Objectives: This study assessed to what extent differences in the subjectively experienced severity of imprisonment (SESI) affect postrelease offending behavior. Methods: Interview and questionnaire data from the Prison Project, a sample of 1,344 Dutch inmates who were incarcerated for up to two years. Results: Bivariate analyses indicate that inmates who experience their imprisonment as more aversive are less likely to be reconvicted following release. While this relation persists after accounting for the duration of confinement, it disappears once potential confounders are accounted for. Conclusions: Even when accounting for the SESI, more severe prison sentences do not deter offenders from subsequent involvement in crime. Hence, while a growing number of scholars argued that accounting for the SESI would result in a different conclusion about the specific deterrent effect of imprisonment than previously assumed, this body of skepticism is not grounded in empirical evidence.

Stalking is an obsessive behavior. Legal definitions generally characterize stalking as repetitive conduct. It may therefore be expected that recidivism by stalkers is high. We investigated court statistics of stalking cases to establish which proportion relapses in stalking behavior after a conviction and what other types of new crimes they commit. Case files of stalking cases have been investigated to find out whether and which neutralization techniques are used by stalkers to justify harassing behaviors. Stalkers who do recidivate do so quickly after a conviction. They appear to make use of various neutralization techniques. There is a small group of highly obsessive stalkers that seems not to be stopped by any of the measures, sanctions, or interventions that are imposed.

Research on legal and extralegal disparity in criminal sentencing has been conducted primarily in the United States, and, to a lesser extent, in select European nations. Largely separate research literatures have developed around juvenile and adult sentencing decisions, and few studies examine both prosecutorial and judicial punishment outcomes. This study examines the effects of diverse legal and socio-demographic characteristics on both prosecutorial and judicial punishments, for both juveniles and adults. It assesses the broad generalizability of prior research and theorizing, analyzing punishment outcomes for all criminal suspects registered by the Public Prosecutor’s Office in the Netherlands in 2007. Results indicate that offense, case-processing and criminal history characteristics weigh heavily in prosecutorial and judicial decision-making. There are also direct effects of age, gender and nationality on both prosecutorial and sentencing decisions, for both juvenile and adult offenders, in the Dutch justice system. These findings are discussed in relation to the broad discretion exercised by Dutch court actors and the paper concludes with recommendations for future sentencing research in international contexts.

To date, in Western jurisdictions, many criminal justice reforms are devised and implemented with a close eye on public opinion. These are typically intended to regain or foster legitimacy. However, within this context, there is no common understanding of this concept. This essay aims to provide such a conceptualisation of legitimacy, to enable a consistent and systematic evaluation of attempts to accommodate public opinion. To this end, five levels of legitimacy research are discussed that could structure evaluations of public-opinion-targeted reforms: (1) the normative dimension, (2) the ‘audiences’ addressed, (3) the purpose of the reforms, (4) trust and distrust, and (5) dialogic, or longitudinal effects. Furthermore, since research departing from these five levels of analysis is likely to result in observations that are, by nature, incommensurable, it is argued that an overall assessment of legitimacy always requires ajudgment, rather than mere measurement.

In contrast to jurisdictions with bifurcated criminal justice proceedings, in Belgium and the Netherlands a defendant’s assessed risk of recidivism is known to triers of fact prior to making decisions about guilt. In three experiments conducted in those two countries, we investigated whether information about recidivism risk would bias the fact finders’ evaluations of evidence and the defendant’s credibility, and their final decision on guilt. Specifically, student participants (Belgian sample: N = 368; Dutch sample: N = 236) and jury-eligible Belgian participants (N = 75) read a vignette about an aggravated assault with circumstantial evidence and a defendant who denied committing the alleged offense. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three vignettes: one without risk information, one describing a low risk of recidivism, and one describing a high risk of recidivism. We found no direct or indirect effect of risk on the proportion of guilty verdicts or on the evaluation of the evidence. We did find that participants who read that the defendant was low risk evaluated the innocence claim as being more credible, compared to those who were given high-risk information or no risk information. Moreover, higher credibility ratings were associated with a higher likelihood of a not-guilty verdict. While preliminary, these findings suggest recidivism risk information may influence fact finding, and merit replication, especially with judges.