Analyzing Variation in Prior Record Penalties Across Conviction Offenses. (June 2018)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Cassidy, Michael; Rydberg, Jason
• Is Part Of: Crime and delinquency. Volume 64:Number 7(2018)
• Page Start: 831
• Page End: 855
• Publication Date: 2018-06
• Subjects: sentencing guidelines -- criminal history -- offense type -- quantile regression -- linear mixed models; Crime -- United States -- Periodicals; Juvenile delinquency -- United States -- Periodicals; 364.05
• DOI: 10.1177/0011128717693215
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0011-1287

Abstract

The focal concerns perspective suggests that criminal history and the nature of the offense interact to influence judicial assessments of community threat, yet this question has not been subject to systematic empirical examination. Drawing on 4 years of data (2007-2010) from the Pennsylvania Commission on Sentencing ( N = 75, 676), we utilize linear quantile mixed models (LQMM) to examine the impact of prior record on the conditional distribution of sentence lengths across violent, property, drug, and sex offenders, controlling for the effects of important individual and judicial district-level covariates. The results indicate that prior record penalties differ both between and within conviction offense types across the conditional sentence length distribution. Substantive, theoretical, and methodological implications are discussed.