By Ebony Ruhland , Edward E. Rhine , Jason Robey and Kelly Lyn Mitchell

The Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice launched a national survey of releasing authorities in March 2015 to each state, and the U.S. Parole Commission. The importance of the survey was underscored by an endorsement from the Association of Paroling Authorities International (APAI). We are pleased to present the results from this important survey here. This is the first comprehensive survey of parole boards completed in nearly ten years. Its findings provide a rich database for better understanding the policy and practice of paroling authorities. The last survey to be conducted of paroling authorities was in 2007 - 2008. The current report offers an expansion and update of previous surveys. The results summarized throughout the report offer a timely resource for paroling authorities, correctional policy-makers and practitioners, legislators, and those with a public policy interest in sentencing and criminal justice operations. It is our hope that the document and its findings provide key justice system and other stakeholders with an incisive snapshot of the work of paroling authorities across the country in a manner that contributes to a larger conversation about sound and effective parole release and revocation practices.

Minneapolis: Robina Institute of Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, 2016. 56p.

By Madeline M. Carter, and The Honorable Richard J. Sankovitz

Isaac Newton was among the first modern scientists to recognize that new discoveries depend heavily on science that is already established: “If I have seen further,” he wrote, “it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”1 Giant strides have been made in the fields of public administration and criminal justice by applying science to practice. Evidence-based decision making asserts that public policy and practice should be informed by the best available research and enhanced through ongoing performance measurement and evaluation. Scientific study has demonstrated that recidivism can be reduced when three key principles are followed: n The risk principle suggests that justice system interventions should be matched to offenders’ risk level, focusing more intensive interventions on moderate and high risk offenders. n The need principle asserts that justice system interventions should target those factors that most significantly influence criminal behavior. n The responsivity principle demonstrates that interventions are most effective when they are based on research-supported models and tailored to the unique characteristics of individual offenders. In this paper, we propose to take this knowledge one step further: to link the duration of probation supervision to the optimal amount of intervention an offender needs in order to reduce risk of reoffense. The proposed “dosage” model of probation suggests that the length of supervision should be determined by the number of hours of intervention necessary to reduce risk, rather than an arbitrarily (or customarily) established amount of time (e.g., 3 years, 5 years). For many offenders, the research shows that correctional intervention is analogous to treating a patient: too little intervention and the patient receives little or no benefit; too much, and the treatment is ineffective or even harmful.2 Given this, we postulate that the length of supervision should depend on how long it takes an offender to achieve the dosage target—the type and amount of intervention that research tells us he or she needs in order to maximize the potential for behavior change and that is necessary in order to minimize risk to the public—rather than a fixed term of supervision.

Silver Spring, MD: Center For Effective Public Policy , 2014. 22p.

By Madeline Carter

In 2011, while working in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on the Evidence-Based Decision Making Initiative, sponsored by the National Institute of Corrections (NIC), the Center for Effective Public Policy (the Center) pioneered the concept of “dosage probation.” In 2012, NIC awarded a cooperative agreement to the Center and its partner The Carey Group to develop a model that would further explore this concept and outline the activities, processes, and objectives that a jurisdiction would carry out at the individual case, agency, and system levels to implement dosage probation as a risk reduction intervention. The model was introduced through the publication of a monograph entitled Dosage Probation: Rethinking the Structure of Probation Sentences (Carter & Sankovitz, 2014). In subsequent years, NIC supported implementation of the model in two pilot sites: Napa County, California, and Washington County, Minnesota. Much has been learned from these pilot efforts.

The dosage probation model suggests that the length of supervision should be determined by the number of hours of intervention necessary to reduce risk as opposed to a standard probation term, such as 3, 4, 5, etc., years. Dosage probation is designed to incentivize behavior change by providing an opportunity for the individual under supervision to receive early termination from probation if they successfully engage in risk reduction interventions tailored to their criminogenic needs, in a “dose” matched to their risk level. This document, the second in a series, provides background information on the dosage probation project; a summary of the literature pertinent to dosage; and information about the dosage pilot sites, including key lessons that emerged from the pilot project. It also lays the foundation for a forthcoming set of resources on this topic: The Dosage Probation Toolkit.

