SJCACC_SUPPORTING STATEMENT Part A revised

SUPPORTING STATEMENT
2014 Survey of Juveniles Charged in Adult Criminal Court (SJCACC)
The Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) proposes to implement a survey of criminal court cases
disposed in 2014 involving persons under the age of 18 (i.e., juveniles) who were charged as
adults.. The goal of the Survey of Juveniles Charged in Adult Criminal Court (SJCACC) is to
produce accurate and reliable case processing statistics on these cases. Core data to be obtained
by this project include demographics of the juvenile, offense(s) charged, method of arrival in
criminal court (i.e., legislative exclusion, juvenile court waiver, or prosecutorial discretion), type
of legal representation of the defendant, and adjudication and sentencing information. This
survey is the only one of its kind that will be able to provide national information on the
processing of juveniles in adult criminal court. Currently, while some states publish statistics on
such cases, those interested in juvenile offending and the justice system response have no
national data on how many juvenile cases are processed in adult courts, the offenses with which
the juveniles are charged, and the outcomes of these cases. In addition, this collection will allow
for comparisons with the case outcomes of similarly situated juveniles processed in juvenile
courts using data collected by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention
(OJJDP).
Currently this project will be implemented as a standalone project. However, once BJS
overcomes unforeseen hurdles faced by the National Judicial Reporting Program (NJRP) which
will collect information on all criminal case processing in state courts, the SJCACC may be
implemented as a recurring supplement to NJRP in the future.
A. Justification
1. Necessity of Information Collection
Under Title 42, United States Code Section 3732 (see Attachment 1), BJS is directed to collect
and analyze statistical information concerning the operation of the criminal justice system at the
federal, state, and local levels. An essential component of the criminal justice system is the
judicial system.
Juveniles (i.e., persons under age 18) can be prosecuted in adult court through a variety of
mechanisms. Depending on state legislation, alleged juvenile law violations can be handled in
the adult criminal court based 1) solely on the age of the youth, 2) on the offense charged, 3) on a
combination of offense charged, age, and elements of the crime (e.g., use of a firearm), 4) on
prior criminal history, 5) on the decision of a juvenile court judge, or 6) on the discretion of the
prosecutor. There are no national statistics that comprehensively examine the number and
demographic characteristics of these juveniles, the legal mechanisms that placed these youth in
an adult court, the crimes with which they are charged, and the outcomes of their cases. These
cases can result in a lifelong criminal history and incarceration in an adult facility, outcomes that
1

would not have occurred had their cases been processed in a juvenile court. Society has a
substantial interest in preventing juvenile offenders from committing future crimes and many
researchers believe that prosecuting juveniles as adults increased the likelihood of future
offending.1
BJS has previously collected data on juveniles charged with felonies processed in adult criminal
court. The report Juvenile Felony Defendants in Criminal Courts: State Court Processing
Statistics, 1990-94 (Strom, Smith, and Snyder 1998) uses three years of State Court Processing
Statistics (SCPS) data from the nation’s 75 largest counties. In the 1998 SCPS BJS oversampled
juvenile cases to obtain enough information on this group in one year. The results from this
effort were published in Juvenile Felony Defendants in Criminal Courts, 1998 (Rainville and
Smith 2003). Both of these studies found that in the 75 largest counties, juveniles processed in
adult criminal court were largely black males and were largely charged with a violent offense.
The National Judicial Reporting Program (NJRP) collected biannual information on felony
sentences in state courts, and in 1996 contained a large enough sub-sample of juvenile-age
felony cases to support a special analysis of this group, as reported in State Court Sentencing of
Convicted Felons (Levin, Langan, and Brown 2000). This study found that just over half of
juvenile-age felony cases had a violent offense as the conviction offense.
The data presented in these reports, while useful, are dated and limited. SCPS only contained
urban counties; given that the prosecution of juveniles in criminal court is heavily influenced by
state law, counties with small populations may contribute a disproportionate share of the national
total of juveniles prosecuted in adult criminal court. NJRP only collected information on
convicted felony cases so critical information of dismissed felony cases was not available from
NJRP. In addition, neither data collection obtained information on juvenile misdemeanor cases
in adult court.
Other data on the processing of alleged juvenile offenders in courts includes OJJDP’s collection
on juvenile cases processed in juvenile court.2 While this collection does not include
information on juveniles processed in adult criminal court, it does captured information on the
transfer of juveniles to adult court through judicial waiver (one of the many pathways for a
juvenile case to be handled in a criminal court).
Two BJS correctional population collections, the National Prisoner Statistics (NPS) and the
National Corrections Reporting Program (NCRP), collect information on some juveniles
incarcerated in adult facilities. NPS provides state-level aggregate age profiles of persons
entering prison and of persons in prisons at the annual one-day counts. The NCRP contains
1

