First Advisor

Ward, Kyle C.

Date Created

8-2019

Embargo Date

8-1-2019

Abstract

Pretrial risk assessments are tools that have been created to address concerns associated with monetary bail in the United States. A pretrial risk assessment tool provides an objective analysis of an arrested person to determine whether he or she will reappear in court or will be rearrested upon being released from jail. One of the goals of pretrial risk assessments is to reduce the financial bail burden the criminal justice system poses on suspected defendants by providing a tool to determine the relative risk defendants pose in the community. Another goal of pretrial risk assessments is to reduce jail overcrowding. Currently, research has only examined if these tools work in reducing rearrest and failure to appear, but little research has considered other factors such as supervision conditions or whether the implementation of the tool is effective. This thesis examined data from a validation study done on the Colorado Pretrial Risk Assessment Tool (CPAT). A quantitative study involving 322 cases was performed. This study found that there are certain types of offenses that are predictive of the type of supervision utilized. This study also found unique differences in the overall effectiveness of differing supervision conditions (e.g. electronic monitoring, substance abuse monitoring, pretrial supervision, etc.) when preventing pretrial failure to appear or pretrial rearrest. Implications include changes in supervision administration, the types of supervision orders administered, and the effectiveness of certain supervision types. Most notably this research indicated that more studies must be conducted analyzing supervision effectiveness.

Extent

99 pages

Local Identifiers

AzariThesis2019

Rights Statement

Copyright is held by the author

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