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Delays at court are an everlasting and potentially consequential reality of criminal justice systems, although most would agree that the timely adjudication of cases is needed from both administrative, judicial, and individual perspectives. This paper uses administrative data and a policy reform in Denmark in 2007 to measure the unconfounded association between court delays – or, more specifically, time to adjudication – and criminal recidivism within 5 years. Results show that although court delays do not push more people into recidivism, the delays matter for how many crimes recidivists end up being convicted of. Also, criminality tends to be muted during the period from charge to adjudication (even in a context with low use of pretrial detention and no bail system), whereby court delays also matter for the timing of new crimes – a finding with important theoretical implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The response of welfare states to immigration is a topic of concern for scholars of welfare and scholars of crime and society. Yet, debates about immigration, crime and welfare in academic literature often take place in isolation. This paper advances both literatures by studying the mechanisms that drive both welfare chauvinism and penal nationalism in relationship to each other. Rather than assuming an a priori and abstract negative construction of immigration in political debates, this study draws on a large-scale Critical Discourse Analysis of political and media debates in Denmark to show how immigration is constructed in ways that justify welfare and penal policy reforms. The analysis shows that both policy shifts – towards a two-tier exclusionary welfare system, and towards penal nationalism that reserves harsher punishment for immigrants – are driven by a discourse that constructs immigrants as threatening welfare first, and only secondarily as threatening personal safety. Based on the empirical data, the article argues that anxieties about the impact of immigration on the integrity of the welfare state is what drives and justifies the construction of a two-tiered welfare and criminal justice system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides an account of young people's experiences of and perspectives on help and support in drug reducing interventions. It is based on interviews with young people age 14–25 who were in contact with the Criminal Justice System (CJS) and, at the same time, participated in a drug reducing intervention. The interview data forms part of the EU funded EPPIC project. Two main themes emerged from the young peoples' accounts that cut across different types of interventions and social systems in both countries. The first revolves around the 'system' of welfare, criminal justice, health and educational services and the barriers young people encountered in navigating the system to find help. The second revolves around the young people's experiences with professionals, including what they appreciated and what they found problematic in professionals' approach to them. Basing our analysis on data from two different countries, we are able to emphasize similarities in the young peoples' perspectives, despite being enrolled in different drug reducing and CJS interventions. The insights gained indicate a need for systems and service changes that can facilitate a better balance between building individual resilience and providing appropriate, timely and adequate support within a 'resilience-building' environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The engagement of young people has been a neglected area in youth justice and drug policy and practice. This paper explores the concept of 'engagement' in relation to drug interventions in custodial and community settings in different European countries. Interviews were undertaken with young people (aged 14–25 years) in contact with the criminal justice system who use illegal drugs and with practitioners involved in the delivery of interventions for our target group in Denmark, Italy, Poland, and the UK. The key techniques to engage young people were described in similar terms across the countries. These included forming relationships based on trust, honesty, and empathy, setting goals collaboratively, and employing practitioners with lived experience and understanding. The objectives and activities on offer are often constrained by criminal justice contexts. Despite the differences between the countries in terms of criminal justice systems and the structure of drug interventions, there were remarkable similarities in the ways young people and practitioners described effective engagement. Strong emphasis on operational engagement to ensure positive relationships between young people and practitioners was important in the design and delivery of interventions. Practitioners working in criminal justice contexts need to have flexibility and autonomy to work creatively to find ways to engage, connect, and inspire young people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on research undertaken as part of the EU funded EPPIC project, this paper aims to update and elaborate on the relationship between drug use and offending behaviours by exploring variations within a cross-national sample of drug-experienced young people in touch with criminal justice systems. Adopting a trajectory-based approach, interviews were undertaken with 198 young people aged 15–25 in six European countries (Austria, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Poland, and UK). Data were analysed by applying the Bennett and Holloway categorization of the drugs-crime link, with a focus on the concept of social exclusion as developed by Seddon. Three main types of mechanisms (economic, pharmaceutical, and lifestyles) are used to interpret the data, showing how the relationship between drugs and offending can vary according to type of substances and over time. Furthermore, it can be associated with very different degrees of social exclusion and needs. The results suggest that while economic inequalities still play key roles in explaining drug use and offending, both behaviours can originate from a state of relative deprivation, resulting from the contradictions inherent in 'bulimic societies' that raise aspirations and desires while providing young people scarce opportunities for self-realisation and social recognition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following a change in the Danish gang milieu in 2008, where ethnic minority street gangs challenged the established outlaw motorcycle gangs, the Danish government has formulated three anti-gang policy 'packages'. To unfold the development they represent to Nordic penology, this article analyses elements of both penal exceptionalism and excess. In this article, it is shown how the packages are based on the notion of gang membership as a choice, which legitimated the development of a parallel justice system for gang members. This foundation is built upon a gang-specific subsection that allows for the doubling of gang-related sentences and for restricting prisoner rights and traditional rehabilitative treatment for gang-related convicts. The packages, however, maintained 'a way out' for gang members who voluntarily entered a formal EXIT program, and thus gained access to traditional penal treatment and also support for leaving the gang milieu. It is argued that the