Justice Involved Women Items
Working With Women Who Perpetrate Violence: A Practice Guide
This practice brief was designed to summarize the available research on female perpetrated violence. Information in this area is still quite limited. However, there is a growing body of evidence to suggest that females who engage in violence are not a homogenous group and that there are some important differences in the context and expression of violent behavior across gender. We will examine a host of personal, contextual, cultural, and victimization-related factors among females charged with intimate partner violence and other violent crimes.
Testing a New Intervention With Incarcerated Women Serving Life Sentences
Purpose: Incarcerated women serving life sentences are a growing subpopulation with multiple mental health needs. However, no existing interventions have been designed for or tested with this population. Method: This study tested a gender-responsive, trauma-informed intervention (Beyond Violence) and examined changes in incarcerated women’s mental health and anger expression. Pre-, post-, and follow-up surveys were administered to two treatment groups with women with life sentences.
Same is not equal: Policy and Practice for Justice Involved Women
Correcional facilities are challenged to manage the growing popluation of justice involved women. Increasingly, agencies recognize that "one size does not fit all."Implementing gender-responsive policy, practice, and programming contributes to a more engaged inmate population, reduces disciplinary issues, and contributes positively to reentry planning. Evidence-based practices and population statistics point toward using gender-specific policies for incarcerated women.
Center for Gender & Justice
The Center for Gender and Justice (CGJ) seeks to develop gender-responsive policies and practices for women and girls who are under criminal justice supervision. The Center is committed to research and to the implementation of policies and programs that will encourage positive outcomes for this underserved population.
A Women’s Typology of Pathways to Serious Crime With Custody and Treatment Implications
Criminal career patterns, social context and features, psychological factors, potential matches in prior pathways research, sub-types, and treatment goals are provided for the following types of women's pathways to crime: "Type 1 - Quasi-Normal non-violent women with drug/alcohol issues"; "Type 2 - Lifelong Victims, many of whom have abusive partners, drug problems and depression"; "Type 3 - Socialized Subcultural Pathways, poor and marginalized but with low victimization and few mental health problems"; "Type 4 - Aggressive Antisocial, high risk/high need and victimized, mental health issues"
On Behalf of Women Offenders Women’s Place in the Science of Evidence-Based Practice
The argument on behalf of women offenders was made at least four decades ago at the National Conference on Corrections convened by then President Richard Nixon in response to the 1971 Attica Prison riots. Among many speakers, Dr. Edith Flynn delivered the only address on women offenders. In “The Special Problems of Female Prisoners,” Dr. Flynn noted that female prisoners were largely ignored.
Examining Perpetration of Physical Violence by Women: The Influence of Childhood Adversity, Victimization, Mental Illness, Substance Abuse, and Anger
Research on women's perpetration of physical violence has focused primarily on partners, often neglecting perpetration against nonpartners. This study proposes a conceptual model with direct and indirect relationships between childhood adversity and different targets of violence (partners and nonpartners), mediated by victimization experiences (by partner and nonpartners), mental illness, substance abuse, and anger.
Gender-Responsive Lessons Learned and Policy Implications for Women in Prison: A Review
The authors review evidence of gender-responsive factors for women in prisons. Some gender-responsive needs function as risk factors in prison settings and contribute to women’s maladjustment to prison; guided by these findings, the authors outline ways in which prison management, staff members, and programming can better serve female prisoners by being more gender informed.