Hahn, R. A., McGowan, A., Liberman, A., Crosby, A., Fullilove, M., Johnson, R., Moscicki, E., Price, L., Snyder,
S., Farris T., Lowy, J., Briss, P., Cory, S., & Stone, G. (2007). Effects on violence of laws and policies facilitating
the transfer of youth from the juvenile to the adult justice system. Atlanta, GA: Centers for Disease Control.
2
Those data are housed in the National Juvenile Court Data Archive and are available for analysis

2

demographic, offense type, and sentencing information on each person entering state prisons for
the 42 states currently submitting data. Both of these collections have limited utility to describe
cases of juveniles handled in adult courts because they either collect information on the ages of
the offenders as they enter state prisons or their ages at the date of a one-day count. Many
juveniles tried in adult court for crimes committed under age 18 do not reach state prison until
after their 18th birthdays; therefore, while NPS and NCRP may be able to identify those juveniles
sentenced to prison who enter prison before their 18th birthdays, the two data collections will not
be able to identify those who enter after the 18th birthdays.
In summary, neither BJS nor any other organization is collecting national data on juveniles
charged in adult criminal court; in addition, what little information is available is both limited in
scope and dated. The SJCACC will provide a national picture of juveniles processed in adult
criminal court. This population is of great interest to practitioners, policy makers and the public.
It is also of interest to BJS because these high risk youth and the justice systems’ reactions to
them affect trends in case flow through the courts and the correctional systems, and if research is
correct, the recidivism patterns of convicted offenders and released prisoners.
2. Needs and Uses
Individuals younger than 18 reach the criminal courts primarily as a result of the operation of
two general categories of state laws-jurisdictional age laws and exclusion laws.




Jurisdictional age laws set age limits to the original jurisdiction of juvenile courts. In
most states the upper age of delinquency jurisdiction is 17—meaning (in most states) that
youth accused of violating the law before turning 18 are routinely handled in juvenile
court, while those accused of doing so on or after their 18th birthdays are handled in
criminal courts. However, as of 2014, nine states had an upper age of 16 (Georgia,
Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Texas,
and Wisconsin) — meaning that youth accused of offenses committed after their 17th
birthdays are routinely processed in criminal courts. In addition, as of 2014, two states
had an upper age of 15 (New York and North Carolina) — meaning that youth accused of
offenses committed after their 16th birthdays are routinely processed in criminal courts.
Exclusion laws provide for exceptions to the general jurisdictional age laws—allowing
or requiring certain categories of offenders to be prosecuted as adults in criminal court,
even though they fall on the juvenile side of the jurisdictional age line. All states have
exclusion laws, though they vary considerably from state to state in their scope and
operation. The basic categories of these laws include (1) judicial waiver laws that
allows a juvenile court judge to waive jurisdiction in defined circumstances, opening the
way for criminal prosecution; (2) concurrent jurisdiction/prosecutorial discretion laws
that designate a class of cases that a prosecutor may file in either juvenile or criminal
court; and (3) statutory exclusion laws granting criminal courts exclusive original
jurisdiction over certain classes of cases involving juvenile-age offenders (essentially an
exception determine by the state legislators).

