What do supervision officers do? Adult probation/parole officer workloads in a rural Western state

For several decades time studies have been used as a decision-making tool in criminal justice settings to assist in staffing allocation decisions. Despite their prevalence, these studies have rarely been documented in empirical journals or subjected to peer-review. Publication bias is a likely issue, with only those providing favorable results reaching a public audience. This study reviews the literature and documents a time study of probation and parole officer workloads conducted in a rural Western state. Results reveal probation and parole rely heavily on office-based interactions with probationers and parolees. An over-reliance on compliance enforcement, substantiated by other research in the state, suggests the transition to evidence-based practices and programs remains an ongoing and challenging process as officers continue to cope with caseloads that exceed national recommendations

Juvenile Risk Assessment: Assessing the Evaluability and Predictive Validity of the Youth Assessment and Screening Instrument for use among the North Dakota Juvenile Probation Population

Risk assessment using an actuarial instrument represents one of eight core evidence-based practices (EBP) in community supervision recognized by the National Institute of Corrections (NIC). Despite the widespread adoption of a variety of instruments, many jurisdictions have not assessed their predictive validity. This research examines the evaluability of a risk assessment instrument, the Youth Assessment & Screening Instrument (YASI), adopted by the North Dakota Juvenile Court. The instrument has been in use since 2002. While studies of the YASI from New York State, Illinois, and Canada provide some confidence in the instrument\u27s predictive accuracy, questions still remain concerning its applicability to female and Native American populations

Interventions Pertinent to Children of Incarcerated Parents

One in 12 children will have a parent incarcerated at some point in their lifetime, with a staggering rate of one in four for African American children (Wildeman et al., 2018). Though the incarcerated populations have been in decline across the United States in the past decade (Carson, 2020), its impact still dwarfs that of most other countries (Coyle et al., 2016). The long-term residual consequences of the country’s imprisonment binge are likely to burden later generations through a myriad of social and economic disadvantages that extend through the children of today’s prisoners. Consequences may manifest in terms of social exclusion, poor parental attachment, developmental problems, behavioral and mental health issues, adverse school performance, antisocial attitudes, and even criminal activity (Thulstrup & Karlsson, 2017; Venema et al., 2021; Wildeman et al., 2018). Further, these consequences will disproportionately impact children of historically disadvantaged populations. It was estimated about five million children experienced a form of parental incarceration in 2012, roughly seven percent of the youth population (Thulstrup & Karlsson, 2017). Though specific population counts for North Dakota are unknown, the Annie E Casey Foundation estimated about 10,000 children (7%) have experienced parental incarceration (Campbell, 2016). Attempts are underway by the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (DOCR) to examine this issue through its Children of Incarcerated Parents (COIP) initiative. As Wildeman and colleagues (2018) note, despite a large increase in empirical interest on the topic of parental incarceration, the state of the literature in terms of what works is decidedly sparse. In this research brief we focus on those interventions, pertinent to COIP, that have received considerable empirical attention as demonstrated by the existence of a systematic review. Systematic reviews are a means by which authors synthesize large volumes of research. While conceptually similar to a literature review, systematic reviews reduce the likelihood of selection bias by clearly documenting and mapping the selection criteria and reasons for inclusion or exclusion of a given work. This also allows for such reviews to be replicated and expanded on by subsequent scholars (for a more detailed explanation see Cooper, 2010; Weisburd et al., 2016, pp. 6-8). In addition, they may also combine statistical information from multiple studies through a process known as meta-analysis (for more see Borenstein et al., 2009). This work is a review of systematic reviews pertaining to COIP interventions

Evolutionary consequences of DNA methylation in a basal Metazoan

Gene body methylation (gbM) is an ancestral and widespread feature in Eukarya, yet its adaptive value and evolutionary implications remain unresolved. The occurrence of gbM within protein-coding sequences is particularly puzzling, because methylation causes cytosine hypermutability and hence is likely to produce deleterious amino acid substitutions. We investigate this enigma using an evolutionarily basal group of Metazoa, the stony corals (order Scleractinia, class Anthozoa, phylum Cnidaria). We show that patterns of coral gbM are similar to other invertebrate species, predicting wide and active transcription and slower sequence evolution. We also find a strong correlation between gbM and codon bias, resulting from systematic replacement of CpG bearing codons. We conclude that gbM has strong effects on codon evolution and speculate that this may influence establishment of optimal codons

Measuring Success: An Evaluability Assessment for the Grand Forks Domestic Violence Court

