For the Defense - Volume 2, Issue 2 - 2017 - 25

data related to normal adolescent development.
This is done to provide the court with some idea
as to how the defendant's family life may have
impacted his developmental process. As already
indicated, risky decision-making is a normative
part of adolescence. However, research has also
shown that adolescents' risky decision-making is
related to an adolescent's perception of their relationship with their parents. For example, research
has demonstrated that those adolescents who
perceived their relationship with their parents
as being problematic over the course of the year
prior to the offense made riskier decisions than
those who did not identify such problems in their
relationship with their parents.44
By collecting information related to the
defendant's family, the clinician can provide the
court with information that might help explain
the defendant's conduct that ultimately led to his
homicide conviction. As an example, a clinician
may learn through interview data and through
the review of records that the defendant's mother
had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. When
she did not take her medication, the client's

mother would become paranoid and delusional.
During these episodes, and to protect the defendant from the devil, she covered the window with
tin foil and made him pray while kneeling on rice
for hours at a time. In this case, the expert could
educate the court on the impact of being raised
in such a household.
Finally, in gathering data related to this factor,
the clinician may also try to assess the defendant's
adverse childhood experiences and understand the
impact of those experiences. To do this, the clinician
could administer an instrument that identifies potentially traumatic experiences, allowing the clinician to
compare the number of traumatic experiences the
defendant experienced to others of the same gender.
As is the case with any type of data, if the clinician
uses a trauma or adverse experience scale that relies
on the youth's self-report, it is important for the
clinician to obtain information from other sources
verifying those experiences. Conversely, through
records and interviews with others, the evaluator
could learn about trauma that the defendant did
not acknowledge. When this occurs, the evaluator
will want to ask the defendant about these incidents

Jason S. Dunkle, Esquire
JD Law, P.C.

CRIMINAL DEFENSE

Serving Pennsylvania and Federal Courts

"The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who
maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis."
Dante Alighieri

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Phone: (814) 954-7622
E-mail: jd@mystatecollegelawyer.com
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Vol. 2, Issue 2 | For The Defense

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of For the Defense - Volume 2, Issue 2 - 2017