The treatment of juvenile offenders was the subject of much discussion and controversy in the first half of the nineteenth century and, from 1840 onwards, there was a vociferous campaign to ban imprisonment for children and to establish schools for delinquents where the emphasis was on moral reformation and rehabilitation rather than retribution. In 1854, as a result of the Reformatory Schools Act, juvenile reformatories became part of the criminal justice system and for the next three decades they were regarded by the Home Office as the key element in the fight against juvenile crime. Nevertheless, historians pay little attention to juvenile reformatories and there is little specific literature on individual institutions or the experience of reformatory inmates. This thesis, however, examines three Protestant reformatories for boys in Lancashire and attempts both to evaluate the reformatory system in the nineteenth century and to develop a greater understanding of the character and nature of the institutions themselves. The thesis examines the impact of the juvenile reform movement on social policy and legislation, particularly the contribution made by philanthropy and the developing, pivotal role of the institution. It considers the different methods used to establish reformatories and examines the origins of the schools in the study. It discusses the ethos and regime which developed in the institutions prior to 1880 and considers the effect on management methods of the powerful alliance formed by reformatory managers and Home Office officials. This is supplemented and illustrated using profiles of fifty inmates in two institutions. The thesis then examines changes in Home Office policy after 1880 and assesses the effect of these on reformatory practice at a local level. Finally it evaluates the role played by reformatories in Lancashire where twenty five per cent of such institutions were situated at the turn of the century. The thesis concludes that the reformatory system was an upper and middle-class response to the problem of juvenile delinquency, which was associated almost exclusively with the urban working class. It also suggests that, in spite of their name, individual reformatories were concerned primarily with training and rehabilitation rather than moral reformation. In addition the evidence indicates that, although the reformatory scheme was discredited elsewhere in the late nineteenth century, reformatory schools continued to play an important part in juvenile justice in Lancashire. These institutions continued to thrive because the majority of inmates did not commit further crime and magistrates believed that they gave value for money. This examination of nineteenth-century solutions to the problem of juvenile crime also illustrates that the present debate about delinquency is hardly novel and that current strategies were first tried out a hundred and fifty years ago.

This research considered the role of active leisure-based interventions with young people at risk of offending. It examined some of the claimed outcomes of participation for young people, and the types of provision which can support positive outcomes. A central feature of the research was an analysis of the impact of interventions on leisure-behaviour and attitudes in the medium term. This was underpinned by three stages of research to ensure the appropriateness of the main longitudinal case studies and the framework diagram.

Regardless of therapeutic orientation, the therapeutic relationship has been consistently shown as central to the therapeutic process. However, research has also shown that this can be difficult to achieve when working with sex-offenders. Less is known about the experience of this relationship and little qualitative research has been conducted in this area. This current study therefore aimed to provide valuable insight into the first-hand accounts of therapists directly working with this client group through exploring their experience of the therapeutic relationship, using a qualitative approach. The study focused upon the experiences of eight Counselling Psychologists, in order to keep the sample homogenous, and explored the differences the therapists may have experienced compared to other client groups. Additionally, it aimed to highlight what difficulties, if any, have arisen in the therapeutic relationships and potentially how these have been experienced, managed, overcome and addressed. Semi-structured interviews were carried out with eight counselling psychologists who have worked therapeutically with sex-offenders. Verbatim transcripts of the interviews were then analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). The analysis illustrated four master themes: i) Forming a relationship- negotiating the degree of intimacy; ii) overcoming barriers to the relationship- contending with the context; iii) establishing a relationship- feeling a reaction yet managing a response; iv) reaping the rewards of the relationship- out of the darkness and into the light. A description of these master themes and the related subordinate themes were presented. The results of the analysis were considered in light of existing theory and their clinical implications.

