The Timing of Prison Sanctions and the Odds of Returning to Prison After Release

Abstract

A sample of 48,930 inmates was examined to estimate the direct and moderating effect of the timing of prison sanctions on recidivism. Logistic regression models demonstrated that number of sanctions was positively associated with recidivism but timing of an inmate’s last sanction before release did not significantly influence recidivism. However, timing of an inmate’s last sanction moderated the association between number of sanctions and recidivism. This moderation effect suggested that as time between an inmate’s last sanction and release from prison increased, the effect of the total number of sanctions on recidivism decreased in magnitude. The results of this assessment suggest that the number and timing of sanctions matter in explaining the relationship between prison sanctions and recidivism.

Keywords

prison sanctions timing of prison sanctions recidivism

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Andrews

D. A.

Bonta

Wormith

J. S.

(2006). The recent past and near future of risk and/or need assessment. Crime and Delinquency, 52(1), 7–27.

Arizona Department of Corrections. (2016). Department order manual. Arizona department of corrections. https://corrections.az.gov/sites/default/files/policies/800/0803_032519.pdf.

Bales

W. D.

Piquero

A. R.

(2012). Assessing the impact of imprisonment on recidivism. Journal of Experimental Criminology, 8(1), 71–101.

Bonta

Motiuk

L. L.

(1992). Inmate classification. Criminal Justice Journal, 20, 343–353.

Browne

Cambier

Agha

(2011). Prisons within prisons: The use of segregation in the United States. Federal Sentencing Reporter, 24, 46–49.

Bushway

S. D.

Apel

(2012). A signaling perspective on employment-based reentry programming. Criminology & Public Policy, 11(1), 21–50.

Butler

H. D.

Griffin

O. H.

III Johnson

W. W.

(2013). What makes you the “worst of the worst?” An examination of state policies defining supermaximum confinement. Criminal Justice Policy Review, 24, 676–694.

Butler

H. D.

Steiner

Makarios

M. D.

Travis

L. F.

III . (2020). An examination of the influence of exposure to disciplinary segregation on recidivism. Crime and Delinquency, 66, 485–512.

Camp

S. D.

Gaes

G. G.

(2005). Criminogenic effects of the prison environment on inmate behavior: Some experimental evidence. Crime and Delinquency, 51, 425–442.

10.

Cao

Zhao

Van Dine

(1997). Prison disciplinary tickets: A test of the deprivation and importation models. Criminal Justice Journal, 25, 103–113.

11.

Casey-Acevedo

Bakken

(2001). The effect of time on the disciplinary adjustment of women in prison. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 45, 489–497.

12.

Chen

M. K.

Shapiro

J. M.

(2007). Do harsher prison conditions reduce recidivism? A discontinuity-based approach. American Law and Economics Review, 9(1), 1–29.

13.

Clark

V. A.

Duwe

(2019). From solitary to the streets: The effect of restrictive housing on recidivism. Corrections: Policy, Practice, and Research, 4, 302–318.

14.

Cloyes

K. G.

Lovell

Allen

D. G.

Rhodes

L. A.

(2006). Assessment of psychosocial impairment in a supermaximum security unit sample. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 33, 760–781.

15.

Cochran

J. C.

Mears

D. P.

(2017). The path of least desistance: Inmate compliance and recidivism. Justice Quarterly, 34, 431–458.

16.

Collica

(2010). Surviving incarceration: Two prison-based peer programs build communities of support for female offenders. Deviant Behavior, 31, 314–347.

17.

Comprehensive Adult Student Assessment Systems (CASAS). (2014). Study of the CASAS relationship to GED. National Reports and Articles.

18.

De Andrade

Ritchie

Rowlands

Mann

Hides

(2018). Substance use and recidivism outcomes from prison-based drug and alcohol interventions. Epidemiologic Reviews, 40, 121–133.

19.

DiIulio

(1987). Governing prisons: A comparative study of correctional management. Free press.

