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Criminal-justice-involved clients often are a complicated population for students to consider through a lens of oppression. Nevertheless, it is critical that they do so given that many will serve clients with criminal records during their careers. An attempt to challenge students' prejudice toward criminal-justice-involved people was deployed using a teaching technique derived from intergroup contact theory. The authors invited Juan Melendez to share his story of incarceration on death row for more than 17 years for a crime he did not commit. This article is an examination of the impact of Mr. Melendez's story and the application of intergroup contact theory.

This qualitative study explores three important and understudied areas of drug court research (e.g., women, opioid use disorder, and medication-assisted treatment [MAT]). The research question for this study is: What are women's thoughts, opinions, and experiences in drug court, in regard to the quality of treatment they received for their opioid use disorders and to the use of MAT in drug court programming to treat opioid use disorders? To answer the research question, data from female drug court participants (n = 14) were collected through a focus group methodology. Four themes emerged from the analysis: (1) Women had more positive views toward the use of extended-release injectable naltrexone, as compared to methadone and buprenorphine; (2) Women reported fears about using MAT to treat their opioid use disorders because they felt it could negatively impact their housing, where they were able to receive substance use disorder and mental health treatment, and their ability to maintain custody of their children; (3) Women reported histories of oppression, mainly trauma, and shared that, in some situations, they were not comfortable disclosing they were using or considering using MAT because of further oppressions they may experience; and (4) Women reported that the use of a non-adversarial approach by the judge, consistent with key component two of the drug court model, helped minimize their concerns related to the use of MAT and gave them a safe place during status hearings to discuss their opioid use disorder treatment and recovery. Implications for drug court practice and criminal justice reform are discussed, such as promoting access to housing and treatment for women who use MAT to treat their opioid use disorders and creating safe, anti-oppressive environments to promote recovery for female participants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United States is releasing more individuals from prisons than ever before. However, returning citizens face numerous challenges transitioning back into community life and many communities remain ill-equipped in successfully supporting them. This study focuses on transportation as in integral component to the success of returning citizens. Rapid and rigorous qualitative data analysis (RADaR technique) is applied to interviews (n = 15) with individuals having returned to their community about the impact of transportation on their reentry. Analysis resulted in three primary themes; interviewees reinforced existing knowledge of the issues with transportation disadvantage, transportation is an extension of freedom, and transportation is directly connected to reentry success. These findings suggest a tiered structure of transportation freedom for returning citizens. This model of transportation will aid future researchers and policymakers in considering how to better resource returning citizens to maximize their success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

People experiencing homelessness are at increased risk of exposure to traumatic events, and face higher rates of suicidal ideation, traumatic brain injury, domestic violence, and sexual assault than the general population. As a result of this trauma prevalence among homeless populations, it is important that human service organizations (HSOs) integrate trauma-informed care (TIC) principles into their service delivery systems. Many HSOs who serve people experiencing homelessness, however, struggle to fully translate TIC principles into administrative practices that are felt as positive at the client level of care. This case study was conducted with focus groups of people experiencing homelessness (n = 13) to investigate the consequences of administrative practice decisions on participants' perceptions of powerlessness and the quality of care they receive from service delivery systems. Study participants repeatedly described their trauma and sense of powerlessness both while experiencing homelessness and while receiving services. Participants' discussion of the service delivery system's staff, policies, processes, and procedures hinged on whether and how they found these service delivery components to make them feel powerless and confused, or not. Study results point towards specific recommendations for how homelessness HSOs ought to implement TIC principles into the homelessness HSO service delivery context, with an emphasis on reducing clients' perceptions of powerlessness within service delivery systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transportation has been identified as one of the major barriers to successful reentry for prisoners released to community in the United States. We foregrounded transportation and mobility in our design consistent with the new mobilities paradigm and investigated the mobility needs of returning citizens from the perspective of service providers and employers in Dallas, Texas. We interviewed 17 participants who directly served returning citizens in their professional roles as part of a conventional content analytic design that focused specifically on transportation and mobility among their clients. The findings include five primary themes: 1) Returning citizens rely primarily on public transit; 2) Access to cars is rare, complicated, but advantageous; 3) Support lays a road to successful reentry; 4) Transportation is critical for successful reentry, and; 5) Returning citizens face a complex network of obligations. We utilized mobilities literature and assemblage thinking to interpret our findings as an expansion of the carceral mobilities literature both conceptually and geo-spatially as a reentry mobility assemblage. The paper concludes with a consideration of the possibilities for social service practice, research, and pedagogy through a mobilities lens. