Search

Despite a history of critique, concentrated discussion and improved assessment processes, neglect continues to be a major challenge for child protection services. This paper draws on findings from a government‐commissioned analysis of 'serious case reviews' (SCRs) in England, arising from incidents of serious child abuse in 2017–2019. There were 235 cases, for which 166 final reports were available. Alongside a quantitative analysis of the whole cohort, we undertook an in‐depth qualitative analysis of 12 cases involving neglect. A key challenge in responding to neglect in its different forms is that it can be so widespread amongst families that practitioners no longer notice its severity or chronicity – it becomes normalised. In this paper we explore two dimensions of the 'paradox of neglect' where it seems to be everywhere and nowhere simultaneously. The first is that neglect is so closely bound up with the prevalence of poverty that little action is taken to address it. The second is that the overwhelming nature of neglect can blind practitioners to other forms of maltreatment that may also be present within a family. Practitioners, now more than ever, need to recognise the dimensions of this paradox to protect children from neglect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the relationship between public houses or pubs, and crime rates in England and Wales. The impact of pubs on local communities is generally studied and investigated within the context of third places, thus physical places that facilitate the accumulation of social capital within communities. We estimate Poisson Fixed-Effects (PFE) and a frontier Spatial Autoregressive (SAR) model on a unique panel dataset for 375 local authorities in England and Wales between 2003 and 2018. Results from the analysis indicate that the presence of pubs progressively relates to a higher incidence of major crimes when transitioning from rural to urban areas, mainly due to weaker level of community cohesion and a lack of resources to support formal policing in more urbanized centres. These findings highlight the importance of place-based strategies in tackling rising incidences of crimes, indicating that recent pub closures may have contributed to severing community ties that act as a deterrent to crime in certain areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analyses of crime based upon aggregate counts of different crime types have restricted value, because they count all crime types equally irrespective of the harm caused. In response to this problem, a series of weighted measures of crime harm have been proposed. In this short contribution, we contend that the use of some crime harm metrics to inform police deployment practices has the potential to reinforce ethnic disparities in the criminal justice system through the creation of unintended negative feedback loops. We focus our analysis on the Cambridge Crime Harm Index and the Office for National Statistics (ONS) Crime Severity Score, the preeminent crime harm indexes in England and Wales. We conclude that the ONS Crime Severity Score, which is based on mean sentencing outcomes, does give cause for concern in some contexts. There is currently no evidence that the Cambridge Crime Harm Index, based on sentencing guidelines, presents the same problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Past research into the effectiveness of multi-agency public protection arrangements (MAPPA) in reducing reoffending it limited. Thus, the current study aimed to evaluate proven reoffending patterns forMAPPAmanaged individuals. Methods: Proven reoffending for 39,501 MAPPA managed individuals was investigated by (1) examining patterns in the timing and frequency of proven reoffending for MAPPA managed individuals; (2) examining 1-, 3-, and 5-year proven reoffending patterns of MAPPA managed individuals by MAPPA category, age, and gender; and (3) comparing crime harm levels and recall to custody for MAPPA managed individuals pre- and post-MAPPA adoption. Results: Taken together, our findings show that proven reoffending rates for individualsmanaged under MAPPA are substantially lower than those reported in proven reoffending statistics for England and Wales. Discussion: Our results suggest that MAPPA is making a positive contribution to a managing individuals convicted of sexual and violent offenses. Additionally, our findings provide the best evidence to date that MAPPA management may also be effective at reducing less serious offenses which do not typically involve immediate removal from society. These findings are considered in light of their theoretical and practical implications while potential limitations and avenues for future research are outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research highlighted that a fundamental rethink of the measurement of domestic abuse was needed in the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW). The research reported here aimed to develop and test new questions on domestic abuse for the CSEW to improve the headline prevalence measure, including frequency of abuse, to develop a way of measuring controlling or coercive behavior within the overall prevalence measure, and to develop a measure of the impact of abuse. The research included focus groups and interviews with victims (n = 27) to assess a set of draft questions and cognitive testing of revised questions with victims and the general public (n = 42). A final set of 24 questions was developed for use with victims of both intimate partner and family abuse, with an additional question for family abuse. The new questions were found to echo victim experiences and were deemed acceptable and reliable measures by victims and the general public for domestic abuse, including controlling and/or coercive behavior and impact. An analytical approach was recommended to improve the headline prevalence measure of domestic abuse by establishing 'high' and 'low' abuse profiles using measures of both behavior and impact. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]