NCJ Number
181910
Journal
Psychology, Public Policy, and Law Volume: 4 Issue: 1/2 Dated: March/June 1998 Pages: 138-174
Date Published
March 1998
Length
37 pages
Annotation
Recidivism among sex offenders is examined with respect to its extent, problems encountered in measuring it, and the current controversy over whether sex offender treatment reduces recidivism; the authors then describe a clinical decision making model linking assessment with interventions to and clinical and judicial decision making.
Abstract
The 1997 decision of the United States Supreme Court in Kansas v. Hendricks will focus increased attention of the legal, social science, and clinical issues related to sex offenders. Research has not yet provided clear, minimally equivocal data on either recidivism rates or treatment effects. A management model of risk is a particular model of clinical decision making that could function effectively in providing risk-relevant information about offender deficits, progress, and ongoing change in risk status to legal decision makers. Ongoing progress reports from treatment could inform decisions about parole. Such an approach would increase an offender’s motivation to participate in risk-relevant interventions for sexual offending. It would have several other advantages as well. Its disadvantages would include the lack of a relationship between treatment progress and risk reduction. Such a procedure would probably encounter a legal challenge if an individual was released from a secure Hendricks setting and reoffended sexually in the community. Nevertheless, it appears that the management model of risk assessment would be useful when applied post-Hendricks to assessment, treatment, and decision making with convicted sex offenders. Figure, footnotes, and 86 references