20.

Duwe

(2018). The effects of the timing and dosage of correctional programming on recidivism. Journal of Offender Rehabilitation, 57(3–4), 256–271.

21.

Eichenthal

D. R.

Jacobs

J. B.

(1991). Enforcing the criminal law in state prisons. Justice Quarterly, 8, 283–303.

22.

Fox

(2016). Applied regression analysis and general linear models. SAGE Publications.

23.

Gaes

G. G.

Camp

S. D.

(2009). Unintended consequences: Experimental evidence for the criminogenic effect of prison security level placement on post-release recidivism. Journal of Experimental Criminology, 5, 139–162.

24.

Gannon

T. A.

Olver

M. E.

Mallion

J. S.

James

(2019). Does specialized psychological treatment for offending reduce recidivism? A meta-analysis examining staff and program variables as predictors of treatment effectiveness. Clinical Psychology Review, 73, 101752. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cpr.2019.101752

25.

Gendreau

(1996). Offeder rehabilitation: What we know, and what needs to be done. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 23, 144–161.

26.

Gendreau

Labrecque

R. M.

(2018). The effects of administrative segregation: A lesson in knowledge cumulation. In Wooldredge

Smith

(Eds.), The Oxford handbook of prisons and imprisonment (pp. 340–366). Oxford University Press.

27.

Glaser

(1967). Incentives motivating prisoner behavior. The Prison Journal, 47(1), 12–20.

28.

Grassian

(1983). Psychopathological effects of solitary confinement. American Journal of Psychiatry, 140, 1450–1454.

29.

Grassian

Friedman

(1986). Effects of sensory deprivation in psychiatric seclusion and solitary confinement. International Journal of Law and Psychiatry, 8(1), 49–65.

30.

Haney

(2017). “Madness” and penal confinement: Some observations on mental illness and prison pain. Punishment & Society, 19, 310–326.

31.

Henry

B. F.

(2020). Adversity, mental health, and substance use disorders as predictors and mediators of rule violations in US prisons. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 47, 271–289.

32.

Jablin

F. M.

(1987). Organizational entry, assimilation and exit. In Jamblin

F. M.

Putnam

L. L.

Roberts

K. H.

Porter

L. W.

(Eds.), Handbook of organizational communication (pp. 679–740). SAGE.

33.

Jones

Schmid

(2000). Doing time: Prison experience and identity among first-time inmates. Jai Press.

34.

Latessa

E. J.

Lugo

Pompoco

Sullivan

Wooldredge

(2015). Evaluation of Ohio’s prison programs. University of Cincinnati Corrections Institute.

35.

Lee

L. M.

(2019). The impact of prison programming on recidivism. Corrections, 4, 252–271.

36.

Liebling

Maruna

(Eds.). (2013). The effects of imprisonment. Routledge.

37.

Listwan

S. J.

Sullivan

C. J.

Agnew

Cullen

F. T.

Colvin

(2013). The pains of imprisonment revisited: The impact of strain on inmate recidivism. Justice Quarterly, 30(1), 144–168.

38.

Lovell

Johnson

L. C.

Cain

K. C.

(2007). Recidivism of supermax prisoners in Washington State. Crime and Delinquency, 53, 633–656.

39.

Luigi

Dellazizzo

Giguère

C. É.

Goulet

M. H.

Potvin

Dumais

(2020). Solitary confinement of inmates associated with relapse into any recidivism including violent crime: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Trauma Violence & Abuse. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/1524838020957983

40.

Mackay

; The Prison Law Office. (2019). The California prison & parole handbook. The Prison Law Office. https://prisonlaw.com/resources/prison-handbook/

41.

Maltz

M. D.

(1984). Recidivism. Academic Press.

42.

Marquart

Trulson

(2016). Understanding the contours of prison disciplinary procedures. In Wooldredge

J. D.

Smith

(Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of prisons and imprisonment (online) (pp. 320–339). Oxford University Press.