Silver Spring, MD: Center for Effective Public Policy, 2020.

By James Austin

This study examined the extent to which the Prisoner Classification Management (PMC) system improved prison operations and reduced violence between inmates. The PMC system classifies inmates into one of five categories: selective intervention -- situational (SI-S); selective intervention -- treatment (SI-T); casework control (CC); environmental structure (ES); and limit setting (LS). Data were collected from records kept by the Research and Planning Section of Washington's Department of Corrections. Data included inmate characteristics (JU67W.DAT), work assignment records (JU68W.DAT), disciplinary records (JU69W.DAT), assignment records (JU70W.DAT), and housing assignment records (JU71W.DAT). Data were also collected from a long (JUnW.DAT) and short (JU73W.DAT) PMC questionnaire. Checks for out-of-range values revealed that the data are free of detectable coding errors.

San Francisco: National Council on Crime and Delinquency, 1990. 100p.

By Ian O'Donnell

Prisoners, Solitude, and Time by Ian O’Donnell is a major addition to the number of outstanding books on imprisonment already published in the Clarendon Studies in Criminology series. As the title indicates, its focus is on prisoners’ experience of solitary confinement, their handling of time, and the interface between these. Professor O’Donnell brings to bear on these issues a wealth of academic expertise, primarily as a psychologist and historian, as well as experience in penal reform, prison visiting, and as a magistrate. The result is an immaculately written book that is not only scholarly but also thought-provoking, moving, and ultimately inspiring about the potential of human beings to somehow and sometimes transcend even the most cruel and unusual deprivations and pains. Time is of the essence of prison as punishment, captured in the cliché ‘if you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime’. Yet the vast criminological literature scarcely focuses on the subjective experience of ‘doing time’.

Oxford, UK; New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. 353p.

By Thomas Mathiesen

A leading text of worldwide renown: available in Norwegian, Danish, English, Swedish, German, Spanish, Italian - and now being translated into Chinese. In this new Third Edition - with its new preface, epilogue and other revisions (plus all the material from earlier editions) - the author expands on the control aspects of prison, the gear change brought about by responses to international terrorism post-September 11 and the London bombings and explains how contemporary events are changing the boundaries of crime and punishment and increasing the risks to civil liberties and the Rule of Law. Thomas Mathiesen also argues for an 'Alternative Public Space' where discussion of serious and fundamental issues of this nature can take place free from the superficial world of knee-jerk reactions from politicians and the entertainment driven needs of the press and media.Part of the "Waterside Press Criminal Policy Series", Prison On Trial distils the arguments for and against imprisonment in a readable, accessible and authoritative way, making Thomas Mathiesen's work a classic for students and other people concerned to understand the real issues. It is as relevant today as when it was first published, arguably more so as policy-making becomes increasingly politicized and true opportunities to influence developments diminish. Mindful of this, Mathiesen recommends an 'alternative public space' where people can engage in valid discussion on the basis of sound information, free from the survival priority of the media, to entertain.

Winchester, UK: Waterside Press, 2006. 215p

Edited by Tom Daems and Luc Robert

This volume explores the role that European institutions have come to play in regulating national prisons systems. The authors introduce and contribute to advancing a new research agenda in international penology (‘Europe in prisons’) which complements the conventional comparative approach (‘prisons in Europe’). The chapters examine the impact – if any – that institutions such as the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and the European Court of Human Rights have had on prison policy throughout Europe. With contributions from a wide range of countries such as Albania, Austria, Belgium, Ireland, Norway and Spain, this edited collection offers a wide-ranging and authoritative guide to the effects of European institutions on prison policy.

Cham: Springer International Publishing , 2017. 333p.

