The Hull Adult Female Triage Project Iain Brennan and Simon Green in collaboration with Humberside Police University of Hull, UK

Intervention overview Pre-charge diversion for females with little or no past history of offending who are arrested for low gravity offences Eligibility assessment in custody suite Referral to women’s charity, Together Women Project Release and recorded as a triage disposal

Empirical basis for the initiative Little research on value of adult pre-charge diversions but they have been weakly effective with juvenile offenders (Schwalbe et al., 2012) Little evidence that drug-related ‘diversion and referral’ schemes work (Mayhurst et al., 2015) Previous UK study of effectiveness of pre-custody diversions to women’s centre for adult females was inconclusive (Jolliffe et al., 2011)

Intervention overview 1.Arrest 2.Assessment of criminogenic needs 3.Admission of guilt 4.Eligibility check – police record 5.Eligibility check – gravity score 1 or 2 6.Referral appointment made with Together Women Project 7.Release from custody 8.Arrest recorded as ‘triage diversion’ 9.Voluntary attendance at TWP

The ‘Together Women’ project Established in 2006 to provide a “safe women-only space in which women can access support and services” Thorough assessment of needs with key worker at initial meeting Tailored individual support with key worker: Drug and alcohol misuse; prostitution; domestic abuse; mental health; housing; deprivation; childcare

Evaluation overview Design: Natural experiment (survival analysis; intention-to-treat) Intervention: Pre-charge diversion and referral to TWP Setting: December 2012-June 2013 with one-year follow-up in Hull, UK Sample: Females arrested for low-severity offence Exclusion: Any adult conviction; police caution within two years Inclusion: Admission of guilt; acceptance of triage diversion Outcomes: Rearrest (Yes/No); Days until rearrest; Number of rearrests

Control sample Pilot nature of project inadvertently created control group

Intention-to-treat Per protocol Study pathway

Rate of rearrest was low for both groups: 14% vs 26% Triaged arrestees were 46% less likely to be rearrested but…when they were rearrested, they were rearrested quicker and more frequently than the control group Results

Two years on… Female triage ongoing and extended to ‘street triage’ Triage extended to male arrestees Causes, types and volume of male arrests has required a revision and evolution of the intervention Cultural shift from ‘offence without punishment’ to ‘emphasis on prevention’

Conclusions Mechanism: No idea which part of the intervention was the active ingredient – voluntary attendance was 41% First step: These early findings from a pilot project should not be taken as proof that this intervention works and the eligibility criteria should be refined Future work: Intervention should be trialled and evaluated elsewhere with a larger sample and a Campbell review of police-involved diversion schemes undertaken

Thanks!