Evaluative Paragraph Vitacco, M.J., Gonsalves, V., Tomony,

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Vitacco, M.J., Gonsalves, V., Tomony, J., Smith, B, Lishner, D.A. (2012). "Can standardized measures of risk predict inpatient violence?: Combining static and dynamic variables to improve accuracy." Criminal Justice and Behavior. 39: 589-606.

This particular source is concerned with the efficacy of the predictive prowess of a number of different methods for auguring which forensic inpatients are likely to commit acts of violence in clinical settings. Based on a literature review that indicated that the subsequent measures demonstrated a degree of veracity in predicting inmate violence, the authors of this article analyzed the results of both static and dynamic factors that were shown to influence forensic inpatient violence. Specifically, the study conducted within this paper utilized three types of tests: the Violence Risk Appraisal Guide (VRAG), the Historical Clinical Risk-20, and the Psychopathic Checklist-Revised as well as the Psychopathy Checklist Screening Version. The results of this study indicate that all three of these tests proved to demonstrate a fair amount of accuracy in predicting inmate violence. However, one of the most noteworthy findings in this study was that the assessment of static factors vs. those of dynamic (or changeable) factors did not prove more reliable than the other in predicting inmate violence. In fact, the study determined that "combining static and dynamic measures further enhance the prediction of inmate violence" (Vitacco et al., 2012, p. 603). This reference is probably most useful for its fairly comprehensive literature review on both the positive and negative attributes associated with testing for inmate violence. Furthermore, this reference paves the way for future studies to ascertain which factors actually can be more accurate in predicting inmate violence, static or dynamic. It was also fairly noteworthy to see that psychopathy, which previous research indicated had a tenuous relationship at best at predicting inmate violence, was actually validated within the present study.

Williams, E.J., Robinson, M. (2004). "Ideology and criminal justice: Suggestions for a pedagogical model." Journal of Criminal Justice Education. 15 (2): 373-392.

This is a rather interesting source that looks at the field of criminal justice as an academic discipline that is considerably deficient in the typical ideology that accompanies most other disciplines that constitute the humanities. The author's explore this deficiency by examining the historical basis for the study of criminal justice in the United States, and eventually conclude that there is a marked lack of ideology in the involvement of teaching this subject within postsecondary institutions. By examining traditional criminal justice pedagogical constructs in relation to both classicism and positivism views of ideology, the authors of this article determine that there is a distinct dearth of the latter in criminal justice education, and that it merely focuses on emphasizing punishment and not presenting enough ideological values that fuel the very institutions in which criminal justice is carried out. The historical basis for this article provides a fairly succinct summary of the traditional educational modules and their deficiencies for teaching criminal justice. The true value in this particular, reference, however, is in the ideological-based model that the authors offer to provide the theory that is indicative of most humanities studies into the discipline of criminal justice. The basis for this ideology would be to teach students the two conflicting philosophies regarding criminal justice, liberalism and conservatism, so that students will be able to apply both of these philosophical tenets to specific cases in which people's lives are hanging in the balance. This source is quite adamant in reiterating that at the time of its writing, there was very little ideological education concerned with the aforementioned viewpoints (or many others, for that matter), and that doing so is akin to "equipping students with the cognitive skills to understand the functioning of law-making, policing, courts, and corrections" (Williams & Robinson, 2004, p. 390).

Ballucci, D. (2012). "Subverting and negotiating risk assessment: A case study of the LSI in a Canadian youth custody facility." Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice.