The federal Post Conviction Risk Assessment (PCRA): a construction and validation study

Offender assessment has been and remains the cornerstone of effective community supervision. This article presents the development of and tests the predictive validity of a 4th-generation risk assessment instrument designed for U.S. probation. A large administrative data set was used to create the assessment instrument and conduct an initial validation. Subsequent data generated from officer-completed assessments were used to conduct a prospective validation. Finally, data from case vignettes scored by trained officers were used to test the interrater agreement of the assessment instrument. Overall, analysis revealed that the assessment instrument predicted rearrest reliably when using the assessment results based on administrative data or officer-completed assessments. Analysis also revealed high rates of interrater agreement. Recommendations for future research and policy implications are presented.