First implemented in the 1990s, specialized domestic violence courts represent one of several solutions developed to improve the response to domestic violence and enhance services for victims (Collins et al., 2021). Other solutions have included mandatory arrest and prosecutorial no-drop policies as well as increased funding support for victim services. There are reportedly over 300 DVCs in the United States as well as 50 in Canada and 100 in the United Kingdom (Eley, 2005; Gutierrez et al., 2016; Hemmens et al., 2020; Home Office, 2008; Tutty & Koshan, 2013). Based on input from a variety of key stakeholders including judges, state’s attorneys, public defense, court administration, and Community Violence Intervention Center (CVIC) staff in 2016, a specialized Domestic Violence Court (DVC) was formally established in Grand Forks (GF) in 2018. It is currently the only DVC court in the state. The GFDVC is a post-conviction specialty court whereby convicted individuals are required to participate in an orientation, intervention programming (such as New Choices facilitated by CVIC), and regular review hearings with Judge Jason McCarthy or Judge Jay Knudson. The goals of the program include increased communication and safety for victims as well as increased compliance and recidivism reduction for the perpetrators. This evaluability assessment briefly summarizes relevant outcome literature pertinent to DVCs, reports the current availability of data maintained by CVIC, and provides short-term and long-term recommendations

Phobos DTM and Coordinate Refinement for Phobos-Grunt Mission Support.

Images obtained by the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) during recent Phobos flybys were used to study the proposed new landing site area of the Russian Phobos-Grunt mission, scheduled for launch in 2011 [1]. From the stereo images (resolution of up to 4.4 m/pixel), a digital terrain model (DTM) with a lateral resolution of 100 m per pixel and a relative point accuracy of ±15 m, was determined. Images and DTM were registered to the established Phobos control point network [7]. A map of the landing site area was produced enabling mission planers and scientists to extract accurate body-fixed coordinates of features in the Phobos Grunt landing site area

Multipliers for p-Bessel sequences in Banach spaces

Multipliers have been recently introduced as operators for Bessel sequences and frames in Hilbert spaces. These operators are defined by a fixed multiplication pattern (the symbol) which is inserted between the analysis and synthesis operators. In this paper, we will generalize the concept of Bessel multipliers for p-Bessel and p-Riesz sequences in Banach spaces. It will be shown that bounded symbols lead to bounded operators. Symbols converging to zero induce compact operators. Furthermore, we will give sufficient conditions for multipliers to be nuclear operators. Finally, we will show the continuous dependency of the multipliers on their parameters.Comment: 17 page

The Spectral Properties of Pitted Impact Deposits on Vesta as Seen by the Dawn VIR Instrument

Pitted impact deposits (PIDs) on Vesta have been shown to exhibit distinct spectral characteristics with respect to their surrounding host deposits and other typical Vestan areas regarding the first major pyroxene absorption near 0.9 μm. The PIDs, especially those in the ejecta blanket of the large crater Marcia, show higher reflectance and pyroxene band strength with respect to their impact deposit surroundings. This study complements the spectral characterization of the PIDs on Vesta with Visible and Infrared Spectrometer observations obtained by NASA’s Dawn mission. In particular, we focus on the second major pyroxene absorption near 1.9 μm. We analyze nine PIDs in the ejecta blanket of the crater Marcia, as well as PIDs within the crater-fill deposits of the craters Marcia, Cornelia, and Licinia. We find that the second pyroxene absorption behaves in similar ways as the first major pyroxene absorption. The PIDs in Marcia’s ejecta blanket show higher reflectance and pyroxene band strength with respect to their immediate impact deposit surroundings. The PIDs present in the crater-fill deposits of Marcia, Cornelia, and Licinia, however, do not show such spectral characteristics. This is also consistent with previous observations of the first pyroxene absorption band. Based on the experimental results of other studies, we speculate that the observed spectral distinctness arises from an oxidation process in the interior of impact deposits, where Fe cations migrate within their host pyroxene grains. Thus, the surfaces of (melt-bearing) impact deposits might be different from their interiors, apart from space-weathering effects

Improving Coordination for Children of Incarcerated Parents

The Annie E. Casey Foundation estimates about 10,000 children in North Dakota have experienced some form of parental incarceration. Compared to non-Hispanic Caucasians, Native American children are 2 to 5 times more likely to have an incarcerated parent. Based on national data, over 50% of all imprisoned individuals in state and federal prisons have minor children, with 64% of mothers and 47% of fathers living with their child prior to arrest or incarceration