The Moderating Influence of Poverty on Criminal Justice Processing

There has been a considerable amount of research examining the role that poverty might play in the development of crime and with being processed through the criminal justice system. Despite this research, there still remain some important gaps in the knowledge base, including whether poverty differentially moderates the effects of criminal behavior and criminogenic influences on being processed through the criminal justice system. The current study addressed this gap by examining whether poverty in adolescence moderated the influence of antisocial behavior and criminogenic influences on being arrested, convicted, and incarcerated in adulthood. Findings revealed little evidence of poverty as a moderating influence on criminal justice processing. The one exception, however, was that poverty moderated the association between antisocial behavior and incarceration such that antisocial behavior had no association on incarceration for persons living in poverty, but that it had a statistically significant and positive association with incarceration for persons not living in poverty. The results of this study are discussed in relation to the existing literature on the poverty-crime nexus.