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Basic jurisdictional age laws do not change often. However, state exclusion laws changed
extensively in the closing decades of the 20th century, and particularly during the 1990s. Almost
every state revised or rewrote its exclusion laws during this period, adopting new exclusion
mechanism, broadening eligibility for exclusion, shifting these decision-making responsibilities
from juvenile court judges to prosecutors, and/or replacing flexible and individualized
consideration with categorical handling. While most states had some form of exclusion law
before 1970, only eight states had laws that made handling of juveniles in criminal court
automatic for certain categories—either by mandating juvenile court waiver in certain cases or
by requiring that some cases be filed initially in criminal court—and even these tended to apply
only to rare offenses, such as murder or capital crimes. Only two states—Florida and Georgia—
had laws giving prosecutors the option to charge some juveniles in criminal court. By the end of
the 1990s, the number of states with automatic exclusion laws had jumped to 38, and the number
with prosecutorial discretion laws had jumped to 15. In addition, in many states automatic or
prosecutor-controlled exclusion statutes that had been narrow and focused were dramatically
expanded in their coverage.
Virtually all of these changes tended to expose more youth to criminal handling and to make the
exclusion exceptions a more prominent part of the nation’s response to juvenile offending.
However, for the most part, the actual consequences of the historic expansion of exclusion laws
have never been quantified on a national scale.
Both jurisdictional age and exclusion laws enable juveniles to be housed in adult correctional
settings, as federal mandates that generally prohibit the mixing of juvenile and adult offenders do
not apply to juveniles processed through the adult court system. Due to their age, juveniles in
adult prisons may both pose more risks to others and face increased risks themselves as
compared to the adult population.3
Various aspects of the processing of juveniles in adult criminal court have been examined in
research and government reports over the years. Topics have included waivers, recidivism, and
comparisons with juveniles processed in juvenile court. The scopes of the studies were generally
limited to subnational populations, limited to a few states or to basic counts of the numbers of
juveniles waived.4 State-specific research has also been conducted, including reports on Texas,5

3

Juveniles in Adult Prisons and Jails: A National Assessment. 2000.
https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/bja/182503.pdf
4
For an extensive literature review on what research is currently available on the processing of juveniles in adult
court, consult The Impact of Prosecuting Youth in the Adult Criminal Justice System, July 2010.
http://nicic.gov/Library/024827
5
Deitch, Michelle. Juveniles in the Adult Criminal Justice System in Texas, 2011
http://www.utexas.edu/lbj/sites/default/files/file/news/juvenilestexas--final.pdf

4

New York,6 Missouri,7 and Florida.8 As with the previous studies, often this research only
examined a portion of juveniles processed as adults, such as only those transferred, or only those
in adult court through jurisdictional age laws and therefore did not include the entire population
of juveniles charged in adult criminal court within that state.
Unlike previous collection efforts, the SJCACC will provide comprehensive data that will allow
for national estimates of all juveniles processed in adult criminal court. It will also collect
information on juveniles in adult criminal court due to jurisdictional age laws, thus allowing for
comparisons of how juveniles of the same age and charged with the same crimes are treated in
adult court when the cases come to the court by different legal mechanics.
Among the research questions the SJCACC data will be able to address are:







How many cases involving youth under age 18 were disposed in the nation’s adult
criminal court in 2014?
What types of offenses were charged?
What were the demographic characteristics of juveniles charged in adult criminal court?
What were the case outcomes?
How many of these cases arrived at criminal court through the various legal pathways?
How did the case characteristics and case outcomes vary with legal pathway?

The core data of interest covered by the SJCACC include the following: demographics of the
juveniles; arrest and charge information; arraignment information; adjudication information;
sentencing information; and data on how a juvenile arrived in adult court (age exclusion or type
of exclusion). The information outlined below to be collected on the juveniles and their cases
will allow BJS to produce the first national description of juvenile cases processed in adult
criminal court.