By Mark S. Fleisher and Jessie L. Krienert

The Myth of Prison Rape provides a nuanced glimpse into the complex sexual dynamics of the American prison. Drawing on results from the most comprehensive study of inmate sexuality to date, the authors analyze the intricacies of sexuality and sexual violence in daily inmate life. Dynamic case studies and interview excerpts enliven this cultural study of sexuality, safety, and violence in American prisons

Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009. 219p.

By Elaine Crawley

Prisons are at once extraordinary and ordinary institutions. They are extraordinary in that they are places in which large numbers of strangers are forced to live, in close proximity with each other, often for sustained periods. On entry to the prison, these strangers are stripped, searched and relieved of their personal possessions by other strangers - prison officers acting on behalf of the state. These officers are obliged to regulate prisoners' behaviour and ensure that they do not escape. Once inside, assigned to a cell and dressed in prison clothing, the strangers-nowprisoners are under almost constant surveillance, and instructed as to how they should conduct themselves, what is expected of them, and at what time, throughout the period of their sentences. In old prisons which stand in the centre of towns, all this may take place only yards from where people are freely going about their daily business - shopping, visiting the hairdressers or the pub, taking children to school, walking in the park. Whenever I step into the sunshine after spending the day in one prison or other, I rarely fail to be struck by this thought and by the apparent invisibility of this other world to passers-by. Yet in many respects, prisons are also very ordinary. They are ordinary in that much of prison life, especially long-term prison life, revolves around those mundane matters which concern all of us in our non-prison lives - eating, sleeping, cleaning and tidying, doing the laundry, working (or looking for work), thinking about family and friends, attempting to alleviate boredom. All these concerns occupy prisoners because the prison is where prisoners must live and, as such, the prisoner is a member of what Clemmer (1940) terms the prison 'community'.

Cullompton, Devon, UK: Willan Publishing, 2004. 298p.

By Graham J Towl and David A Crighton

The definitive guide from two leading authors central to developments in the field. An invaluable book which covers everything from theoretical and community research to precisely what is known about prisoners and the risk of their committing suicide. Covers the Harris Review and Government Response to it as well as the stance of politicians, reform groups and other leading experts on what in 2017 is an escalating problem for UK prisons. Contains analysis and data from over 30 years, bringing together key knowledge and information at a critical time of concern and attention.

Hook, UK: Waterside Press, 2017. 208p.

Edited by Tim Causer, Margot Finn, and Philip Schofield

Jeremy Bentham and Australia is a collection of scholarship inspired by Bentham’s writings on Australia. These writings are available for the first time in authoritative form in Panopticon versus New South Wales and other writings on Australia, a volume in The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham published by UCL Press.

In the present collection, a distinguished group of authors reflect on Bentham’s Australian writings, making original contributions to existing debates and setting agendas for future ones. In the first part of the collection, the works are placed in their historical contexts, while the second part provides a critical assessment of the historical accuracy and plausibility of Bentham’s arguments against transportation from the British Isles. In the third part, attention turns to Bentham’s claim that New South Wales had been illegally founded and to the imperial and colonial constitutional ramifications of that claim. Here, authors also discuss Bentham’s work of 1831 in which he supports the establishment of a free colony on the southern coast of Australia. In the final part, authors shed light on the history of Bentham’s panopticon penitentiary scheme, his views on the punishment and reform of criminals and what role, if any, religion had to play in that regard, and discuss apparently panopticon-inspired institutions built in the Australian colonies.

This collection will appeal to readers interested in Bentham’s life and thought, the history of transportation from the British Isles, and of British penal policy more generally, colonial and imperial history, Indigenous history, legal and constitutional history, and religious history.

London: UCL Press, 2022. 425p.

By National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine; Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education; Committee on Law and Justice; Committee on Evaluating Success Among People Released from Prison; Richard Rosenfeld and Amanda Grigg, Editors

Nearly 600,000 people are released from state and federal prisons annually. Whether these individuals will successfully reintegrate into their communities has been identified as a critical measure of the effectiveness of the criminal legal system. However, evaluating the successful reentry of individuals released from prison is a challenging process, particularly given limitations of currently available data and the complex set of factors that shape reentry experiences.

