83 FR 55913 - Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed eCollection eComments Requested; New Collection; Fourth National Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway and Thrownaway Children (NISMART-4)

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE
Office of Justice Programs

Federal Register Volume 83, Issue 217 (November 8, 2018)

The Department of Justice (DOJ), Office of Justice Programs, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, will be submitting the following information collection request to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and approval in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995.

[Federal Register Volume 83, Number 217 (Thursday, November 8, 2018)]
[Notices]
[Pages 55913-55914]
From the Federal Register Online  [www.thefederalregister.org]
[FR Doc No: 2018-24398]


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DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

Office of Justice Programs

[OMB Number 1121-NEW]


Agency Information Collection Activities; Proposed eCollection 
eComments Requested; New Collection; Fourth National Incidence Studies 
of Missing, Abducted, Runaway and Thrownaway Children (NISMART-4)

AGENCY: Office of Justice Programs, Department of Justice.

ACTION: 60-Day notice.

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SUMMARY: The Department of Justice (DOJ), Office of Justice Programs, 
Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, will be 
submitting the following information collection request to the Office 
of Management and Budget (OMB) for review and approval in accordance 
with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995.

DATES: Comments are encouraged and will be accepted for 60 days until 
January 7, 2019.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:  If you have additional comments 
especially on the estimated public burden or associated response time, 
suggestions, or need a copy of the proposed information collection 
instrument with instructions or additional information, please contact 
Benjamin Adams, Social Science Analyst, Office of Juvenile Justice and 
Delinquency Prevention, 810 Seventh Street NW, Washington, DC 20531 
(email: [email protected]; telephone: 202-616-3687).

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Written comments and suggestions from the 
public and affected agencies concerning the proposed collection of 
information are encouraged. Your comments should address one or more of 
the following four points:

--Evaluate whether the proposed collection of information is necessary 
for the proper performance of the functions of the Office of Juvenile 
Justice and Delinquency Prevention, including whether the information 
shall have practical utility;
--Evaluate whether the accuracy of the agency's estimate of the burden 
on the proposed collection of information, including the validity of 
the methodology and assumptions that were used;
--Evaluate whether and if so how the quality, utility, and clarity of 
the information collected can be enhanced; and
--Minimize the burden of the collection of information on those who are 
to respond, including use of appropriate automated, electronic, 
mechanical, or other technological collection techniques or other forms 
of information technology, e.g., permitting electronic submission of 
responses.

Overview of This Information Collection

    1. Type of Information Collection: New collection.
    2. The Title of the Form/Collection: Fourth National Incidence 
Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway and Thrownaway Children (NISMART-
4).
    3. The agency form number, if any, and the applicable component of 
the Department sponsoring the collection: Not applicable (new 
collection).
    4. Affected public who will be asked or required to respond, as 
well as a brief abstract: Primary: State, county, and local law 
enforcement agencies (LEAs), state Missing Child Clearinghouses (MCCs), 
and the National Center on Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC). 
Abstract: The Fourth National Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted, 
Runaway and Thrownaway Children (NISMART-4) will include three pilot 
studies and one national data collection. The three pilot studies will 
test methodologies for collecting information from law enforcement 
agencies on child victims of stranger abductions, parental abductions, 
and other types of missing children, respectively. The pilot test data 
will be used solely to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed 
survey methodologies. The national study will collect data on the 
number and characteristics of children abducted by strangers (i.e., 
``stereotypical kidnappings''). OJJDP will use the information gathered 
in the national study in published reports and statistics. The reports 
will be made available to the U.S. Congress, Executive Office of the 
President, practitioners, researchers, students, the media, others 
interested in missing children statistics, and the general public via 
the OJJDP website.
    5. An estimate of the total number of respondents and the amount of 
time estimated for an average respondent to respond:
    Burden Hours for Law Enforcement Survey--Stereotypical Kidnappings 
(LES-SK) Pilot: OJJDP expects 20 law enforcement investigators to spend 
an average of 40 minutes completing an online case detail survey and 20 
minutes completing the telephone debriefing about the online survey (20 
x 60 minutes = 20 hours). In addition, OJJDP expects the NCMEC database 
administrator to spend 5 hours pulling 20 stereotypical kidnappings 
cases from the NCMEC database for use in testing the online survey (1 x 
5 hours = 5 hours). The total amount of time for the LES-SK pilot is 25 
hours.
    Burden Hours for Law Enforcement Survey--Family Abductions (LES-FA) 
Pilot: The sample size for Components 1 and 2 of the pilot is 30 law 
enforcement investigators who will be asked to search their database 
for cases of family abductions occurring in a 1-year period. OJJDP 
estimates the search will take an average of 3 hours and that 28 will 
comply (28 x 3 hours = 84 hours), 2 will decline (2 x 3 minutes = 6 
minutes). OJJDP estimates that database administrators for NCMEC and 
the MCCs associated with states in the sample will all agree to conduct

