Parole: Early Release and Reentry
Chapter Objectives
1. Present a brief history of American parole development.
2. Understand the function of parole in the criminal justice system.
3. Define parole and explain the parole decision-making process.
4. Describe the characteristics of the parole population.
5. Explain what works in parole supervision.
6. Summarize current issues in parole.
Chapter Outline
I. Parole as Part of the Criminal Justice System
Parole is the conditional release of a prisoner prior to completion of the imposed sentence under the supervision of a parole officer (responsibility for offenders’ passes from the courts to the corrections system upon imprisonment).
· Release on parole may be mandatory or discretionary.
o Discretionary release is at the paroling authority’s discretion within boundaries established by the sentence and the law.
o Mandatory release is early release after a specific period of time as specified by law.
A. Historical Overview
· The parole concept has its roots in an 18th-century English penal practice—indentured servitude.
o This practice was similar to today’s parole in that the indentured servant has to comply with certain conditions to remain in supervised “freedom.”
· In 1840, British Navy Captain Alexander Maconochie developed a “ticket of leave” system, which moved inmates through stages—imprisonment, conditional release, and complete restoration of liberty.
Early American Parole Development
· The first legislation authorizing parole in the United States was enacted in Massachusetts in 1837.
· By 1889, 12 states had implemented parole programs; by 1944, all 48 states had enacted parole legislation.
Parole Development in the Early 20th Century
· The Wickersham Commission, a commission on law enforcement and observance appointed by President Herbert Hoover, issued a report in 1931 that advocated uniformity in state parole practices by recommending that states establish centralized policymaking boards to write standards and guidelines for parole practices.
· This report included a list of the “essential elements” of a good parole system:
o Indeterminate sentence law permitting the offender to be released (conditionally) at the time when he or she is most likely to make a successful transition back to society
o Provision of quality release preparation—in the institution—for the offender who is reentering the community
o Familiarity by the parole officer with the home and environmental conditions of the offender before he or she leaves the institution
o Sufficient staffing levels to ensure an adequate number of parole officers to supervise parolees.
Parole Development in the Late 20th Century
· Opposition to parole resurfaced in the 1960s and 1970s, this time as part of a larger political debate about crime, the purposes of sanctioning, and the appropriateness of the unlimited discretion afforded various sectors of the criminal justice system (paroling authorities in particular).
· In the 1970s, research indicated that prison rehabilitation programs had few positive benefits.
· In 1987, the American Probation and Parole Association voiced its support of parole and objected to efforts to abolish it.
· By the year 2000, 16 states and the federal government had abolished discretionary parole board release, and another four states had abolished discretionary parole release for certain violent offenses or other crimes against a person.
B. Reentry
· Reentry is the use of programs targeted at promoting the effective reintegration of offenders back to communities upon release from prison and jail.
· Almost 2,000 offenders leave state and federal prison every day and almost one-half are reincarcerated within three years for either committing a new crime or for violating conditions governing their release.
o There are many reasons. Among them are the following:
§ Parole supervision—most parole officers manage large caseloads and typically meet with offenders for about 15 minutes once or twice a month.
§ Shift in parole function—parole has shifted from a service orientation to a surveillance-oriented, control-based strategy centered on monitoring behavior, detecting violations, and enforcing rules.
§ Responses to technical violations—violators of probation and parole represent the fastest-growing category of admissions to jail and prison, one-third nationally, and 60 to 70 percent in some states such as California.
Offender Problems
· Research shows that when people are released from jail and prison, their job prospects are dim, their chances of finding a place to live are bleak, and their health is poor.
o Fewer than half have a job lined up before leaving prison.
Reentry Programs to Help Ex-Offenders
· The national Second Chance Act (SCA) was signed into law on April 9, 2008.
o This first-of-its-kind federal legislation authorizes making grants to government agencies and nonprofit organizations to provide employment assistance, substance abuse treatment, housing, family programming, mentoring, victim support, and other services that can make a person’s transition from prison or jail safer and more successful.
Eligibility for Reentry
· The parole eligibility date is the earliest date on which an inmate might be released.
· State statutes usually dictate parole eligibility dates and specify what portion of a sentence an offender must serve before being considered for release.
Granting Parole–The Paroling Authority
· In most states, a paroling authority is a correctional agency (often called a parole board or parole commission) that has statutory authority to grant parole, set conditions of parole, supervise parolees, revoke parole, and discharge from parole.
· Research has indicated that parole board decision making relies primarily on two factors—criminal history and institutional behavior.
· A national survey of parole board members said that the most important factors in the decision to grant or deny parole tend to be the nature of the inmate’s offense and the inmate’s prior criminal record, attitude toward the victim, institutional adjustment, and insight into the causes of past criminal conduct.
· In the 1970s, the United States Parole Commission developed the salient factor score (SFS), a risk assessment instrument to estimate an inmate’s likelihood of recidivating following his or her release from prison.
Granting Parole–The Hearing
· In general, parole hearings are attended by victims, the applicant, the institutional representative, and hearing examiners or parole board members.
· The final decision to grant or deny parole is based on both eligibility guidelines and the interview.
Conditions of Parole
· Paroling authorities set specific conditions for parole on a case-by-case basis.
· Parolees must comply with the conditions, averaging three years, which may include restitution, substance abuse aftercare, remote-electronic monitoring, and/or house arrest, among others.