Defendant information: The information collected on the juvenile will include date of
birth, sex, race and ethnicity, case ID, defendant ID, and fingerprint ID. Date of birth is
necessary to determine if a juvenile is in adult court due to age exclusion laws. BJS will
also use this and the other demographic information (sex, race, and ethnicity) to report on
the nature of the juvenile population processed in adult court. This information, along
with charge and conviction information, will allow for comparisons with juveniles

6

Peterson, Ruth. Youthful Offender Designations and Sentencing in the New York Criminal Courts, Social
Problems. Vol. 35, n. 2, 1988.
7
Brown, Michael P. and Jill D’Angelo. Missouri Juvenile Justice Reform Act of 1995, Criminal Justice Policy
Review, vol. 314, 2008.
8
Lanza-Kaduce, Lonn, Charles E. Frazier, Jodi Lane, and Donna M. Bishop. Juvenile Transfer to Criminal Court
Study: Final Report. Florida Department of Juvenile Justice, 2002.
http://www.prisonpolicy.org/scans/juveniletransfers.pdf

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









processed in juvenile court. Case ID and defendant ID will be used to link juveniles with
their cases. Fingerprint ID will be obtained to allow for future recidivism studies.
Arrest and charge information: This information will include date of the offense, date of
arrest, number of charges at arrest, and information on the charges at arrest (i.e., statute
number, offense name, felony/misdemeanor distinction, and level/grade). The date of
offense and date of arrest are needed to determine method of arrival in adult court. The
charge data will be used by BJS to report on the types and seriousness of the offenses
with which juveniles in adult court are charged. These can be compared with conviction
information, when applicable.
Arraignment information: This information will include date of arraignment, the type of
legal representation at arraignment, the number of charges at arraignment, and
information on the charges at arraignment (i.e., statute number, offense name,
felony/misdemeanor distinction, and level/grade). Date of arraignment is important for
determining case processing time. Charges at arraignment information will be used by
BJS to report on both the seriousness of the offenses at this stage of case processing and
to compare with arrest charges and conviction charges, if applicable. Legal
representation will be used by BJS to report on the type of counsel involved in the case at
arraignment. This is an important measure of fairness in criminal case processing. These
data will document the use of legal counsel including the type of counsel (e.g. public
defenders, private counsel, other types of attorneys) for this unique population of
defendants.
Adjudication information: BJS will collect information on date of final adjudication;
type of adjudication/conviction (i.e., no contest, bench trial, or jury trial) and
nonconviction type (i.e., dismissal, nolle prosequi, bench trial, and jury trial); information
on the charges at adjudication (i.e., statute number, offense name, felony/misdemeanor
distinction, and level/grade), and the type of legal representation at adjudication. As with
the other stages, the charge data are important to BJS to report on seriousness of
convictions in addition to the change in charges at each stage of case processing.
Sentencing information: The type of sentence ordered for convicted juveniles will include
type and length of sentence imposed (e.g., probation, jail, prison, youthful offender
facility, juvenile facility, fine, restitution, treatment and/or counseling, or a blended
sentence). Such information will allow BJS to report on the type and seriousness of
sentence for convicted juveniles. As with the other information in this collection, it can
be used to compare the processing of juveniles in adult court across the various legal
pathways and with the processing of similarly situated juveniles in juvenile court.
Legal mechanism information: Juveniles can arrive at adult court through various legal
pathways. Documenting the pathway used in each case will allow BJS to report on the
arrival mechanism of juveniles in adult court, and how the characteristics of the juveniles
and their cases vary by each mechanism.