[[Page 55914]]

database searches for the agencies in Component 1 and Component 2 and 
that these searches will take an average of 3 hours (31 x 4 hours = 124 
hours). OJJDP estimates that all 5 agencies selected for telephone 
debriefing in Component 1 will participate and the interviews will take 
an average of 20 minutes to complete (5 x 20 minutes = 1.67 hours). 
OJJDP expects that all 10 of the law enforcement investigators selected 
to complete the Component 3 case detail telephone survey will 
participate and that the interview will take 30 minutes (10 x 30 
minutes = 5 hours). OJJDP estimates that 18 of the 20 investigators 
selected to complete the Component 3 case detail online survey will 
comply and that the instrument will take an average of 15 minutes (18 x 
15 minutes = 4.5 hours), 2 will decline (2 x 3 minutes = 6 minutes). 
OJJDP expects that all 18 investigators who complete the online survey 
will agree to participate in the 20 minute debriefing telephone 
interview (18 x 20 minutes = 6 hours). The total amount of time for the 
LES-FA pilot is 225.4 hours.
    Burden Hours for Law Enforcement Survey--Missing Children (LES-MC) 
Pilot: The sample size for Components 1 and 2 of the pilot is 30 law 
enforcement investigators who will be asked to search for case of 
missing children occurring in a 1-month period. OJJDP estimates the 
search will take an average of 3 hours and that 28 will comply (28 x 3 
hours = 84 hours), 2 will decline (2 x 3 minutes = 6 minutes). OJJDP 
estimates that database administrators for NCMEC and the MCCs 
associated with states in the sample will all agree to conduct database 
searches and that these searches will take an average of 4 hours (31 x 
4 hours = 124 hours). OJJDP estimates that all five agencies selected 
for telephone debriefing in Component 1 will participate and the 
interviews will take an average of 20 minutes to complete (5 x 20 
minutes = 1.67 hours). OJJDP expects that all 10 of the law enforcement 
investigators selected to complete the Component 3 case detail 
telephone survey will participate and that the interview will take 30 
minutes (10 x 30 minutes = 5 hours). OJJDP estimates that 18 of the 20 
investigators selected to complete the Component 3 case detail online 
survey will comply and that the instrument will take an average of 15 
minutes (18 x 15 minutes = 4.5 hours), 2 will decline (2 x 3 minutes = 
6 minutes). OJJDP expects that all 18 investigators who complete the 
online survey will agree to participate in the 20 minute debriefing 
telephone interview (18 x 20 minutes = 6 hours). The total amount of 
time for the LES-MC pilot is 225.4 hours.
    Burden Hours for National Law Enforcement Survey--Stereotypical 
Kidnappings (LES-SK): A total of 4,727 law enforcement agencies are 
included in the national stratified cluster sample of 400 PSUs (Primary 
Sampling Units). All of these agencies will receive the mail screener. 
OJJDP estimates that 2,836 (60 percent) of the law enforcement agencies 
will complete the screener by mail, based on the response rate for the 
mail screener obtained for NISMART-3. The great majority of these will 
have no stereotypical kidnapping cases during the 1-year timeframe of 
the survey and OJJDP estimates the average time to complete the mail 
screener to be 15 minutes (2,836 x 15 minutes = 709.05 hours), 1,891 
will not respond by mail (1,891 x 3 minutes = 94.54 hours). OJJDP 
estimates that 1,229 (26 percent) of the law enforcement agencies will 
complete the mail screener by telephone, based on the percentage of 
mail screeners completed by telephone in NIMSART-3. OJJDP estimates 
that the time to complete the screener by telephone will be 4 minutes 
(1,229 x 4 minutes = 81.9 hours), and 662 will not respond (662 x 3 
minutes = 33.1 hours). OJJDP estimates that 204 cases will be 
identified that appear to meet the definition of a qualifying 
stereotypical kidnapping case. The estimate is based on the number of 
cases identified in NISMART-3 for telephone followup from the mail 
screener and searches of other databases. Investigators of these cases 
will be asked to complete the online survey about case details. OJJDP 
estimates that 161 (79 percent) of the law enforcement officers will 
complete the case detail online instrument (estimate again based on the 
percentage of investigators who completed this component for NISMART-3) 
with 145 (90 percent) completing online. OJJDP estimates that the 
instrument will take an average of 40 minutes to complete (145 x 40 
minutes = 96.6 hours), 59 will not respond online (59 x 3 minutes = 
2.95 hours). OJJDP estimates that 16 (10 percent) of the 161 law 
enforcement officers who complete the detailed case survey will do it 
via telephone interview and that the interview will take 60 minutes (16 
x 60 minutes = 16 hours), and that 43 will not respond (43 x 3 minutes 
= 2.15 hours). OJJDP estimates the time for NCMEC and state MCCs 
database administrators to conduct a database search of any 
stereotypical kidnapping cases in their states to be 4 hours and expect 
that all NCMEC and the state MCCs in the 49 states where the sampled 
PSUs are located will participate (50 x 4 hour = 200 hours). The total 
amount of time for the National LES-SK study is 1,236.5 hours.
    6. An estimate of the total public burden (in hours) associated 
with the collection: There are an estimated 1,712 total burden hours 
(1,259 hours for law enforcement investigators and 453 hours for NCMEC 
and MCC database administrators) associated with the three pilot 
studies and the national LES-SK study.
    If additional information is required contact: Melody Braswell, 
Department Clearance Officer, United States Department of Justice, 
Justice Management Division, Policy and Planning Staff, Two 
Constitution Square, 145 N Street NE, 3E.405A, Washington, DC 20530.

    Dated: November 2, 2018.
Melody Braswell,
Department Clearance Officer for PRA, U.S. Department of Justice.
[FR Doc. 2018-24398 Filed 11-7-18; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 4410-18-P