Selecting Delinquents for Adjudication

Abstract

This paper examines the influence of discriminatory factors and legal criteria on intake officers' decisions to treat a case formally versus informally in two juvenile courts which differ in their legal philosophy (therapeutic v. due process). Because earlier research on intake decision making has been charac terized by inadequate analytic techniques, this study analyzes multivariate relationships among qualitative variables using Goodman's method of log-lin ear analysis to identify the factors related to intake decisions in the Denver and Memphis juvenile courts. No support is found for the contention that race and class bias affect this decision in either court. Rather, our data indicate that sex, court philosophy, and type of offense have the most influence on the intake unit's case treatment decision. Prior record and being idle versus employed/in school were also found to influence this decision. The inconsistent findings of previous research are attributed to methodological inadequacies.