Types of Parole
· Release on parole may be mandatory or discretionary.
o Discretionary parole decisions are made by a paroling authority such as a parole board or parole commission after its members review a case to determine whether they believe the prisoner is ready to be returned to the community.
o Mandatory parole release is set by law and occurs in jurisdictions using determinate sentencing.
· In January 2010, the California legislature introduced a new type of release from prison called nonrevocable parole (NRP).
o NRP is a type of unsupervised parole that, unlike regular parole, cannot be revoked for technical violations.
II. Characteristics of Parolees
· The majority of the population is unconcerned—or unaware—that at least 95 percent of those who enter prisons eventually return to the community, and most do so in about two and one-half years.
· After declining in 2009, the U.S. parole population increased for the second consecutive year by nearly 13,300 offenders (from about 840,600 at yearend 2010 to 853,900 at yearend 2011).
o Eighty-seven percent of those adults were state parolees; the rest were federal.
· The typical adult parolee is a white, non-Hispanic male on mandatory parole and under active parole supervision for more than one year.
o The median age of a parolee is 34, with an 11th grade education.
o Women make up 11 percent of the parole population.
A. Parole Supervision: What Works?
· In 2012, researchers at the Urban Institute, the Council of State Governments, and the John Jay College of Criminal Justice Prisoner Reentry Institute launched a clearinghouse to identify and analyze all research on the subject of prisoner reentry.
o Its purpose is to provide government agencies and criminal justice practitioners a scientifically solid basis for deciding which reentry programs work for the more than 700,000 people released from prison each year.
· Approximately 1,000 studies have been identified as potentially being worth listing on the website, but to date only about 300 have been processed.
o Programs are characterized by whether they have strong or modest beneficial effects, no effect, or strong or modest harmful effects.
· To date, preliminary findings have been compiled in four areas including brand name programs (those employing a variety of treatment options from mental health treatment to employment assistance to address returning prisoners’ needs), employment, housing, and mental health.
III. Issues in Parole
A. Can Parolees Vote?
· Currently, an estimated 5.9 million people in the United States have lost their voting rights as a result of a felony conviction, including some 2.6 million citizens who have served their sentences.
· Only two states—Maine and Vermont—do not deny persons the right to vote based on a criminal conviction; even prisoners may vote by absentee ballot.
· There are at least four arguments in support of felon disenfranchisement.
o Inmates should be denied the right to vote as a matter of principle because they committed a felony.
o States have the right to deny felons the right to vote as added punishment, just as they have the right to restrict them from certain occupations.
o Denying felons the right to vote sends a message about respect for the law.
o Felons should be denied the right to vote because they cannot be trusted to make politically informed decisions.
· On the other hand, there are five arguments against felon disenfranchisement.
o Voting is not a privilege but a right guaranteed by the Constitution, and the states don’t have the right to take it away.
o Felon disenfranchisement laws are unfair to minorities who are treated unfairly by the criminal justice system—one of every eight adult black males is ineligible to vote.
o Felon disenfranchisement laws are not an effective form of punishment since most ex-felons didn’t vote before incarceration.
o Removal of an inmate’s right to vote is inconsistent with reentry.
o Once we open the door by declaring that a certain group of people does not deserve the basic right to vote, then which group of people might be next that we attempt to restrict?
B. Reentry Courts
· The U.S. Department of Justice proposes that a reentry court have six core elements:
o Assessment and planning
o Active judicial oversight
o Case management of support services
o Accountability to the community
o Graduated sanctions
o Rewarding success
C. Reintegration Involving Victims
· Successful reintegration programs also involve victims.
· Victims and victim organizations can assist in the reintegration of parolees by providing parole board members and parole officers with relevant information, offering their experience and expertise, and encouraging offender accountability.
D. Abolition of Discretionary Parole Board Release
· Some states abolished discretionary release from prison by a parole board because of the following four reasons:
o Scholars concluded that indeterminate sentencing and discretionary parole did not achieve offender rehabilitation, which was unfair because it was based solely on parole board judgment without explicit standards of fairness and equity in sentencing.
o Eliminating discretionary parole appeared to be tough on crime.
o Parole board’s lack of openness in the decision-making process, in which boards made their parole decisions on a case-by-case basis without benefit of a written set of policies and procedures, prompted criticism.
o State politicians were able to convince the public that parole was the cause of the rising crime problem and that abolition was the solution.
E. Prisoner Reentry and Community Policing
· Reentry isn’t just for corrections anymore for two reasons:
o The fourfold increase in the number of persons being released each year from state and federal prisons over the past two decades into crime-ridden neighborhoods that lack services and support systems is more than community corrections officers can handle.
o In spite of all the efforts being made at prisoner reform, offenders are still leaving prison unprepared for successful reentry.
· One way some communities are responding to the problems of prisoner reentry is to involve community policing with reentry initiatives.
o The argument for involving community policing in reentry is this—because the majority of ex-offenders are rearrested within three years, making contact with former prisoners is part of the everyday business of law enforcement.
F. Community-Focused Parole
· Community-focused parole is a process of engaging the community so the community engages parole.
· The process requires at least three changes to current parole practice:
o The first is to capture a mission statement that the public understands.
§ Some parole agencies are adopting public safety in addition to offender reform as a definition of their services
o A second change is visibility.
§ Unless the work of parole is made visible to the community, it will not result in the service being valued or supported.
o The third change—building partnerships—is central to any community-oriented initiative.
§ Strategies that raise an agency’s profile and elicit support are critical to the development of a community-focused parole service.