Overrepresentation of Young Indigenous Offenders: Differences in Criminogenic Risk/Needs and Implications for Practice

Abstract

Indigenous youth are overrepresented in the Australian criminal justice system, yet little is known about how they differ from non-Indigenous youth in terms of criminogenic risk and need profiles in relation to reoffending. The aim of the study was to examine the differences between Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth in terms of criminogenic risk and need profiles. This paper expands on findings of our previous study. and present the results of two analyses. The first is a comparative analysis of the differences in criminogenic risk and need factors in a sample of 4,653 youth. Results raise questions about how Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth differ on type of criminogenic needs and how risk/needs are defined in an Indigenous context. The second analysis examines the predictive validity of a shortened version of the YLS/CMI in a subsample of 921 youth. Results show that a specific combination of five items for Indigenous youth corresponds to an improvement in AUC scores from c. = 0.65 for the full version to c. = 0.73. For non-Indigenous youth, the selected set of five items corresponds to an improvement in AUC scores from c. = 0.66 for the full version of the YLS/CMI to c. = 0.73. Implications of these findings for research, policy, and reducing Indigenous overrepresentation are discussed.