Citation

Cook TB. Suicide Life Threat. Behav. 2012; 42(5): 495-506.

Affiliation

Thomas Bradley Cook, Epidemiology & Biostatistics, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, USA; Mark S. Davis, Criminal Justice Research Center, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2012, American Association of Suicidology, Publisher John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1111/j.1943-278X.2012.00107.x

PMID

22906021

Abstract

Relatively little is known about legal entanglements and suicide risk. This matched case-control study estimated the risk of suicide associated with legal strains using online court archives, a novel source of exposure data. Court records linked to suicide deaths (N = 315), controls (N = 630), and unintentional injury and poisoning deaths (N = 630) for an urban county from 2000 to 2005 revealed that nearly a third of suicide victims had recent court involvement, twice the proportion among controls. Misdemeanors, car accidents, and foreclosures were each associated with a threefold risk of suicide. Implications for suicide prevention and research are discussed.

Language: en