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Bind Over and Blended Sentencing in Ohio

Kunkle, Susan M.

Abstract Details

2011, PHD, Kent State University, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Political Science.

In the early 1990s, juvenile crime in the US appeared to be increasing in frequency and seemed to be exceedingly more violent. In state after state, legislative efforts increased the mechanisms of transfer, made transfer mandatory for a larger number of offenses, and generally sought to remove more serious and violent juveniles from the special jurisdiction of the juvenile courts. This research is an effort to understand how those legislative actions were operationalized by the juvenile courts, specifically by identifying the relationship between legal and extra legal variables and dispositional outcomes.

In Ohio, three outcomes are salient in the disposition of cases of youthful offenders who engage in felony-level, violent, and/or repetitive criminal offending – retain in the juvenile court, a blended sentence that straddles both the juvenile and adult criminal court system, and a transfer of the case from the juvenile to the adult criminal court system.

Data were collected from five Ohio Juvenile Courts and the Ohio Department of Youth Services and consist of populations of transferred and blended sentence cases and a sample of felony adjudication cases from the years of 2002 through 2006. Multinomial logistic regression was used to analyze the data; retained in the juvenile court was identified as the reference factor.

The use of a weapon, the severity of the offense, if the offense was violent, prior record, the age of the offender at the time of the offense, and the age of the offender at first contact with the juvenile justice system were significant in the decision to transfer a case to the adult criminal court system. The use of a weapon, the severity of the offense, prior record, and the age of the offender at the time of the offense were significant in the decision to dispose of a case through a blended sentence.

Mark Colvin, PhD (Committee Co-Chair)
Pamela Tontodonato, PhD (Committee Co-Chair)
Eric Jefferis, PHD (Committee Member)
Thomas Brewer, PhD (Committee Member)
Janis Crowther, PhD (Committee Member)
161 p.

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Kunkle, S. M. (2011). Bind Over and Blended Sentencing in Ohio [Doctoral dissertation, Kent State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1302131672

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Kunkle, Susan. Bind Over and Blended Sentencing in Ohio. 2011. Kent State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1302131672.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Kunkle, Susan. "Bind Over and Blended Sentencing in Ohio." Doctoral dissertation, Kent State University, 2011. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1302131672

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)