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Pre-Conference Workshop
Culturally Responsive Risk Assessment: Improving Case Formulation with Indigenous Persons
PRESENTERS: Dr. Brianne K. Layden; Dr. Alicia Nijdam-Jones; Mr. Brandon Burgess; Dr. Stephen D. Hart
DATE: June 17, 2024
TIME: 9am - 5pm
CONTINUING EDUCATION CREDITS: 7 credits
COST: $300 CAD (includes 2 catered coffee break; lunch NOT included)
DESCRIPTION:
The utility of forensic assessment with culturally diverse populations is a growing concern internationally. Culture is integral to an individual’s decision-making processes and social responses, influencing when or why someone engages in violence or other criminal behavior; however, most risk assessment measures and techniques have been developed and studied in the United States and Canada using predominantly non-Hispanic White samples (Singh et al., 2011). If a forensic risk assessment tool or technique is less effective for one cultural group, its use with that population disadvantages both the evaluated individual and the criminal legal system.
Members of marginalized and equity-seeking groups are internationally overrepresented in the criminal justice system, often due to issues of colonialism, racism, systemic bias, and socioeconomic disparities. For example, in the Canadian context, several landmark Supreme Court cases have attempted to reduce the overrepresentation of Indigenous people in the legal system by providing guidance and the consideration of cultural factors in sentencing decisions. Specifically, Section 718.2(e) of the Canadian Criminal Code (CCC) requires the judiciary to consider the unique circumstances impacting Indigenous offenders during sentencing (e.g., colonization) with the goal of reducing overrepresentation of Indigenous persons in custodial settings. The circumstances judges must consider were clarified in R v. Gladue (1999) and reaffirmed in R v. Ipeelee (2012). Unfortunately, in Canada, correctional centres have seen no reduction in the over-representation of Indigenous persons since the enactment of Section 718.2(e). Much of the discourse surrounding the problem of Indigenous over-representation in carceral settings has focused on the potential bias inherent to our legal system, with far less attention paid to how the work of risk or threat assessment professionals may have contributed to this problem.
Several years after R v. Ipeelee (2012), a pivotal case in the field of violence risk assessment, Ewert v. Canada (2015, 2018), raised the issue of whether actuarial violence risk assessment tools have sufficient validity for use with Indigenous persons. Following this case, a discussion ensued among scholars regarding the potential for unfairness in violence risk assessment processes and how evaluators may avoid such unfairness (e.g., Hart, 2016). One means of mitigating unfairness is to strive for an individualized or idiographic risk assessment rather than a statistical or predictive approach where the person is compared to a standardized sample. A cornerstone of idiographic risk assessment is culturally responsive case formulation: a careful analysis of the role that cultural factors may have played in a person’s decision-making with respect to violence (Hart et al., 2023). For example, are the factors influencing an Indigenous person’s risk primarily the unique circumstances specified in R v. Gladue (1999) that reflect the direct impact of colonization and, if so, can they be safely mitigated in the community? One of the challenges evaluators face when doing risk assessments with Indigenous persons is that many of the factors that the judiciary considers mitigating for Indigenous persons in sentencing are risk factors—that is, problems that are causally related to risk for violence. For example, intergenerational trauma and historical loss associated with colonization and Residential Schools can result in substance use, involvement with the criminal legal system, and psychological distress (Muir et al., 2023). At the same time, traumatic experiences, substance use, antisocial behavior, and symptoms of major mental disorders, are not only adverse outcomes to colonization, but they also serve as risk factors for violence. Furthermore, persistent discrimination and the perpetuation of colonial structures in forensic mental health services perpetuate harm. How then, can evaluators consider such risk factors in an individualized, culturally sensitive way?
This workshop will provide an overview of legal considerations specific to violence risk assessment with Indigenous individuals, including landmark cases and legislative mandates internationally. In addition, to provide an example of the effectiveness of legislative interventions to reduce over-representation of Indigenous persons, the workshop will include a brief overview of key findings from a mixed-method study of legal decisions in Canada between 1999 and 2022 (Layden, Nijdam-Jones, Burgess, & Hart, in progress). The workshop will also include a review of promising practices regarding culturally responsive case formulation and risk communication using the Structured Professional Judgment framework. Finally, the workshop will include a case review to illustrate culturally responsive case formulation with Indigenous persons in practice with special attention paid to the issue of mitigating and aggravating factors. Sections of sanitized sample reports will be shared with participants.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
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