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BJS will use these data to produce national estimates of the processing of juveniles charged in
adult criminal court. With these data BJS will report on the legal mechanisms that drove the
juvenile cases into an adult court, the demographics of the juveniles, the case types and the case
outcomes. BJS needs this information to better understand the nature and flow of these high
profile matters through the justice system. The cases of juveniles processed in criminal courts
present a unique challenge to the justice system. Given the range of issues these cases bring with
them (i.e., from the legal questions of mental competency; to the strain that handling these young
people place on legal services, adult pretrial and other adult custody providers; to the ongoing
social pressures felt by system actors from those who question the appropriateness of handling
and sanctioning juveniles as adults), these cases bring with them added layers of complexity than
most criminal court cases and, therefore, absorb a disproportionate amount of justice system
resources and attention. Clearly, BJS needs to have a better understanding of these cases. In
addition, while important in their own right, quantifying the volume and nature of these cases
will help BJS better understand overall variations and trends in justice system processing and
costs.
BJS also needs to conduct the SJCACC to judge the feasibility of using administrative data from
courts across the country to support its broader needs for detailed criminal court processing data.
In the past year BJS tried to implement the National Judicial Reporting Program (NJRP) using a
similar model of data collection. Early on in the NJRP work state courts raised concerns about
the capacity of their administrative data to support such a national data collection effort. BJS
believes it needs to prove to the criminal justice community that such an approach is possible,
practical and cost-efficient. Therefore, instead on beginning with a data collection effort with the
broad goal of capturing information on all criminal cases (which is NJRP), BJS has chosen to
focus the administrative data collection on a low volume but high profile case type that the
criminal justice community has lobbied BJS for years to investigate. Hopefully, when the
SJCACC is successful, BJS will be able convince state courts of the value to them (as well as the
nation) of the new NJRP collection modality and the stalled project will be back on track. Once
BJS’ core court collection (NJRP) is implemented, the SJCACC will likely be incorporated as a
recurring supplement, thereby providing recurring data on juveniles charged in adult criminal
court.
It is expected that many constituencies will use the data collected by the SJCACC. Others who
have expressed interest in the data or are expected to use the data include other Department of
Justice and federal agencies, state policy makers, corrections officials, and researchers.


OJJDP funds data collection and research related to juveniles processed in the justice
system. As noted earlier, OJJDP funds the collection of data on juveniles processed in
juvenile court, and is interested in using that data to compare to information collected by

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the SJCACC. These two collections can be used to compare the outcomes of similarly
situated juveniles in juvenile vs. adult criminal court.


State policy makers and researchers can use the SJCACC data to examine and predict the
impact of proposed policy changes in exclusion and age laws by comparing the volumes
and outcomes of juvenile cases processed under the various transfer mechanisms.



Finally, the nature of the proposed data collection (i.e., the complete enumeration of these
cases in states with statewide electronic court information systems) will support more
detailed subnational comparative studies of states with similar and with different legal
structures for handling juveniles as adults.

3. Use of Information Technology
SJCACC will largely consist of the collection of electronic data files from states and counties.
BJS will provide the respondents with technical assistance as needed to minimize respondents’
efforts in data collection and to improve data quality control. Respondents will have the option
to 1) provide a uniform or non-uniform extract of only the relevant data or 2) a download of a
larger data file that the BJS data collection agent will format into a file suitable for analysis. The
BJS data collection agent will provide the respondents with a secure method for data transfer and
will work with the respondent to determine the data format and completeness of the data. For
those who are unable to provide data electronically, a paper case-level data collection form will
be available. BJS’ experience with its other collections show that electronic data submission
greatly reduces burden relative to other methods of collection. BJS and the SJCACC contractors
will evaluate submitted data using automated logic checks to uncover high rates of missing and
out-of-range values.
Publications resulting from the SJCACC will be generated in electronic formats and will be
available on the BJS website.
4. Efforts to Identify Duplication
The SJCACC is not duplicated by any other federal agency or program, as BJS is the only
government agency to collect national level data on state adult criminal court.9
A search of the National Criminal Justice Reference Service repository and other internet search
engines did not reveal any other similar projects. The information is not attainable from any
current BJS data collections. BJS has worked closely with other agencies in the Office of Justice
Programs, such as OJDDP, to prevent duplication of efforts. In addition, BJS has received

9

As noted previously, OJJDP’s court collection on juveniles is for juveniles processed in juvenile court.

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numerous letters of support from parties such as judges and researchers noting the lack of data on
this topic and the necessity of collection of this information.
5. Efforts to Minimize Burden
In an effort to minimize respondents’ burden, there are multiple methods with which they can
submit data. If feasible, they can provide electronic data downloads. These downloads may be
either formatted or unformatted (the data collection agent will process unformatted files if
necessary). If not feasible, the data collection plan allows the respondents to submit data through
a paper-based questionnaire. In addition, the contractors hired by BJS to conduct the SJCACC
will recode state statutes and other data fields into standard BJS codes, which will significantly
reduce the burden on participating jurisdictions.
6. Consequences of Less Frequent Collection
BJS has never collected nationally representative data on juveniles processed in adult criminal
court. The last systematic data BJS collected was at a subnational level in the 1990s. This is the
only data collection that will be able to present national level estimates of juvenile cases in adult
courts and compare methods of transfer to adult court. In the future, if BJS is able to implement
a national collection collecting all adult criminal cases, the data on juveniles will be collected on
an annual basis. Otherwise, these data will be collected every two to three years so changes in
legislation and court practices in the processing of juveniles can be measured. Letters of support
for this work received from the field document the current need for this information.
7. Special Circumstances
No special circumstances have been identified.
8. Adherence to 5 CFR 1320.8(d) and Outside Consultations
The SJCACC collection is consistent with the guidelines in 5 CFR 1320.8(d). The 60 and 30 day
notices for public commentary were published in the Federal Register.
In the design and development of the SJCACC, BJS has consulted with policymakers, research
specialists, and practitioners who specialize in juvenile case processing and in court electronic
record systems. These consultations occurred through interagency meetings, conferences, and
visits to state court administrative offices. Some of the agencies consulted include the Office of
Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Westat, state court administrators, the National
Center for Juvenile Justice (NCJJ), and the National Center for State Courts (NCSC). Through
these discussions the relevant research questions were developed and the questionnaire and
extract guide were designed.
9. Paying Respondents

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No gifts or incentives will be given. If needed, BJS will hire state and local staff for their time to
collect the data.
10. Assurance of Confidentiality
All information that has the potential to identify individuals (e.g., felon’s name) will be held
confidential according to Title 42, United States Code, Section 3789g. A letter from the Director
of BJS will notify respondents that the data will be held confidential and that participation is
voluntary.
11. Justification for Sensitive Questions
There are no questions of a sensitive nature.
12. Estimate of Respondent Burden
The SJCACC data collection will employ various methods to obtain data from states and
localities. To determine the burden imposed on respondents, estimates were obtained from
criminal court data providers in addition to other court data collections such as the State Court
Processing Statistics (SCPS, OMB number 1121-0306) and studies done by OJJDP on juvenile
court processing. Similar to the SJCACC, both of these collections require the processing of
electronic court records. The SCPS collection entails the submission of electronic records from
both states and counties containing almost all of the variables necessary for the SJCACC.
For the 28 states with state-wide electronic record systems, electronic files will be submitted for
the SJCACC. These files can be either a uniform extract, which will have a pre-defined file and
data structure for the SJCACC that will be provided to the court prior to the beginning of data
collection; a non-uniform extract, which is a data file that contains the information necessary for
the SJCACC in whatever structure the court decides; and a data dump, which is a file containing
information beyond that required for the SJCACC.
Information on the ability of states to provide electronic data files was obtained through both the
SCPS collection and surveys on state court administrative records systems conducted by the
National Center for State Courts (NCSC). NCSC routinely provides technical assistance to states
regarding their court information systems, and they therefore regularly survey the states about
the capabilities of these systems. BJS used this information in conjunction with its experience
with the availability of electronic records for SCPS to develop the burden estimate and the
sampling strategy.

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Survey of Juveniles Charged in Adult Criminal Courts Burden Hour Estimates
Instrument
Number of
Average Number
Average Burden
Respondents
of Responses per
Hours per
Respondent
Response
Uniform Extract
31
1 file
823
Non-uniform
132
Extract
Unformatted
122
Electronic Data
Files (Data Dump)
Sampled counties
185
(Electronic data
files)
Sampled counties
95
(Teleform Survey
of Juveniles
Charged in Adult
Court)
Summary Tables
224
Estimated Total Annual Burden Hours

Total Burden
Hours
246

1 file

623

806

1 file

433

516

—

146

252

407

28

729 (720 plus 9
hours contact)

