No description available.

Private probation companies were formed to provide supervision to low-risk offenders who committed misdemeanor charges by allowing offenders to reside in the community instead of being incarcerated. However, research has revealed that private probation agencies have become problematic because state and local governments have benefited financially by collecting court costs and probation supervision fees from indigent probationers who are unable to pay. Other researchers have revealed that gender, race, and attorney representation r impact whether a warrant would be issued for failure to pay court costs and supervisions fees. This study examined the predictive relationships between race, gender, attorney representation, and warrants being issued. The theoretical framework for this study was the prison-industrial complex that emphasizes how government and private companies' financial interests are linked to the expansion of the penal system. This study addressed the question of whether gender, race, and attorney representation predicted the likelihood of private probation warrants being issued. A quantitative, correlational, cross-sectional design based upon secondary data analysis was used to address the research question. Results from a logistic regression showed that only race predicted the likelihood of private probation warrants being issued. Results also showed that Black males were more likely to have a warrant issued for their arrest. The findings can be used to advocate fair treatment of Black males who are disproportionately affected by unconstitutional practices of private probation companies. Findings can be used to promote social change by advocating that indigent offenders by offered alternative sentences other than jail when they cannot pay court costs and probation fees.

This study investigates the use of oral interpretation in social contexts. The context chosen was a community corrections program which provides education and employment assistance to adults on probation in Denton County, Texas. A solo interpretation script was incorporated into a public awareness presentation about the Denton County Probationer Education and Employment Program. The presentation was presented to a pilot audience to test the effectiveness of combining oral interpretation with public speaking to inform audiences about and elicit support for community corrections. It was determined that integrating an interpretative performance into an informational presentation is an effective method of employing oral interpretation outside the classroom and expanding its rhetorical dimensions.

No description available.

Risk has emerged as a defining feature of punishment in the United States. Feeley and Simon (1992) note that contemporary punishment is increasingly moving away from rehabilitation (the old penology) and moving toward the management and control of offenders (the new penology), often though actuarial techniques. While the profusion of risk assessment instruments, now entering their fourth generation, provides some support for the assertion that risk is indeed an important element in corrections, it was previously unknown if the risk model applied to all offenders, particularly female offenders. This dissertation addressed that gap by examining whether the risk model applied to female offenders in the community corrections setting. This dissertation surveyed 93 community corrections officers employed by the Orange County Community Corrections Department. The findings suggest that the department has incorporated many elements of the new penology into the classification and supervision of offenders in each of its units, though several gender differences were noted. Classification overrides, the perceived level of risk to the community, supervision decisions, and the perceived importance of risk and need factors were all examined in this study. The results indicate that some elements of classification and supervision function uniformly for offenders and operate irrespective of gender, but some areas, such as the perceived level of risk to the community and the perceived importance of risk factors, are influenced by gender.

The United States is in the midst of an opioid crisis. Fortunately, effective treatments for opioid use disorder exist (OUD); however, they are underutilized. Medications for opioid use disorder (MOUDs) decrease death by 50 %. These MOUDs are particularly relevant in the criminal justice population given that this population has a higher OUD disease burden but is less likely than the general population to receive this life-saving treatment. Research has identified negative attitudes toward MOUDs among corrections staff as a barrier to utilizing MOUDs. This thesis examines the relationships between community correction staff familiarity with methadone, one type of MOUD, and their opinions toward methadone using extant data from the Criminal Justice Drug Abuse Treatment Studies 2 (CJ-DATS 2) series. These data were collected between 2010-2012. The study was guided by the Knowledge-Attitude Behavior (KAB) model. The data are described using descriptive statistics, and I estimate logistic regressions to examine the relationship between respondent familiarity with methadone and their attitude toward methadone while controlling for other covariates. With a sample of 167 corrections employees, I found that corrections staff who agreed or strongly agreed with the statement that they were familiar with methadone had more positive methadone attitudes. Future research should examine the relationship between familiarity/knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors in other criminal justice settings and for other MOUDs (i.e., buprenorphine and naltrexone).

No description available.

No description available.

Each year, approximately one-third of all people admitted to prison in the United States are committed as the result of a revocation of community-based supervision such as probation, parole, or federal supervised release (Carson & Anderson, 2016). Many of these individuals are being incarcerated for technical violations of their supervision - conduct other than the commission of a new crime which is in violation of a condition of supervision. The practice of committing offenders to prison for technical violations of supervision is rather common at the state level. In a 2013 study, for example, Ostermann found that although paroled inmates in New Jersey were less likely than inmates who served their entire prison terms without parole to engage in new criminal conduct following their release, the paroled inmates were just as likely to be returned to prison within three years due to having been charged with technical violations of their supervision. This practice also occurs in the federal criminal justice system, where 70% of the offenders under community-based supervision who are returned to prison each year are recommitted on the strength of technical violations of supervision alone (Administrative Office of the United States Courts, 2017a). A substantial amount of prior work (for example, Apel et al., 2010; Clear, 2007; Petit, Sykes & Western, 2009; Rose & Clear, 1998) has revealed the potentially harmful consequences of imprisonment. Despite this, little research has examined how incarcerating persons for technical violations of supervision compares to widely-available alternative, intermediate sanctions such as home confinement and reentry center placement in terms of ability to prevent the commission of new crimes or continued technical non-compliance. The present study examined these questions, utilizing a sample of offenders in the federal criminal justice system. Propensity score matching was used to construct comparable treatment and control groups, thereby reducing concerns of selection bias. Post-matching analyses suggest the following: 1) the effect of incarcerating offenders for technical violations of supervision is negligible compared to subjecting them to intermediate sanctions with regard to preventing the commission of new crimes; 2) offenders incarcerated for technical violations of supervision are more likely to commit new crimes post-sanction – and sooner – than offenders subjected to intermediate sanctions; 3) offenders imprisoned for technical violations are more likely to engage in subsequent technical violations – and sooner – than offenders subjected to intermediate sanctions; and 4) the greater the intensity of the intermediate sanction (i.e., residential reentry center placement vs. home confinement), the more likely an offender will be charged with a technical violation during service of the sanction. Although the study is subject to concerns about potential sensitivity to unobserved confounders and other limitations, it makes an important contribution to our understanding of a topic which has rarely before been examined. When one considers the financial, public safety, and ethical consequences of incarcerating people for non-criminal conduct, the research has implications for persons under supervision, probation and parole organizations, and the general public alike. / Criminal Justice

The U. S. criminal justice system has used risk assessment tools in an effort to reduce recidivism and risk assessment tools are now commonplace. Correctional organizations, however, have struggled with officers' resistance to these tools in spite of the evidence for their utility. There is limited research that explores the impact of resistance to organizational change within the context of correctional agencies. To address that gap, this correlational study used organizational change theory to examine officers' resistance to the use of risk assessment tools based on officers' opinions of the risk assessment tool being used in North Carolina. Data were collected through an online survey of 109 North Carolina probation and parole officers. Multiple linear regression analysis was used to examine the statistical relationship between officer use of risk assessment tools and the dependent variables which included officers' opinions of the risk assessment tool, knowledge of risk assessments, training for use of risk assessments, risk assessments in the sentencing process, and officers' length of time employed. Findings indicated that opinions of the risk assessment tool and training to use the tool statistically impact officers' use of the tool in daily supervision of offenders. Organizational change theory predicted these findings as officers' resistance to policy change was manifested in their opinions of that policy. Implications for positive social change include recommendations for corrections agencies to refine training regarding risk assessments in efforts to minimize officer resistance of properly applying risk assessment tools in daily job duties with the intended outcome of reducing recidivism, and therefore preventing future harms to the community.