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drug courts have been part of the criminal justice system for over 30 years. A plethora of quantitative quasi-experimental, experimental, and meta-analytic studies have demonstrated their effectiveness at promoting recovery from substance use disorders and reducing criminal recidivism. Qualitative studies, however, are less common and little is known about specific populations that drug courts serve, such as women. To our knowledge, this is the first qualitative interpretive meta-synthesis (QIMS) of women's experiences in drug court (n = 79). The QIMS resulted in four new, overarching themes related to (1) receiving praise, compassion and encouragement from the judge and counseling staff; (2) promotion of parenting skills and improvement of mother-child relationships; (3) receiving gender-specific services addressing co-occurring mental health and trauma issues; and (4) continuous performance monitoring, including drug testing, which held participants accountable for their conduct while promoting gradual development of intrinsic motivation for change. Implications for drug court practice and future research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drug courts are an alternative to incarceration for individuals who have substance use disorders. The drug court model is guided by key interventions (e.g., required treatment, frequent status hearings with a judge, continuous drug testing, prosecutors and defense attorneys collaborating in a non-adversarial manner) that are designed to promote recovery and wellbeing, as compared to traditional, punitive approaches to criminal justice. Evidence suggests that, in some drug courts, African Americans may graduate less, compared to their white counterparts. This is alarming because graduating drug court has consistently been a predictor of participants not being rearrested following participation in the program. This study predicted graduation and criminal recidivism outcomes for a drug court that primarily serves African Americans. The focus of the research is to inform drug courts about best practices in treating and retaining African American participants. Females, participants who were employed or were students, those whose drug of choice was marijuana, and participants with no criminal history were most likely to graduate. Participants with a criminal history and those who were terminated from drug court were most likely to recidivate. Implications for drug court practice are discussed, particularly in regards to enhancing resources for employment and the need to develop evidence-based treatments for African American drug court participants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Extant literature has demonstrated connections between workplace environment and worker stress, as well as between worker stress and direct service provision. Current research on direct service provision to people experiencing homelessness, however, has not established a clear association between the workplace environment and the quality of direct services provided to clients receiving case management. This study extends the existing research by establishing connections between all of these constructs, specifically within the context of case management services to people experiencing homelessness. For this mixed methods study, the authors sampled 16 case managers providing direct services to people experiencing homelessness in one homelessness services organization (HSO) in a large metropolitan area. Through focus group interviews and web-based surveys, the authors collected data on the workplace environment, worker stress, and direct service provision. The authors then analyzed the data using a concurrent nested approach for mixed methods analysis. The results of this study suggest that case managers in homelessness HSOs often experience a stressful workplace environment due to workplace cultural norms, inefficient processes, and high expectations placed upon them by both clients and administrators. The stressful workplace environment can interact with client trauma to produce secondary traumatic stress in direct service providers, which then influences client-case manager rapport development. Study findings point toward specific policies and practices that homelessness HSOs ought to adopt in order to mitigate case managers' workplace stress and secondary traumatic stress, and negative influences of these stressors on rapport development between case managers and clients experiencing homelessness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Higher education is an important pathway to safety for survivors of intimate partner violence (IPV). Recent work documents tactics of school sabotage (behaviors aimed at sabotaging educational efforts) identified by school staff and IPV advocates. However, the perspectives of current students who are IPV survivors are unexplored. As part of a multiphasic study, 20 semi-structured qualitative interviews with community college students who reported current or recent IPV were conducted. Identified tactics included disrupting child care, emotional abuse tied to school, and using manipulation to limit access to campus or resources. Identified impacts include preventing focus, diminished academic achievement, emotional or mental health challenges, and instilling a desire to overcome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rate of serious psychological distress among jail inmates (26.4%) is significantly higher than the rate (5%) among the general adult population. The current study is an exploration of the psychosocial impact of an animal assisted intervention (AAI) for men incarcerated in a Texas jail. Participants (N = 17) completed weekly measures of depression, anxiety, PTSD, self-esteem, loneliness, and resilience at Time 1 and Time 2, five weeks later. Dependent sample t-tests were run to test the hypothesis that there are significant differences in participant responses between their first and last week in the AAI program. Analyses revealed significant reductions in PCL-C (t (df = 16), 3.030, p =.008) and CESD (t (df = 16), 1.738, p =.101) scores when comparing the first and last week in the program. An additional dependent samples t-test was run over individuals who had clinically significant scores (moderate to severe) for each measure. These analyses revealed even stronger effects on PCL-C scores (t (df = 8), 4.498, p =.002) and GAD-7 scores (t (df = 8), 2.622, p =.031). Successful completion of the AAI program led to significantly lower symptoms of PTSD, depression, and anxiety. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drug courts have been an important part of the criminal justice system since 1989. They continue to expand throughout the United States because nearly three decades of research has shown that they are more effective than other interventions, such as traditional probation. There is a pattern, though, in some drug courts where African Americans are less likely to graduate than their Caucasian counterparts. This qualitative study explores this phenomenon by asking African American participants (n = 31) their views on the most helpful aspects of drug court and how drug court could be more helpful in supporting them in graduating the program. Participants felt that the respect and compassion they received from the drug court judge and their case managers, as well as the camaraderie they developed with other participants, was an aspect of drug court that supported them in graduating the program. Next, participants felt that graduation rates would improve if drug court better supported them in gaining employment or sustaining the employment they already had. Implications for drug court practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Police violence in the USA disproportionately impacts black Americans. However, most research exploring minority experiences assumes black ethnicity is monolithic and therefore elides experiences of African immigrants to the USA—a growing subpopulation. This interpretative phenomenological analytic study sought to capture and understand the views of African diasporans in the USA of police violence through open-ended interviews with ten adult participants. We used critical race theory as the primary conceptual lens and found four themes: otherness, perception of police, civic engagement and systemic racism. The results offer a counter-narrative that complicates normative categorisation of race in the USA. This work offers activists and social work practitioners a more nuanced understanding of racialised identity, and the concomitant vulnerabilities and resiliencies of African diasporans in the USA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]