An Evaluation of JUST Court in Yuma County, AZ

Pepperdine University

Status: Completed

Conditions: Juvenile Delinquency Unspecified; Substance Abuse; Adolescent Behavior

Treatments: Other: JUST

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT02449057

SPP1014F01

Details and patient eligibility

About

Arizona has created a pilot program for juvenile probationers called Juveniles under Supervision and Treatment (JUST), which includes swift and certain, but modest responses, to technical violations of the terms of juvenile probation. JUST targets high- and medium-risk juvenile probationers and its stated objective is to reduce violations and overall incarceration of youth in the program. The JUST pilot is being implemented under the authority of the Arizona Governor's Office for Children, Youth and Families (GOCYF) and the Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC).

Full description

Arizona's Juveniles Under Supervision and Treatment (JUST) Court is a pilot project initiated by the Arizona Governor's office. It is designed to test whether the principles of Swift, Certain, and Fair (SCF) Supervision-clear rules, close monitoring, and swift and certain, but modest, penalties for each violation can succeed when applied to juveniles under community supervision. The Arizona Administrative Office of the Courts piloted JUST in two counties: Yavapai and Yuma. The Yuma program was launched in March 2011. The goal of JUST is to (a) reduce the violation rate so as to reduce the number of petitions filed to revoke probation (the purpose is to reduce the use of juvenile detention), and (b) reduce recidivism overall. All juveniles in Yavapai are supervised under JUST (evaluation using an RCT is therefore unfeasible). JUST in Yuma is now being scaled up, which affords the opportunity for an RCT. The goal of the RCT is to compare the performance of youth supervised under JUST with those supervised under probation-as-usual.

Enrollment: 150 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 13 to 17 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Newly probated
• At least 13 years old
• No older than 17 years and 3 months
• At least nine months remaining on supervision
• Must be on standard probation with a supervision level of moderate to maximum
• Must be able to participate in the program for at least nine months

Exclusion criteria

• Not meeting all inclusion criteria
• Sex offender
• Dangerous offenses

Trial design

Primary purpose: Other

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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150 participants in 2 patient groups

JUST

Experimental group

Description:

Juveniles Under Supervision and Treatment. This entails swift, certain, and modest sanctions for violations of terms of community supervision.

Treatment:

Other: JUST

Probation-as-Usual

No Intervention group

Description:

Juvenile probation-as-usual.