This paper is based on responses of practitioners to a 1982 report by the Department of Justice's Ad Hoc Committee on the Future of Justice Research and subsequent discussions with professional organizations and State and local agencies. Practitioners appreciated the need for a mixed strategy in funding research, but felt the Government should emphasize applied research and encourage a greater range of methodological approaches. Practitioners desired an equal role with academicians and other researchers in establishing research agendas, reviewing proposals, and disseminating results. Both practitioners and researchers gave highest priority to violent crime, followed by the career criminal, arresting community decline and improving neighborhood social control, more effective policing methods, sentencing, and incapacitation and punishment. However, practitioners believed that more resources should be devoted to synthesizing existing knowledge and determining how it can be used by agencies to improve their crime prevention and control efforts. They also felt more attention should be given to research on improving treatment for victims of crime and links between drug use and criminal activity. Practitioners disagreed with the report's recommendation to deemphasize criminal justice management, education, and dissemination, feeling that components of the system often work against themselves and cause considerable waste and inefficiency. Practitioners criticized the Ad Hoc Committee's relative neglect of performance measures; costs of justice; criminal analysis; information systems; and research on the defense, prosecution, and judiciary. Corrections officials agreed that issues surrounding the problems of prison overcrowding had highest priority. The appendix provides lists of Ad Hoc Committee members and practitioner respondents. (Author summary modified)