Overcrowding is a serious problem in prisons and jails. Most
people who are in prison and jail have substance abuse
problems. Long-term, intensive, therapeutic community,
substance abuse treatment in prison has proven effective in
reducing arrests, amounts of incarceration and time until
first arrest. Jails, with their shorter times of
incarceration, make long-term treatment impossible and
therapeutic communities or milieu therapy difficult. There
are few substance abuse treatment programs in jails and even
fewer outcome evaluations to determine effectiveness so it is
not known if jail treatment is effective. Graduates of the
Inmate Recovery Program (a short term, day treatment style,
jail-based substance abuse treatment program) were compared
four years before and up to five years after treatment with a
nontreated control group and a treatment drop-out group. The
IRP group had fewer arrests, less time incarcerated, a bigger
drop in rates of incarceration and a longer time lapse until
first arrest than the drop-outs. The IRP group had less
arrests, a longer time lapse until first arrest, a bigger drop
in rate of incarceration and less incarceration in two out of
five years than the control group. IRP produced a
conservative net avoided cost of incarceration of $786,593.89
alone. This is equivalent to an average savings of $3,480.50
per client for the average three and a half years after
treatment. Experiences prior to IRP also impacted treatment
results. Subjects with fewer previous prison sentences; fewer
prior arrests; less time incarcerated the year of treatment;
more prior alcohol and drug related arrests; a job, or another
legal source of income; who were older; and had more DUII
arrests before treatment were associated with fewer arrests
and less time incarcerated after treatment. This information
may help improve future IRP performance. Therefore the Inmate
Recovery Program has a variety of favorable impacts and
appears to also be a cost-effective program. / Graduation date: 1996
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ORGSU/oai:ir.library.oregonstate.edu:1957/36774 |
| Date | 08 May 1996 |
| Creators | Hughey, Raymond W. |
| Contributors | Saslow, Carol |
| Source Sets | Oregon State University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
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