The Limits of Recidivism: Measuring Success After Prison finds that the current measures of success for individuals released from prison are inadequate. The use of recidivism rates to evaluate post-release success ignores significant research on how and why individuals cease to commit crimes, as well as the important role of structural factors in shaping post-release outcomes. The emphasis on recidivism as the primary metric to evaluate post-release success also ignores progress in other domains essential to the success of individuals returning to communities, including education, health, family, and employment.

In addition, the report highlights the unique and essential insights held by those who have experienced incarceration and proposes that the development and implementation of new measures of post-release success would significantly benefit from active engagement with individuals with this lived experience. Despite significant challenges, the report outlines numerous opportunities to improve the measurement of success among individuals released from prison and the report’s recommendations, if implemented, will contribute to policies that increase the health, safety, and security of formerly incarcerated persons and the communities to which they return.

Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/26459.

Edited by Emily A. Wang, Bruce Western, Emily P. Backes, and Julie Schuck

The conditions and characteristics of correctional facilities — overcrowded with rapid population turnover, often in old and poorly ventilated structures, a spatially concentrated pattern of releases and admissions in low-income communities of color, and a health care system that is siloed from community public health — accelerates transmission of the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) responsible for COVID-19. Such conditions increase the risk of coming into contact with the virus for incarcerated people, correctional staff, and their families and communities. Relative to the general public, moreover, incarcerated individuals have a higher prevalence of chronic health conditions such as asthma, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease, making them susceptible to complications should they become infected. Indeed, cumulative COVID-19 case rates among incarcerated people and correctional staff have grown steadily higher than case rates in the general population. Decarcerating Correctional Facilities during COVID-19 offers guidance on efforts to decarcerate, or reduce the incarcerated population, as a response to COIVD-19 pandemic. This report examines best practices for implementing decarceration as a response to the pandemic and the conditions that support safe and successful reentry of those decarcerated.

Washington (DC): National Academies Press ; 2020. 161p.

By InSight Crime and American University’s Center for Latin American & Latino Studies - CLALS

Over the past thirty years, the Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC) has emerged as one of the most powerful criminal organizations in South America. From its founding in São Paulo’s prison system, it has spread rapidly across southern Brazil, contested trafficking routes in Brazil’s northern and northeastern regions, and become a potent force in Paraguay. Drawing on a variety of case studies developed from research in Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina, the report describes the origins of the PCC, its unique model of organization, and its ability to regulate criminal markets in the areas it controls. The report analyzes the forces that have facilitated the PCC’s rise and expansion, as well as the constraints to its further spread, including increased law enforcement, the rise of rival organizations, and the organizational challenges of expansion. We conclude that although the PCC is facing unprecedented challenges, the organization is resilient to many law enforcement pressures, and the PCC “model” of criminal organization is increasingly being emulated by other criminal groups in the region.

Washington, DC: InSight Crime and CLALS (American University), 2020. 66p.

By Stanton Wheeler , Hugh F. Cline , David J. Armor

This book presents the formerly-unpublished manuscript by Wheeler and Cline detailing the landmark, comparative prisons study they conducted in the 1960s which examined fifteen Scandinavian prisons and nearly 2000 inmates across four Nordic countries. At the time, it was the largest comparative study of prisons and inmate behavior ever undertaken and despite 15 years of analysis and write-up it was never published but it influenced many other important prison studies that followed. This book engages with the functionalist perspectives that were widespread in the 1960s, and tries to answer some of the classical questions of prison sociology such as how prisoners adapt to imprisonment and the degree to which prisoner adaptations can be attributed to characteristics of prisoners and prisons. It examines the nature and structure of prisons, the effect of that structure on individual prisoners and the other factors that may influence the way that they respond to confinement. It also includes discussion about the prisoners’ considerations of justice and fairness and a explanation of the study design and data which was highly unique at the time. The Scandinavian Prison Study brings Wheeler and Cline's pioneering work into the present context with a preface and an introduction which discuss the questions and claims raised in the book still relevant to this day.

