Unlock 'Em Up
No one--at least, no one in
elite policy-wonk circles--is a bigger fan of incarcerating known, adjudicated
adult and juvenile criminals than me. No one has written more over the years
about the cost-effectiveness of incarceration as measured both in terms of its
crime-reduction value and in terms of doing justice. Still, when it comes to
the search for rational, workable crime policies, it's time to admit that the
brain-dead law-and-order right is no better than the soft-in-the-head
anti-incarceration left. More and more conservatives now favor abolishing
parole, sharply curtailing probation, imprisoning every adult felon for his or
her entire term, and warehousing juvenile offenders in adult jails. The prudent
response, however, is not to abolish probation and parole, but to reinvent
them.
First,
let's get crystal clear on the grim facts about crime, prisons, probation, and
parole. Be giddy about recent drops in national crime rates if you wish, but
each year Americans still suffer some 40 million criminal victimizations; about
a quarter of these are violent crimes. Only about one in 100 crimes actually
results in anyone getting caught, convicted, and sentenced to prison. Most
felony defendants are repeat offenders; yet, most felony defendants are
sentenced not to prison but to probation.
Likewise, a half-dozen recent studies prove beyond a
reasonable doubt what every veteran policeman knows: Most prisoners are
not petty, nonviolent thieves or mere first-time, low-level drug
offenders. Yet, most of these hardened criminals are still paroled well before
they have served out their latest sentence behind bars. On any given day in
America, there are three convicted adult criminals out on probation or parole
for every one in prison--and many of these are indistinguishable (in terms of
their violent and repeat criminal histories) from those who remain in prison.
As for juvenile offenders, between 1989 and 1993, the number of adjudicated
juvenile cases that resulted in probation rose by 17 percent. The number of
probation cases involving a "person offense"--such as homicide, rape, robbery,
or assault--soared by 45 percent.
Literally
dozens of careful studies document that probation and parole are, to put it
mildly, failing to protect the public. Nearly half of all state prisoners in
1991 had committed their latest crimes while out on probation or parole. While
formally "under supervision" in the community, their "violations" included more
than 13,000 murders, some 39,000 robberies, and tens of thousands of other
crimes. More than a quarter of all felons charged with gun crimes in 1992 were
out on probation and parole. Here, too, what's true for the revolving-door
adult system is even more true for the no-fault juvenile system. In many
cities, for example, most cases involving violent older teen thugs who get
referred to adult court result in probation. Kids plea bargain, too.
Why are the adult and juvenile probation
systems so poor, and what, realistically, can be done to improve
them--soon?
A big part of the answer is
that we spend next to nothing on the systems, and get about what we pay for.
Take adult probation. Joan R. Petersilia, former director of RAND's
criminal-justice-research program, has calculated that we currently spend about
$200 per year per probationer for supervision. "It is no wonder," she notes,
"that recidivism rates are so high." Likewise, Patrick A. Langan, a
statistician with the U.S. Justice Department, has found that more than 90
percent of probationers are supposed to get substance-abuse counseling, pay
victim restitution, or meet other requirements. But about half do not comply
with the terms of their probation. Probation sanctions, he concludes, "are not
rigorously enforced."
But how
could they be properly supervised by overworked, underpaid probation officers
with scores of cases to manage? As Petersilia argues, even probationers who are
categorized as high-risk offenders receive little direct, face-to-face
oversight. If "probationers are growing in number and are increasingly more
serious offenders," she advises, "then they are in need of more supervision,
not less. But less is exactly what they have been getting over the past
decade."
Ditto for juvenile probation. Over half of street-level
juvenile probation officers earn less than $30,000 a year. In big cities, the
probation caseload of serious and violent juvenile cases has increased rapidly.
In a national survey, probation officers admitted that their average urban
caseloads were at least 25 percent higher than they should be.
To
reinvent probation, we will need to reinvest in it. More money, more agents,
and closer supervision are just the first phase. Equally important is the type
of creative and critical thinking represented by Boston's probation chief
Ronald P. Corbett. Among other innovations, Corbett has teamed local probation
officers with local police officers. Patrolling the streets together, they have
cut crime. Corbett has also got probation officers to work with inner-city
clergy on a wide range of crime control and prevention initiatives.
In Philadelphia, the district attorney's office
has developed a no-nonsense program in which volunteers from the neighborhoods
where the juveniles committed their crimes hear the cases, set terms, and
monitor compliance. Run for the district attorney's office by veteran probation
officer Mike Cleary, the citywide program boasts an 80 percent success rate,
costs little to administer, and holds kids (including hundreds of juvenile
felony offenders) accountable.
"The value of Philly's
program," observes former New Jersey Superior Court Judge Daniel R. Coburn, "is
that it separates the minnows from the sharks, then holds the minnows
accountable and hence less likely to become sharks, let alone become the
predatory Great Whites we must incarcerate." He should know. Coburn pioneered
two major and highly successful programs in New Jersey. One is the state's
Enforcement Court, which goes after people who remain on probation because they
failed to pay fines and restitution, collects the money, restores the trust of
crime victims, and brings literally millions of dollars into state coffers that
can be used to beef up other justice programs. The other is the Sheriffs Labor
Assistance Program (SLAP), which puts low-level criminals to work (for real!)
cleaning up parks, painting public buildings, helping out in nursing homes, and
more. "Fail to do exactly what you're required to do on SLAP," Coburn declares,
"and you get slam--as in, see you in jail for sure."
Admittedly, parole is a tougher reinvention nut to crack. In the late 1980s, I
myself had expressed hopes that intensive-supervision parole programs could
protect the public and its purse. But the best studies of intensive-supervision
programs for high-risk parolees soon found that the programs cut neither
recidivism nor costs. So for the last several years I have argued in favor of
some types of "three strikes and you're out" laws. And I continue to strongly
favor a no-parole policy for some categories of violent and chronic
criminals.
But the most interesting parole-reinvention idea I've
encountered to date comes from Martin Horn, formerly head of New York State's
parole authority and presently commissioner of prisons in Pennsylvania. As Horn
argues, in most cases there is relatively little that parole agents can do to
keep an offender who is determined to commit new crimes from committing them.
The flip side is that parolees who want to go straight often can make it if
they are literate, civil, and can stay off drugs, remain sober, and get a job.
But parole agents often waste time chasing the bad guys rather than helping the
good. And in many states, the laws perversely limit a parole agent's
discretion. For example, I've heard many agents complain of having to revoke
the parole of guys who failed a drug test but who were not, in the agent's best
judgment, doing anything more than getting high. As one agent confided: "A
parolee of mine is OK and is looking for a job. He pees in a bottle and comes
up dirty, and I have to send him back inside. But a real predator I know is
using, selling, and almost certainly doing other crimes. He stays on the
streets unless I catch him red-handed--and I won't. It's insane."
Horn's radical notion is to
reinvent parole on the basis of a "personal responsibility" model. A released
prisoner would be given the equivalent of a parole services voucher. For a
fixed period of time--say two years--he can use the voucher to seek out
education, job training, drug treatment, or other services from state-selected
providers. If he wants to help himself, he can. If not, he's on his own. Do a
new crime during this period--bite the hand that is offering you a way to help
yourself--and you do the time for the crime, plus a year or two.
It's time to get behind
serious efforts to reinvent probation and parole, and time to debate fresh
ideas. After all, we are not going to put every convicted adult and juvenile
felon behind bars and keep him or her there--nor should we.
