Racial and Ethnic Disparities

• Racial and Ethnic Disparities (RED) research in Utah has focused on youth contact at various points of the juvenile justice system as shown in the figure. These points include contact before a youth enter the system but is not an exhaustive list of other contacts a youth may have while in the system.

• Cases involving youth who are referred to the juvenile court could be petitioned to court for formal court processing. In court, a judge may order a youth to be placed on probation, in a community placement, or in secure care. Youth may be held in locked detention awaiting a hearing with a judge. For the majority of youth referred to the juvenile court, cases are handled nonjudicially, being diverted from the system with no formal court processing and without seeing a judge.

Utah Youth’s Population

• A common way to measure disparity is to compare a group’s share of the general population to their share that exists at different points of contact in the system.

• If these shares are higher when a youth enters the juvenile justice system than their share of the general population, then overrepresentation exists. In other words, there is disparity for that group at entry into the juvenile justice system.

• As seen in the figure to the left, minority youths make up around 28% of Utah’s youth population. Then for equity, minority youths would comprise a similar proportion at various points of contact in our juvenile justice system. This data point is important in analyzing proportionality at various points of contact within our juvenile justice system.

Representation at Front End Points of Contact

While minority youths account for about 28% of the general youth population, they make up about:

• 32% of arrests and

• 40% of referrals to court.

Representation at Different Points of Contact Post-Referral

Following a court referral, youth have the opportunity to be diverted from the system through the use of a Nonjudicial Adjustment if certain criteria are met. We see here minority youth make up 39% of all diversions, 38% of petitions and 53% of pre-trial locked detention.

Representation at Disposition Points of Contact

Disposition refers to any order of the court, after adjudication, as defined in Utah Code section 80-1-102. This means that if a case reaches disposition, a youth has seen a judge. Once the point of disposition has been reached, we see that minority youth make up:

• 41% of intake probation (IP) orders

• 46% of formal probation (FP) orders

• 48% of community placement (CP) dispositions, and

• 53% of secure care (SC) dispositions

Additional data analysis would need to be evaluated to meaningfully understand the significance of this information, as this does not account for factors such as the level of referred offenses. In particular, the CP and SC dispositions are greatly dependent on what the offense was that was referred and adjudicated.

The Relative Rate Index (RRI)

The Relative Rate Index (RRI) can help us understand if disparity stays the same, increase, or decrease as youth move through the system by taking into account the previous point of contact. The RRI is simply a ratio between two percentage shares that measures either:

• Equity: an RRI that is equal to 1
• Overrepresentation: an RRI greater than 1
• Underrepresentation: an RRI below 1

For example, when the RRI measures at 2, it means that one group is twice as likely as the other groups to experience an event.

From Population to an Arrest

Taking into account the population size for each respective group:

• In 2019 the RRI measured at almost 1.5, implying that minority youth were 1.5 times more likely to be arrested than white youth.

• However, we can see the disparity has been decreasing over the years with an RRI of 1.19 in 2022.

• Additional data analysis would need to be evaluated to meaningfully understand the significance of this information.

From an Arrest to Locked Detention

• Once a youth is arrested, a judge will review a probable cause statement and within 24 hours determine whether the youth should have been arrested or not. Within 48 hours a youth will see a judge for a detention hearing, at which time, a youth may be ordered to remain in locked detention pending further hearings before a judge.

• In 2022, minority youths were 2.4 times more likely to be held in detention after an initial detention hearing, based on their share of arrests compared to white youths, which is a decrease from 2021.

• Additional data analysis would need to be evaluated to meaningfully understand the significance of the information presented here, as this presentation does not consider factors such as the level of referred offenses.

From an Arrest to a Court Referral

• Taking into account the arrest rate for each respective group, we see a slight decrease in disparity at the point of court referral with the RRI measured in 2022 at almost 1.43. This means minority youth were 1.43 times more likely to be referred to court than white youth.

• Additional data analysis would need to be evaluated to meaningfully understand the significance of this information.

From a Court Referral to a Diversion

• From a Court Referral, a youth may be diverted from formal court processing through a Non-Judicial Adjustment. Here we see minority youth are being diverted about 5% less than white youth for 2022.

• Additional data analysis would need to be evaluated to meaningfully understand the significance of this information, as it does not account for factors such as the level of referred offenses.

From a Court Referral to Petition

• If a youth is not diverted, a prosecuting attorney will screen the referral. The prosecuting attorney may file a petition, or they may decline to do so. If the prosecuting attorney files a petition, the youth will see a judge. If adjudicated, a disposition will be made.

• Here, we see a close parity between minority and white youth for 2020, 2021, and 2022.

• Additional data analysis would need to be evaluated to meaningfully understand the significance of the information presented here, as this presentation does not consider factors such as the level of referred offenses.

From a Petition to an Intake Probation Order

• When a youth is formally petitioned to court and appears before a judge, a youth may be placed on Formal Probation, which statute defines as court monitoring that includes field supervision, or Intake Probation, court monitoring that does not include field supervision.

• In 2022, Intake Probation was close to parity for minority and white youth.

• Additional data analysis would need to be evaluated to meaningfully understand the significance of the information presented here, as this presentation does not consider factors such as the level of referred offenses.

From a Petition to a Formal Probation Order

• In 2020, Formal Probation was close to parity for minority and white youth. However in 2022 we see that minority youth were 1.42 times more likely to receive a Formal Probation order than white youth.

• Additional data analysis would need to be evaluated to meaningfully understand the significance of the information presented here, as this presentation does not consider factors such as the level of referred offenses.

From a Petition to a Community Placement Disposition

• When looking at Community Placement, minority youth were 1.5 times more likely than white youth to receive an order for this form of supervision in the community.

• Additional data analysis would need to be evaluated to meaningfully understand the significance of the information presented here, as this presentation does not consider factors such as the level of referred offenses.

From a Petition to a Secure Care Disposition

• Secure Care is the system’s most restrictive and serious placement. Minority youth were 1.8 times more likely than white youths to be given this disposition in 2022, a decrease from 2021.

• It is important to note that the number of secure care dispositions overall in 2022 was less than 100.

• Additional data analysis would need to be evaluated to meaningfully understand the significance of the information presented here, as this presentation does not consider factors such as the level of referred offenses.