Absconding Among Juvenile Parolees in Arizona

Abstract

Absconding refers to the active or passive avoidance of contact with correctional supervisory agencies by offenders. Absconders are problematic because their whereabouts are unknown and their threat to the public is elevated. The aim of this study was to construct and validate an actuarial instrument designed to assess risk for absconding among juvenile parolees that accounts for gendered differences. The data were gathered from 1,063 juveniles released from the Arizona Department of Juvenile Corrections into community settings in 2008 and 2009. Juveniles were randomly subdivided into construction and validation samples to assess the validity of the instrument. Twelve risk factors were identified to construct the instrument, three of which were found to operate differently for male and female juveniles. Upon application to the validation sample, the instrument correctly classified 70% of juvenile parolees, and a corresponding r value of .37 was observed. The author discusses the substantive and practical implications for assessing absconding risk and modeling gender differences when supervising offenders in community settings.