Systematic reviews of offenders’ as well as non-offenders’ engagement research revealed inadequate and inconsistent definitions and assessments of engagement and an absence of theory. Furthermore there is no research on facilitators’ engagement in offending behaviour programmes. A constructivist grounded theory methodology was employed to develop a theory of engagement in group offending behaviour programs that accounts for facilitators’ engagement as well as that of offenders’. Interviews and observations of sessions were used to collect data from 23 program facilitators and 28 offenders (group members). Group members’ engagement was a process of ‘moving on’, represented by a number of conceptual categories including early ambivalence, negotiating the group, and acknowledging and accepting. Facilitators’ engagement was a process of building engagement, by personalizing treatment frameworks using ‘the hook’, a cornerstone of treatment similar to the therapeutic or working alliance. It also involved disarming group members and dealing with initial resistance, and establishing roles and positions in the treatment framework. There were a number of barriers to both group members’ and facilitators’ engagement identified that were rooted in programme and referral factors. The TEGOBP provides four distinct developments in engagement research as well as a number of important implications for research and practice that are discussed.

The identification of ecological risk factors for delinquency is a widely employed approach to a problem in which there is no single root cause. A number of theoretical and practical approaches typically provide insight into delinquency. The ecological approach in particular focuses on aspects within the urban environment that can be used to explain the disproportionate number of offenders emanating from particular locations. Remarkably, few ecological studies of delinquency have been forthcoming in South Africa which is an astonishing fact for a country plagued with high and rising levels of crime for much of its recent history. Most explanations for the high crime levels in the country centre either on the legacy of apartheid or the transition to democracy. In terms of the former, the apartheid system was premised on the segregation of South African society and the concomitant socio-spatial marginalisation of ‘non-white’ communities. In the context of state repression, marginalisation and a consequent insurrectionary struggle, levels of crime and violence spiralled out of control. The transition to democracy in turn resulted in a number of changes occurring in the country, most notably the rigorous transformation and restructuring of the criminal justice sector. Despite, or perhaps because of, these changes levels of recorded crime remain alarmingly high fourteen years into democracy with seemingly no end in sight and no local theory eminent to guide appropriate action. This thesis aims to contribute towards for a better ecological understanding of delinquency in South Africa based upon the use of Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and quantitative techniques. The thesis presents a geo-analytic perspective of offenders residing within the city of Tshwane, and where possible, translates this knowledge towards an urban ecological theory of crime in South Africa. The findings of the study are used to provide practical insights into effective crime reduction policy initiatives. The study is based on an analysis of offender records obtained from the South African Department of Correctional Services (DCS) during the beginning of 2006. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2009. / Geography, Geoinformatics and Meteorology / Unrestricted

The purpose of this study was to determine the validity of the Iowa Sex Offender Risk Assessment (ISORA) instrument used in the Iowa Department of Corrections to assess for future occurrences of female offender recidivism. Using a sample of 105 females convicted of a sexual offense in the State of Iowa, the current study examined rates of recidivism using the ISORA. The goal of this study was to determine the validity of the ISORA in predicting recidivism rates as measured by (a) new convictions for sex offenses and other violent crimes, (b) new convictions for sex crimes using a strict definition, and (c) any new conviction for any new crime. Data were collected on all female participants in this study using case file information from various database resources. Mean-cost rating scores and Receiver Operating Characteristic Curve analyses were conducted to explore the relationships between risk assessment categories on the ISORA and each type of recidivism as well as between raw ISORA scores and each type of recidivism. Results showed the overall recidivism rate of female offenders was 22% for this study, while the sexual recidivism rate in this study was 2%. Results also provided evidence that the ISORA can be used to predict sexual and violent recidivism (AUC = .85) as well as general recidivism (AUC = .64) for female sex offenders. In conclusion, the ISORA is a valid risk assessment tool when predicting general and sexual or violent recidivism for female sexual offenders. However, further research examining improvements in the instrument could be conducted to enhance the validity of the instrument.

