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THE PREDICTIVE VALUE OF CRIMINAL BACKGROUND CHECKS: DO AGE AND CRIMINAL HISTORY AFFECT TIME TO REDEMPTION? *
Author(s) -
BUSHWAY SHAWN D.,
NIEUWBEERTA PAUL,
BLOKLAND ARJAN
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
criminology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.467
H-Index - 139
eISSN - 1745-9125
pISSN - 0011-1384
DOI - 10.1111/j.1745-9125.2010.00217.x
Subject(s) - conviction , criminal record , psychology , affect (linguistics) , criminal history , criminology , value (mathematics) , criminal conviction , period (music) , predictive value , criminal case , face value , social psychology , political science , law , history , medicine , computer science , physics , communication , archaeology , machine learning , acoustics
Criminal record checks are being used increasingly by decision makers to predict future unwanted behaviors. A central question these decision makers face is how much time it takes before offenders can be considered “redeemed” and resemble nonoffenders in terms of the probability of offending. Building on a small literature addressing this topic for youthful, first‐time offenders, the current article asks whether this period differs across the age of last conviction and the total number of prior convictions. Using long‐term longitudinal data on a Dutch conviction cohort, we find that young novice offenders are redeemed after approximately 10 years of remaining crime free. For older offenders, the redemption period is considerably shorter. Offenders with extensive criminal histories, however, either never resemble their nonconvicted counterparts or only do so after a crime‐free period of more than 20 years. Practical and theoretical implications of these findings are discussed.