1 table/report

1

22
2,571

— Burden estimates do not vary with number of respondent/records/cases. Burden to submit files with
1,000 records/cases is no different than burden to submit files with 100,000 records/cases. Burden
depends more on the complexity/sophistication of the information system and the skill of the person
extracting the data from it.
1
Based on assumption that jurisdictions will prefer simpler data preparation over the more complex task
of preparing a Uniform Data Extract.
2
Based on assessments of state data system capabilities routinely conducted by NCSC and an assumption
that jurisdictions will prefer simpler data preparation over the more complex task of preparing a Uniform
Data Extract.
3
Based on file preparation estimates from the State Court Processing Statistics (SCPS) and the National
Juvenile Court Data Archive.
4
For use in producing sampling based estimates.
5
Based on estimate of selecting 18 PSUs from states with no statewide electronic data systems. We
estimate 12 PSUs will have 18 counties with electronic data systems and 6 PSUs will have 9 counties
requiring sampling for surveys.
6
Based on SCPS estimate of time to program a sample selection program for the non-pretrial data
elements.
7
Based on a recommended upper limit for paper data entry of 50 cases and estimates that sampled PSUs
using these modes of data reporting will have 40 cases on average. Sampled PSUs with caseloads larger
than 50 will be urged to submit data files.
8
Based on estimates from criminal court data providers who reviewed survey instrument.

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For the estimated 12 responding states providing unformatted electronic data files it is estimated
that it will take one hour to respond to the contractor and grant permission to obtain the data.
They will spend 32 hours on the preparation and submission of the files and an additional 10
hours of correspondence with the contractor as the contractor processes and develops an
understanding of the files. For these states, the total burden is an estimated 516 hours.
The time spent preparing a file will be greater for those respondents providing some form of
extract, while the time spent corresponding with the contractor will be less than those submitting
an unformatted file. For the estimated 13 respondents submitting a non-uniform extract, it is
estimated they will spend one hour to respond to the contractor and grant permission to obtain
the data, an average of 56 hours on preparation and submission of the files and an additional 5
hours of correspondence with the contractor. For these states, the total burden is an estimated
806 hours. The three responding states believed to be able to provide a uniform extract will
spend one hour to respond to the contractor and grant permission to obtain the data, an average
of 80 hours on their submissions, and an additional hour of correspondence, for a total burden of
246 hours.
The remaining 22 states that do not provide electronic data will be stratified by transfer method
and size. Each of these states will then be divided into primary sampling units (PSUs) that will
have one or more counties. Eighteen of these PSUs will be selected with probability
proportional to size, taking one or two PSUs per stratum depending on the distribution of the
stratification characteristics. Once the 18 PSUs are selected, it will be determined which of the
constituent counties in the PSUs have electronic data systems and which do not. For those
counties with electronic data, all cases will be processed; for those counties without an electronic
system, their cases will be sampled. It is estimated that 18 counties in 12 of the selected PSUs
will have electronic files, that they will spend one hour to respond to the contractor and grant
permission to obtain the data, and that these files will require 12 hours on average for the
respondent to process and one hour of correspondence, for a total of 252 hours. An estimated
nine counties in six PSUs will complete Teleform surveys, with one hour to respond to the
contractor and grant permission to obtain the data. Completion of the case sampling and the
paper survey for an average of 40 counties will require an average of two hours, for a total
burden for the nine counties of 729 hours. These 22 states will also be asked to provide state
summaries to be used in adjusting for nonresponse and coverage, and to improve the precision of
sample based estimates. It is estimated it will take each of these states 1 hour to provide the
summary tables.
It is estimated that in total the respondent burden will be 2,571 hours.
The least successful anticipated scenario is that BJS receives statewide data from only 25% of
states with state-wide data, or seven states. While this scenario is unlikely, the burden estimate
12

will increase, as the number of sampled counties would increase to 116, thus increasing the
number of respondents. The burden estimate for the 25% scenario is provided in the table below.
It is estimated the total burden would increase to 4,677 hours.
Survey of Juveniles Charged in Adult Criminal Courts Burden Hour Estimates
Instrument
Uniform Extract
Non-uniform
Extract
Unformatted
Electronic Data
Files (Data
Dump)
Sampled counties
(Electronic data
files)
Sampled counties
(Teleform Survey
of Juveniles
Charged in Adult
Court)

