The Critical Case File Approach: A Novel Tool for Critically Analyzing Mixed-Method Data as Exemplified in a Juvenile Legal Setting.

Current criminology and corrections research is limited in its ability to fully conceptualize and analyze inequities in the legal systems' response to young people, particularly those with multiple marginalized identities. This article presents a novel methodological framework-the Critical Case File (CCF) approach-to advance methodological innovations in criminal and juvenile legal system research. Specifically, the CCF approach leverages the rich multisystem information available within case file data and analyzes it through a critical lens to examine (a) the structural factors (e.