logistic regression to compare the explanatory power of variables measuring different aspects of the social environment of daily life drawn from three theoretical frameworks (broken windows, routine activities, and critical race theory) when considering contact with police and perceptions of police and court discrimination in a sample of African-diasporic youth (N=529) who self-identify as African, Caribbean, or Black in a mid-sized city in Ontario, Canada. All measures of the social environment contributed significantly to explaining contact and perceived discrimination. In addition, the significant increase in the variance explained for both contact and perceived discrimination with each successive block supports the conclusion that consideration of the social environment of daily life contributes to an understanding of youth–police contact and youth perceptions of police and courts. The study’s findings add to the discussion of inequality and youth–police contacts and experiences, as well as to the Canadian criminological literature exploring relationships between police and racialized youth.

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Visitor Inflows and Police Use of Force in a Canadian City

Rémi Boivin, Patricia Obartel

Early ethnographic studies suggested that police intervention should be understood within its larger context. Still, the number of studies focused on the ecology of force remains small compared to those of studies on individual and situational factors. Furthermore, Canada remains nearly absent from the academic literature on police use of force. Assuming that force does not occur in a spatially random manner, this article aims to test propositions for the main macrosociological perspectives in the use-of-force literature: social disorganization theory, the minority-threat hypothesis, and the theory of police rigour. Another purpose of this study is to investigate whether, at the level of the census tract (CT), visitor inflows are predictive of police action. Negative binomial regression modelling is used to predict the occurrence of 1,411 self-reported uses of force in 506 CTs. The findings show that social disorganization is the most predictive explanation for the frequency of use-of-force situations in an area. The analysis also supports the proposition that the frequency of use-of-force situations is positively related to the level of crime in the area. While the inclusion of visitor inflows significantly improves the analysis of spatial variations of police use of force, it contributes relatively little relative to other explanations. No support was found for the minority-threat hypothesis, nor for Klinger’s theory of police vigour.

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Traitement des plaintes d’agression sexuelle envers les enfants dans le système de justice criminel Québécois

Agnès Alonzo-Proulx, Mireille Cyr

Our understanding of the criminal process of child sexual abuse (CSA) cases in the province of Québec remains limited. In order to better determine the variables linked to the investigators’ decision to substantiate the complaint and the district attorney’s to authorize its proceeding in court, characteristics of the child, sexual abuse, shared custody, disclosure context, available evidence, and investigative interviews were collected from 169 CSA police files and interview transcripts. Results from the logistic regressions show some common predictors at both professionals’ levels in their decision to accept the file: the child’s age and the suspect’s corroboration. At the investigators’ level, additional predictors were significant in finding the case substantiated: an accidental disclosure, the choice of the first person who received the disclosure, and the frequency of the abuse. At the district attorneys’ level, additional significant predictors were the protection offered by the mother following her child’s disclosure, the use of a non-suggestive interview protocol, and the corroboration of the witness. These results underline the importance of variables linked to the evidence’s strength but also point to the interest of justice and complainant, such as the maternal protection, as predictors of court involvement in CSA cases.

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