25% Statewide
Success

Average Number
of Responses per
Respondent

Average Burden
Hours per
Response

Total Burden
Hours

11

1 file

823

82

32

1 file

623

186

32

1 file

433

129

775

—

146

1078

39

5

Summary Tables
43
Estimated Total Annual Burden Hours

40

7

1 table/report

2

8

1

3159
(3120 plus 39
hours contact)
43
4,677

13. Estimate of Respondent’s Cost Burden
We do not expect respondents to incur any costs other than the time to respond. The information
requested is of the type and scope normally carried in their records and no special hardware or
accounting software or system is necessary to provide information for this data collection.
Respondents are not expected to incur any capital, start-up, or system maintenance costs in
responding. Further, purchasing of outside accounting or information collection services, if
performed by the respondent, is part of the usual and customary business practices and not
specifically required for this information.
14. Costs to Federal Government
The total expected cost to the federal government for this data collection is estimated to be up to
$813,210 over a two year period. This work consists of planning, developing the questionnaires,

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preparation of materials, collecting the data, evaluating the results, and generating the reports. A
BJS GS-level 13 statistician will be responsible for overseeing the project.
Estimated costs for the Suvery of Juveniles Charged in Adult Criminal Court (SJCACC) project
BJS costs
Staff salaries
GS-13 Statistician (25%)
$23,000
GS-15 Supervisory Statistician (3%)
$5,000
GS-13 Editor (10%)
$9,000
Other Editorial Staff
$5,000
Front-Office Staff (Deputy Directors and
Directors)
$3,000
Subtotal salaries
$45,000
Fringe benefits (28% of salaries)
$13,000
Subtotal salaries and fringe
$58,000
Other administrative costs of salary and fringe
(15%)
$8,750
Subtotal BJS costs
$66,750
Data Collection Agent (Westat/NCJJ)
Direct salaries
Indirect costs
Reimbursement to states and localities
Computing and supplies
Subtotal: Data collection Agent (Westat/NCJJ)
Total estimated costs

$376,571
$214,913
$127,286
$31,190
$749,960
$816,710

15. Reason for Change in Burden
Not applicable to this project. New data collection.
16. Project Schedule and Publication Plan
This project will be completed according to the following schedule:
Planning and preparation
(Includes OMB review):
Data collection:
Data review and evaluation:
Publication:
Archive data:

January 2014 – November 2014
January 2015 – December 2015
February 2015 – February 2016
May 2016 – July 2016
May 2016

After securing OMB approval, the SJCACC data collection will occur from January 2015 to
December 2015. A letter from the BJS director will be sent to inform respondents about the
SJCACC 2014 in October of 2014 (see Attachment 2). The data collector will begin to process
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the electronic files for states and counties in January 2015. When it is determined which
respondents require the hardcopy Teleform survey, they will be sent instrument for completion.
The data will be compared against aggregate statistics available from the states. For both the
electronic data and the questionnaire submissions, respondents will be contacted by telephone or
e-mail to discuss any inconsistencies in the data.
As part of verification of the data, preliminary analyses will begin as soon as each data
submission is received. This will allow for callbacks with the respondents to clarify the data.
Once data collection is complete, the final data will be used to produce two types of reports: one
type will describe the characteristics of juveniles charged in adult criminal court and their case
outcomes, and the other will be a technical report on the feasibility of utilizing administrative
court data to produce national level case processing statistics.
The first report, Juvenile Transfers to Adult Criminal Court, 2014, will contain information on
the demographic information of the defendants, information on how they arrived in adult
criminal court (type of transfer, legislative exclusion), the distribution of charges at arrangement
and conviction, and sentencing outcomes.
The second report, Use of Administrative Data to Produce National Case Processing StatisticsTechnical Report, will focus on the technical aspects of using administrative court data to
produce national statistics. Analyses of the quality of the data, including the percent missing by
variable and the coverage of the data, such as whether some cases are excluded from the files
will be reported. For variables with significant missing, analyses to determine the randomness of
the missing will be conducted and potential imputation methods will be developed. This report
will document the utility of each state’s data for producing statistics on case processing and the
limitations that impact their utility.
17. Display of Expiration Date
The expiration date will be shown on the paper data collection form.
18. Exception to the Certificate Statement
Not applicable to this project. New data collection.

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