Thesis (Ph. D. (Administration)) -- University of Limpopo, 2016 / The purpose of this study was to assess the poverty and crime levels among the offenders’ families and to compare the perceptions of the offenders and correctional officials regarding incarceration and rehabilitation in the correctional centres with the view of developing an adjusted framework for the Department of Justice and Correctional Services. The study utilised a mixed method approach and was descriptive. The study used survey method to collect quantitative and qualitative data. Quantitative data were collected using self-administered structured questionnaires and qualitative data used self-administered semi-structured questionnaires and open-ended questions. Three groups of respondents participated in this study. The population for the quantitative design were offenders (n=59) and correctional officials (n=17), respectively from Polokwane Medium B Prison. Participants for the qualitative design were the same correctional officials (n=17) and offenders’ families (n=10). Quantitative data was analysed using SPSS version 22 package while qualitative data was coded and analysed manually. The majority of offenders (66%) indicated that their families were struggling while they were incarcerated and corroborated by 59% of the correctional officials, whereas 80% of the offenders’ families were evidenced during the interview that they were struggling. The findings revealed that incarceration and rehabilitation lead to recidivism and the ensnarement of offenders’ families to poverty and crime. The study revealed that overcrowding, limited staff and lack of staff with expertise were the contributing factors to the ineffectiveness of rehabilitation programmes in the correctional centre. The study recommends the coordinated efforts of the stakeholders (government departments and NGOs) for improving the implementation of the remunerated work for the offenders. The researcher is optimistic that if the proposed adjusted incarceration and rehabilitation framework is implemented, the poverty among the offenders’ families might be alleviated. KEY CONCEPTS: incarceration; rehabilitation; recidivism; offenders’ families; prisoners; correctional officials; mixed research methodology.

Criminological aspects of cybercrime Abstract The thesis concerns the offenders and victims of cybercrime as the selected criminological aspects of cybercrime. The objective of the thesis was to particularly analyse and compare the criminological findings of the offenders and victims of cybercrime and discover and point out the specifics in comparison to the offenders and victims of the offline criminality. Both Czech and foreign literary sources were used for the purposes of this thesis. In the first part the basic terms which are used in this thesis are clarified - cybercrime, the offender and victim including the particularly vulnerable victims. The second part concerns the development of the image of the offender of cybercrime, his characteristics in comparison to the offenders of crimes committed out of cyberspace and his categorization. Particularly the attention was brought to the organized groups of criminals in the area of cybercrime and the motivation of the offender as one of the criminogenic factors. In the third part different victimological aspects of cybercrime including the impact of this kind of criminality on the particularly vulnerable victims are discussed. In relation to the latency of cybercrime the causes of this latency including the reasons for not reporting this kind of criminality...

Psychopathic criminals commit more crimes, are more prone to recidivism, and more likely to engage in violent crimes and other aggressive behavior than nonpsychopathic criminals. Less is known about forensic patients, both with and without psychopathy, and their aggression. In the current study, patients in a maximum security hospital were examined with respect to their psychopathy and its predictive value on institutional management and dangerousness. In this regard, the Psychopathy Checklist (PCL) and the Psychopathy Checklist - Revised (PCL-R) have proven to be valid and reliable measures of psychopathy. The present study was an attempt to establish predictive validity for a new version: the Psychopathy Checklist Screening Version (PCLSV). As such, this study examined the PCL-SV's relationship to (a) diagnoses of Antisocial Personality Disorder according to DSM-III-R criteria and (b) the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI) Aggression, Drug Problems, and Antisocial Features scales. The influence of major Axis I disorders on the assessment of psychopathy with the PCLSV was also examined. Participants were 150 male forensic psychiatric patients at Vernon State Hospital who were committed for various reasons: incompetence to stand trial, initial evaluation and treatment after having been found not guilty by reason of insanity, and manifest dangerousness. Chart reviews were completed for a six month follow-up period during which all instances of aggressive or socially disruptive behaviors were recorded. Results supported the predictive validity of the PCL-SV as a measure of psychopathy for aggression and treatment noncompliance. Unexpected findings among correlations of the PCL-SV with the PAI Antisocial Features scale were examined and discussed. A review of the costs and benefits of the PCL-SV in clinical decision making is presented and the clinical utility of the present findings is discussed.

Understanding desistance processes can have important implications for offender rehabilitation by informing treatment practitioners of offender strengths for reintegration. Despite this potential utility for program development, desistance remains difficult to measure consistently across studies. The present study attempts to establish the utility of the Measure of Criminal and Antisocial Desistance (MCAD) by comparing and contrasting desistance scores between a group of probationers and a group of civilly committed sex offenders. The results suggest that the MCAD is a valid and reliable measure that is able to observe differences in multidimensional desistance constructs between groups. Furthermore, suppression effects of desistance strategies on offenders under civil commitment were observed. Future research should explore the use of the MCAD and measures like it in creating more effective treatment programs for offenders.