Reoffending: Evidence and Implications for Practice and Policy Darrick Jolliffe Head of the School of Law and Criminology University of Greenwich

Outline What we know about reoffending. Prison, the experience of prison and reoffending. What should we be doing to reduce reoffending?

What We Know About Reoffending?

What We Know About Reoffending?

What We Know About Reoffending?

What We Know About Reoffending? Not succeeding in public protection Not helping those who need help to re-integrate 9.5 – 13 Billion GBP per year People with certain characteristics are more likely to reoffend

Risk Assessment Tools

Offence Group Reconviction Score - 3 Gender Age Current offence type Rate of accruing convictions = Score out of 100

Example Male 36 Criminal Damage (Vandalism) First offence at age 18 and 13 previous convictions

Risk Score = 45% Two theft offences….40 days later.

Example Female 19 Absconding/Bail Offence First offence at age 16 and 16 previous convictions

Risk Score = 74% No offences (1.5 years later)

Risk Assessment Tools How good are risk assessment devices? Which risk assessment tool is best? (Farrington, Jolliffe & Livingston, 2007; Coid et al., 2011; Singh et al., 2011) Predictive validity of these tools is very similar

Risk Assessment Tools Fazel (2019) – tools not strong enough to support punitive measures. They could be used for positive things. Strongest predictors of reoffending are not causal Risk assessment tools tell us who, but not how

Prison Increases Reoffending Jolliffe & Hedderman (2015) 1162 males sent to prison 1162 males put on community order Significant increase in reoffending Hedderman & Jolliffe (2016) 320 females to prison 320 females put on community order Cost an extra £3.8 million GBP

So What Can We Do To Reduce Reoffending? Use prison less often Provide ‘evidence-based’ interventions to those who most need it Jolliffe & Farrington, 2007 - Review of interventions for violent offenders 11 evaluations Overall they reduced reoffending by about 11% Studies that included cognitive skills training and role-play showed greater reductions

Stop Now and Plan (SNAP) Leena Augimeri 12-week cognitive-behavioural intervention including self-control and problem-solving techniques structured curriculum, facilitated discussion, role-play participants learn to problem-solve in provoking situations Weekly 90 minute sessions Also, one-to-one family counselling. For every 1$ spent on the programme between 3 – 6$ was saved.

Lipsey (2009) An analyses of over 500 interventions that had been used for younger offenders Working with higher risk individuals An intervention that was therapeutic (not deterrent) Interventions that had high ‘fidelity’

Evaluation is Important Highest quality evaluations might not be possible. However, collection of fairly basic information will help to build ‘evidence’. Who are you working with? What work have you done with this person? What happened after?

Conclusions Reoffending is far too high We have tools to help us identify who to work with Prison is not one of these Interventions to reduce reoffending should be ‘evidence-based’ or be ‘evidence-collecting’

Professor Dr Darrick Jolliffe Head of the School of Law and Criminology University of Greenwich d.jolliffe@gre.ac.uk