43.

Mears

D. P.

Castro

J. L.

(2006). Wardens’ views on the wisdom of supermax prisons. Crime and Delinquency, 52, 398–431.

44.

Mitchell

M. M.

Spooner

Jia

Zhang

(2016). The effect of prison visitation on reentry success: A meta-analysis. Criminal Justice Journal, 47, 74–83.

45.

Moffitt

T. E.

(1993). Adolescence-limited and life-course-persistent antisocial behavior: A developmental taxonomy. Psychological Review, 100, 674–701.

46.

Moffitt

T. E.

(1997). Adolescence-limited and life-course-persistent offending: A complementary pair of developmental theories. In Terence

P. T.

(Ed.), Developmental theories of crime and delinquency (Vol. 7, pp. 11–54). Routledge.

47.

Newton

Day

Giles

Wodak

Graffam

Baldry

(2018). The impact of vocational education and training programs on recidivism: A systematic review of current experimental evidence. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 62(1), 187–207.

48.

Ohio Administrative Code. (2020). Disciplinary procedures for violations of inmate rules of conduct before the rule infraction board. Ohio Laws & Administrative Rules. https://codes.ohio.gov/ohio-administrative-code/rule-5120-9-08

49.

Papp

Wooldredge

Pompoco

(2021). Timing of prison programs and the odds of returning to prison. Corrections: Policy, Practice and Research, 6, 124–149. https://doi.org/10.1080/23774657.2019.1598308

50.

Pearl

(2009). Causality. Cambridge University Press.

51.

Reisig

M. D.

Mesko

(2009). Procedural justice, legitimacy, and prisoner misconduct. Psychology Crime and Law, 15(1), 41–59.

52.

Reiter

Ventura

Lovell

Augustine

Barragan

Blair

Chesnut

Dashtgard

Gonzalez

Pifer

Strong

(2020). Psychological distress in solitary confinement: Symptoms, severity, and prevalence in the United States, 2017-2018. American Journal of Public Health, 110, S56–S62.

53.

Rydberg

Clark

(2016). Variation in the incarceration length-recidivism dose–response relationship. Criminal Justice Journal, 46, 118–128.

54.

Severson

R. E.

(2019). Gender differences in mental health, institutional misconduct, and disciplinary segregation. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 46, 1719–1737.

55.

Silver

I. A.

Nedelec

J. L.

(2018). Ensnarement during imprisonment: Re-conceptualizing theoretically driven policies to address the association between within-prison sanctioning and recidivism. Criminology & Public Policy, 17, 1005–1035.

56.

Smith

(2016). Toward an understanding of “what works” in segregation: Implementing correctional programming and re-entry-focused services in restrictive housing units. In Department of Justice U.S. (Ed.), Restrictive housing in the U.S.: Issues, challenges, and future directions (pp. 331–366). National Institute of Justice.

57.

Spence

(1973). Job market signaling. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 87, 355–374.

58.

Steiner

Wooldredge

(2014). Comparing self-report to official measures of inmate misconduct. Justice Quarterly, 31, 1074–1101.

59.

Taylor

Kent

M. L.

(2010). Anticipatory socialization in the use of social media in public relations: A content analysis of PRSA’s public relations tactics. Public Relations Review, 36, 207–214.

60.

Tennessee Department of Corrections. (2018). Inmate rules and regulations. Tennessee Department of Correction. https://www.tn.gov/correction/about-us/policies-and-procedures.html

61.

Toman

E. L.

(2019). The victim–offender overlap behind bars: Linking prison misconduct and victimization. Justice Quarterly, 36(2), 350–382.

62.

Zgoba

K. M.

Pizarro

J. M.

Salerno

L. M.

(2020). Assessing the impact of restrictive housing on inmate post-release criminal behavior. American Journal of Criminal Justice, 45, 102–125.

Supplementary Material

Please find the following supplemental material available below.

For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.

For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.

0.00 MB

0.04 MB