We encourage you to explore Vera's extensive resource library, built up by decades of expert research, analysis, and real-world application. Vera produces a wide variety of resources about our work, including publications, podcasts, and videos, dating from our founding in 1961 to the present. You can search these resources using the filters below to sort by type of resource, project, or topic. Enter part of the title in the search box to look for a specific resource.
Latest Resources
In this podcast New York University sociologist David W. Garland discusses his book, "Peculiar Institution: America's Death Penalty in an Age of Abolition." Garland presents evidence that the death penalty in the United States fails to realize its stated goals. Yet it persists here—alone among developed nations—because it serves social and political ends.
Family Court judges and other decision makers must weigh whether arrested youths are likely to reoffend or fail to appear if allowed to go home prior to their court date. To help guide these decisions, staff from Vera’s Center on Youth Justice partnered with juvenile justice stakeholders in New York City to create and implement a research-based detention risk-assessment instrument (RAI) for use alongside a continuum of community-based alternatives to detention. This report describes that process and early results from the RAI’s implementation.
In this podcast from the Neil A. Weiner Research Speaker Series, David Weisburd, Distinguished Professor in the Department of Criminology, Law and Society at George Mason University discusses his groundbreaking study of micro-geographic units or “hot spots” in predicting and preventing crime. Weisburd is the director of George Mason University’s Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy. He also serves as director of the Institute of Criminology at the Hebrew University. In 2010 Weisburd won the prestigious Stockholm Prize in Criminology for this work.
The Vera Institute of Justice's Neil A. Weiner Research Speaker Series features David C. Brotherton, professor and chair of the sociology department at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice and the Graduate Center, CUNY. In this podcast, Brotherton discusses an alternative view of gangs in the era of globalization. While police and domestic security agencies have characterized gangs as international criminal groups that present a grave threat to national security, Brotherton argues that there is no social scientific evidence to support that perspective. He describes his cross-cultural and transnational research on 21st-century gangs and his findings that, contrary to decades of social scientific assumptions about their antisocial nature, gangs around the world are engaged in movements for political and social change.
Jim Parsons, director of The Vera Institute of Justice's Substance Use and Mental Health Program, discusses a pilot project mapping the life-course of incarcerated women with mental illness and substance use histories.
Research shows that incarcerated individuals who maintain contact with supportive family members have better outcomes—such as stable housing and employment—when they return to the community. Yet many people who work in corrections do not know how to help individuals on their caseload draw on these social supports. This report describes the Family Justice Program’s Reentry is Relational project, which implemented the Relational Inquiry Tool (RIT)—a series of questions designed to prompt conversations with incarcerated men and women about the supportive people in their lives—in prisons in Oklahoma and New Mexico. The report also discusses results from surveys and interviews with incarcerated men and women and their family members that were conducted as part of the implementation process.
The Vera Institute of Justice's Neil A. Weiner Research Speaker Series features Susan Herman, associate professor at Pace University in the Department of Criminal Justice and Human Services and author of the book "Parallel Justice for Victims of Crime." In this podcast, Professor Herman discusses parallel justice, which she describes as "a new framework for responding to victims of crime." Parallel justice refers to a societal obligation to help repair the harm created by crimes. Within this framework, a discrete set of responses to the victim would be triggered when a crime is reported, in addition to traditional criminal justice responses.
Just 'Cause is the quarterly newsletter of the Vera Institute of Justice and is produced by the Communications Department. This issue includes the following articles:
- "Institute Marks 50 Years of Innovation," by Jules Verdone
- "Making Reform Real in New Orleans," by Jules Verdone
- From Vera's Director: "Research Is Key to Current and Future Cuts in Corrections Spending," by Michael Jacobson
- "Fifth Annual Benefit Honors Herb Sturz and Jeffrey Kindler"
- Q&A with Christian Henrichson, senior policy analyst with the Cost-Benefit Analysis Unit, interview by Abbi Leman
- News & Announcements
- Recent Event: Alumni Reception
This brochure provides an overview of the Vera Institute's mission, history, past achievements, and current work.
This brochure provides an overview of the Vera Institute's mission, history, past achievements, and current work.