Center for Court Innovation Associate Director of Research Sarah Picard-Fritsche discusses the risk-need-responsivity model for working with offenders and the Center's efforts to create a brief screening tool for assessing the risks and needs of criminal defendants. (May 2015)
This video offers excerpts of speeches from the 10th anniversary celebration of Bronx Community Solutions on April 21, 2015 in the ceremonial courtroom at Bronx Supreme Court.
Bronx Community Solutions seeks to re-engineer the response to low-level crime in the Bronx, New York. By providing judges with additional sentencing options for non-violent offenders, Bronx Community Solutions reduces the reliance on short-term jail sentences and offers defendants the assistance they need to avoid further criminal conduct.
This book chapter by the Center for Court Innovation's research director summarizes the research demonstrating that the problem-solving judicial role directly contributes to reduced criminal behavior among program participants. The chapter also discusses individualized justice (assessing and responding to the needs of each defendant) and predictability (using standardized tools and generating clear expectations). Available in Offender Release and Supervision: The Role of Courts and the Use of Discretion, ed. Martine Herzog-Evans. Oisterwijk, Netherlands: Wolf Legal Publishers.
In January of 2015, New York State Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman visited the Center for Court Innovation for a one-on-one conversation with Greg Berman. Topics ranged from the challenges of implementing justice reforms, managing fiscal crises, the value of strongly worded dissents, and how Judge Lippman likes to relax. This is an edited transcript of that wide-ranging conversation.
This Brooklyn Justice Initiatives annual report outlines the first year of a supervised release program that aims to reduce pre-trial detention for misdemeanor defendants in Brooklyn, New York.
This study examines the work of the Red Hook Community Justice Center’s Peacemaking Program, which uses traditional Native American practices to resolve disputes. Participants can avoid the justice system by participating in peacemaking sessions and reaching a consensus agreement for restitution and repair.
Community courts, which offer creative responses to low-level crime, have traditionally been thought of as neighborhood courts. But the core principles of community courts—promoting alternatives to incarceration, encouraging respectful treatment of defendants, engaging the public in doing justice—can work just as effectively when handling cases from an entire town, city, or county. This paper looks at three jurisdictions that have successfully adapted the community court model beyond single neighborhoods.
The results of a 2010 community survey in Brownsville, Brooklyn focusing on perceptions of neighborhood quality of life, youth issues, public safety, and criminal justice agencies.
