Teen courts are becoming a popular mechanism whereby to process youngsters charged with relatively minor offenses. There has been limited systematic analysis of teen courts to identify either their successes or failures. This study examines the teen court of Doña Ana County, New Mexico, including its processes and apparent recidivism rates. The 478 participants were randomly selected from the program and traced through the local Juvenile Probation and Parole Office (JPPO) database. Interviews were conducted with a teen court staff member, JPPO staff members, and former teen court participants. A 25% recidivism rate was found between 1994 and 1998, affected by gender, age, the presence of a prior referral, whether the youngster completed the teen court program, with whom the juvenile resided, and the severity of the jury sentence. The study—the first of its kind for this court—was able to identify some of the successes and shortcomings of this county's teen court.

One of the lingering controversies surrounding the juvenile justice system in the United States is the transfer of juvenile offenders to adult criminal courts, ostensibly for more severe dispositions. This issue especially has been of concern as the “get-tough” movement seemingly has gained momentum over the past two decades. This article examines the waiver process in New Mexico to establish the characteristics of the juveniles subject to the process and to determine the actual, instead of symbolic, criminal court dispositions of juveniles tried as adults.

Those persons confined in any correctional facility are bound by codified rules of behavior and are subject to some form of loss of privileges or liberty if found guilty of violating these rules. The present research focuses on the extent to which legal variables (i.e., information related to the specific rule violation charged, previous criminal activities of the accused, etc.) and extralegal variables (i.e., personalbiographical information, institutional security level, etc.) are associated with outcomes of institutional disciplinary procedures. Seriousness of the charge and the security level of the accused were associated with formal processing of complaints. Minority group members are less likely to receive formal processing. Finally, the severity of one's sanction is almost exclusively understood in terms of who does the sanctioning. The implications of these findings are discussed.

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In this article, we examine gang membership and gang activity in Dona Ana County, New Mexico. We collected the data through a self‐administered questionnaire completed by 373 randomly selected 9th and 11th grade students attending two high schools and two junior high schools. By the self‐report method, 56 indicated they were currently active in a gang; another 45 had been members of gangs but were no longer involved; and, “wannabes,” or students who at some time had considered joining a gang but did not or could not, totaled 68. The 169 students who indicated some interest in or involvement with gangs represented 45% of the total sample. A more restrictive definition of actual gang membership (i.e., the group must have initiation rites and employ some external symbols of membership, such as “colors,” tattoos, or handsigns) results in a different trichotomization. We employ both the self‐definition and restrictive definition of gang membership in our analysis of their personal biographical characteristics and criminal behavior. Our findings suggest that self‐definition demonstrates clearer ties to self‐reported gang‐related activities than does the more restrictive one. We discuss the policy implications of this finding in the article.