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This phenomenological interpretation provides insight and understanding into the parents' experiences and has implications for practice, education and research in nursing.

Extending Koons‐Witt's (2002) study of whether sex‐based disparities in imprisonment likelihoods changed under sentencing guidelines in Minnesota, we examined similar models for Ohio with additional analyses of felony conviction likelihoods and sentence length for 5,472 felony defendants from twenty‐four trial courts. The main effects of a defendant's sex on imprisonment were significant during both periods (unlike the Minnesota findings), consistent with a chivalry perspective. Random coefficient models revealed that these effects were similar across the twenty‐four jurisdictions. Analyses also revealed significant postguideline reductions in sentence length disparities based on a woman's race and number of dependent children, yet increased disparities in imprisonment likelihoods postguidelines based on a woman's race and whether she was convicted on drug charges. These and other findings are discussed in the context of the Ohio legislature's implementation of a sentencing scheme that retains considerably more judicial discretion relative to Minnesota's template.

Intense interest in disturbing child abductions by the mass media, public safety organizations, and the public has helped sustain a socially constructed mythology and sporadic “moral panic” about the presumed pervasiveness of this threat to children. The result has often been reactionary “memorial” legislation enacted in response to sensational cases. A recent example is the America's Missing Broadcast Emergency Response (AMBER) Alert system, which is designed to interrupt serious child kidnappings in progress by soliciting citizen tips to help officials quickly rescue victims. Drawing on available empirical evidence and theoretical considerations, the authors contend that AMBER Alert has not achieved and probably cannot achieve the ambitious goals that inspired its creation. In fact, AMBER Alert is arguably an example of what could be called crime control theater. It is a socially constructed “solution” to a socially constructed problem, enabling public officials to symbolically address an essentially intractable threat. Despite laudable intentions, AMBER Alert exemplifies how crime control theater can create unintended problems, such as public backlash when the theatrical policy fails and a distorted public discourse about the nature of crime. Considerations for the future of AMBER Alert in particular, and the concept of crime control theater in general, are discussed.

Despite concerns over racial disparities in imprisonment across the United States, little empirical attention has been paid to how changing the structure of sentencing might affect levels of disparity. This article examines whether Ohio's shift to determinate sentencing corresponded with significant changes in legal and extralegal effects on case outcomes, both generally and differentially for African American and white defendants. Bilevel analyses of felony defendants from 24 jurisdictions reveal relatively few substantive changes in these effects over time. Some changes involved reductions in race-related disparities (e.g., in the severity of charges convicted on), with others reflecting increased disparity (e.g., higher imprisonment likelihoods for African Americans). Findings underscore a modest link between restructured sentencing and actual case outcomes overall, with some relatively mixed effects on levels of disparity.Cons iderable academic attention has been given to the overrepresentation of African Americans in U.S. prisons relative to their representation in the general population, contributing to discussions about the magnitude and sources of race-related disparities in sentencing (Zatz 2000). As described by Mauer (1999), scholars have posed different possible explanations for the problem, including race group differences in crime rates, criminal histories, and treatment by prosecutors and judges, as well as the differential impact of changing sentencing policies. Extant research on the topic has focused primarily on race group differences in treatment

AMBER Alerts are public announcements designed to elicit citizen tips that could help rapidly recover abducted children before they can be harmed by their kidnappers. Using various media accounts as a data source to garner a convenience sample of 275 alerts, the authors gathered basic information, including victim–offender relationship, recovery time, and the direct effects of the alert. AMBER Alert does appear to provide some positive benefits in recovering abducted children, although the evidence suggests that the alerts are not often used in “stereotypical” stranger abduction cases, and rarely do they appear to have the effect of possibly saving lives. The alerts appear most likely to be “successful” in familial abduction situations instead of the more menacing stranger abduction cases for which they were intended. Policy implications are discussed.

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