packages represent a development of intended bifurcation based on status differentiation between citizen groups, a process also observed in regard to Danish anti-ghetto policies. Thus, rather than resembling a general turn to punitiveness, the packages indicate a penological development based on penal differentiation, which raises questions about access to justice for those found wanting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes how victims of violence experience their initial meeting with the Danish police and the time that follows. Based on observations of police-victim encounters and interviews with victims, we explore how victims' rights are brought into play when victims report crimes to the police. Such rights are meant to help victims cope with their situation. However, our study shows that rights are not always adhered to and are at times administered in ways that suit the needs of the criminal justice system more than those of victims. Our study also shows that rights do not always reflect the needs of victims. We point to the incremental development and piecemeal nature of victims' rights in Denmark as a possible explanation for the current state of affairs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper locates the emerging professional police force in Copenhagen both in a European-wide context and in the context of Danish absolute monarchy between 1660 and 1799. The surviving source material on the activities of the new police force itself (from 1683) is reviewed, but the notion of 'good police' is placed in a much broader early modern framework involving not only daily security in the city, and matters of criminal and civil law arising naturally in a growing urban environment, but also the relationship between the police master and the many other existing agents of domestic policy in early modern Denmark. The role of 'good police' in terms of begging, vagrancy and the workhouse conform largely to contemporary European patterns, but when the police was also (from 1773) given powers to control newspapers and the press, questions of civil rights and obligations were bound to be raised - not least once public opinion became fully aware that the mental condition of Christian VII meant that absolutism could not operate in the normal way. Although the Copenhagen police provided a tool for more co-ordinated implementation of social policy in the 18th century, there were no sudden changes in domestic agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the participation of young people in contact with criminal justice systems in the development of drugs interventions. Interviews were undertaken with 160 young people (aged 15–25) and 66 practitioners involved in the design, delivery and commissioning of drug interventions. We analyse the key challenges in involving young people in the development of interventions including structural, organisational and individual factors. We argue that these barriers can be overcome by fostering flexible models of participation and identifying the most meaningful and appropriate approaches for involving young people at different stages and in different initiatives which consider socio-cultural contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The pairwise overlaps in system involvement between child protective services (CPS), mental health services and the criminal justice system are well-documented. Yet, less is known about how contact to these three systems evolves as children age, and how children's trajectories through these institutions should be conceptualised. In this article, we use administrative data on the full population of Danish children born 1982–1995 that had contact to at least one of the three systems before turning twenty-one. Theoretically, we argue that children's trajectories of institutional contacts can be understood as a moral career as suggested by Goffman. Empirically, we study how children move between and are retained within the three systems across childhood. We find that early contact originates with CPS but branch out through both overlap and transitions to the other systems. Further, across age, there are high levels of retention within the systems, and clear gendered dynamics play out as children age. We argue that children's trajectories across age can be viewed as moving from a position as a subject at risk to a position as subject of risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Little is known about the role birth order plays in delinquency and adult crime outcomes that carry significant externalities. We use rich data sets from Denmark and Florida to examine these outcomes and explore potential mechanisms. Despite large environmental differences between the areas, we find remarkably consistent results: in families with two or more children, secondborn boys are 20%–40% more likely to be disciplined in school and enter the criminal justice system than are their firstborn male siblings. We rule out health at birth and school quality as mechanisms but find evidence for the role of parental time investment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background. The Danish Medico-Legal Council provides the court with statements based on available psychiatric assessment reports to assist the law in the use of the Penal Code sections on mentally disordered offenders. Aims. To analyse the impact of the Council on the courts' choice between punishment and treatment in cases of offenders falling under §69 of the Penal Code, i.e. mentally disordered, although not psychotic offenders. Methods. In 298 cases of defendants who according to the Medico-Legal Council might fall under §69 the recommendations of the assessment reports, the recommendations of the Council and the final verdicts are compared; and assessment reports from forensic psychiatric centres are compared with those from other psychiatrists. Results. The recommendations of the Medico-Legal Council were often, but not blindly followed by the courts. The probability for the Council to recommend some measure of treatment was about 50% for adult males, and higher for adolescents and for females. In court, however, the two genders as well as adolescents and adults alike all had the same probability, approximately 50%, of being sentenced with treatment instead of punishment. When measured by the final verdict, the Medico-Legal Council is of higher quality than the assessment reports, especially those from outside forensic psychiatry. Conclusion. The Council serves as a quality assurance of Danish forensic psychiatric assessments, and the Council's statements are by the court considered to represent the state of the art of these assessments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on the evolution of criminal justice policies in Denmark during its golden age. Denmark had a fundamentalistic criminal system from the Reformation in 1536 and on to the latter part of 1700s. The citizens were without legal rights. The theocratic system entered in the Rationalism and Age of Enlightenment. Civil rights of liberties were won in the U.S. and France at the end of the 1700s. In the middle of the 1800s, the democratic Rechtsstaat was created in response to the autocracy and the protect the citizens against injustices by the State. The Rechtsstaat principle in criminal legislation have been endorsed by the Danish political parties for several years. Lately, it has been abandoned by prominent politicians.