The Role of the Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist in the Adjudicatory Assessment.

When courts look to mental health professionals to help inform legal decisions, psychiatrists are key members of the skilled clinicians qualified to respond. Child and adolescent psychiatrists are in a unique position to apply their diagnostic acumen and expertise in psychopharmacology to adjudicatory assessments. Key components of these evaluations include diagnostic assessment, risk assessment, treatment amenability, and specific recommendations for available treatment.

Commentary: nuances of reverse-waiver evaluations of adolescents in adult criminal court.

Several factors influence a judge's decision to transfer youthful defendants to juvenile court from adult court, including the forensic evaluator's ultimate opinion, the defendant's amenability to treatment, and public safety risk. In this commentary, we examine the constructs that evaluators must assess, as established by Kent v. United States (1966).

Psychotropic medication patterns among youth in juvenile justice.

This paper aims to determine the prevalence, patterns, and demographic and diagnostic correlates of psychotropic medication use in a sample of youth in one state's post-adjudicatory secure facilities. The health records database of the facilities was the source of linked demographic, diagnostic and pharmacy information for the 1-year period ending June 30, 2008. Age, gender, race, offense, prior petitions and diagnoses were examined across groups, and concomitant psychotropic pharmacotherapy patterns were identified.