What are the Policy Implications of Our Knowledge on Serious, Violent, and Chronic Offenders?

• Author: Rolf Loeber,Lia Ahonen
• Published date: 01 February 2014
• Date: 01 February 2014
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9133.12072

POLICY ESSAY

SERIOUS, VIOLENT, AND CHRONIC

JUVENILE OFFENDERS

What are the Policy Implications of Our

Knowledge on Serious, Violent, and Chronic

Offenders?

Rolf Loeber

Lia Ahonen

University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA

Baglivio, Jackowski, Greenwald,and Howell (2014, this issue) have replicated several

aspects of previous studies, fortifying our knowledge about serious, violent, and

chronic (SVC) offenders as a small group of individuals who are responsible for

a disproportionate amount of serious crime (e.g., Loeber and Farrington, 2012; Loeber,

Farrington, and Waschbusch, 1998; Moffitt, 1993, to mention a few). The sample is

impressive: State-wide data on all juveniles referred to the Florida Department of Juvenile

Justice (FDJJ) during the course of 5 years. What makes this particular study stand out is the

inclusion of protective factors to balance the effect of risk factors, which is a leap forward in

the study of serious offending. Takentogether, Baglivio et al.’s extended approach to serious

and violent offenders is of great importance to policy makers on all levels. This is also true

for agencies that depend on accurate and precise risk assessments to identify individuals

who are most at risk for recidivism and, in the end, reduce the financial burden on society

caused by crime as well as increase public value of the administration of justice.

A wide array of papers and books have covered the topic of increasing public value

and making official institutions such as the justice system more accessible and customer

user-friendly, somewhat resembling the efforts of companies within the commercial/private

sector (reviewed by Moore, 2013). One of the more important questions is what public

value means to different groups and how is this attainable. Public value is sometimes de-

fined as the individual’s perception of use and perception of the quality of an organization’s

Direct correspondence to Rolf Loeber, University of Pittsburgh, Sterling Building, Suite 408, 201 North Craig

Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15218 (e-mail: loeberr@upmc.edu).

DOI:10.1111/1745-9133.12072 C2014 American Society of Criminology 117

Criminology & Public Policy rVolume 13 rIssue 1