Cham, SWIT: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020. 390p. 386p.

By Joshua M. Price

The United States imprisons more of its citizens than any other nation in the world. To be sentenced to prison is to face systematic violence, humiliation, and, perhaps worst of all, separation from family and community. It is, to borrow Orlando Patterson’s term for the utter isolation of slavery, to suffer “social death.” In Prison and Social Death, Joshua Price exposes the unexamined cost that prisoners pay while incarcerated and after release, drawing upon hundreds of often harrowing interviews conducted with people in prison, parolees, and their families. Price argues that the prison separates prisoners from desperately needed communities of support from parents, spouses, and children. Moreover, this isolation of people in prison renders them highly vulnerable to other forms of violence, including sexual violence. Price stresses that the violence they face goes beyond physical abuse by prison guards and it involves institutionalized forms of mistreatment, ranging from abysmally poor health care to routine practices that are arguably abusive, such as pat-downs, cavity searches, and the shackling of pregnant women. And social death does not end with prison. The condition is permanent, following people after they are released from prison. Finding housing, employment, receiving social welfare benefits, and regaining voting rights are all hindered by various legal and other hurdles. The mechanisms of social death, Price shows, are also informal and cultural. Ex-prisoners face numerous forms of distrust and are permanently stigmatized by other citizens around them. A compelling blend of solidarity, civil rights activism, and social research, Prison and Social Death offers a unique look at the American prison and the excessive and unnecessary damage it inflicts on prisoners and parolees.

New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2015. 2122p.

By Alison Liebling

The suicide rate in prisons in England and Wales is 40 per 100,000—four times that of the general population. How can this rate be explained? Recent prison suicides have aroused much public concern and media attention, yet there has been very little research examining their true cause or nature. Previous studies have tended to rely exclusively on official statistics and prison records, and have had little effect on formulating policy and practice. Suicides in Prison is the first major study in this area to draw directly on the experiences of both prisoners and staff. The interviews conducted by the author help to cast new light on the circumstances which can lead to suicide or attempted suicide. The book provides further evidence to support the growing recognition that suicide is not an exclusively psychiatric problem. The coping mechanisms and social support given to the people involved can play a crucial role. Alison Liebling also shows how serious difficulties in the management of prisoners at risk of suicide may be exacerbated by problems of communication between departments, and that prison officers may lack the necessary training to play a potentially major role in suicide prevention. Most importantly, if staff perceptions and attitudes are not addressed, any attempt to improve procedures may well be ineffective. Suicides in Prison will be of interest to probation officers, social workers and prison staff and governors as well as those studying penology. It traces the recent history of the problem and provides the first major theoretical discussion of the nature and causes of suicide in prison.

London; New York: Routledge, 1998. 288p.

Edited by Elisabeth Fransson, Francesca Giofrè and Berit Johnsen

"What is prison architecture and how can it be studied? How are concepts such as humanism, dignity and solidarity translated into prison architecture? What kind of ideologies and ideas are expressed in various prison buildings from different eras and locations? What is the outside and the inside of a prison, and what is the significance of movement within the prison space? What does a lunch table have to do with prison architecture? How do prisoners experience materiality in serving a prison sentence? These questions are central to the texts presented in this anthology. Prison, Architecture and Humans is the result of a collaboration between researchers and architects from Italy, Norway and Sweden. It presents new approaches to prison architecture and penological research by focusing on prison design, prison artefacts, everyday prison life and imprisoned bodies. The book will be of interest to students, researchers, architects and politicians."

Oslo: Cappelen Damm Akademisk, 2018. 349p.

By Craig Russell

The United States has almost three times as many prisoners as it did just twenty-five years ago. Although the cost of keeping people in prison is rising, there are less expensive alternatives that may also be more effective at keeping people from returning to jail after they are released. Recent changes in the U.S. criminal code allow judges more freedom to give sentences other than prison.

Broomall, PA: Mason Crest, 2018. 82p.

Edited by Leslie Fairweather; Sean McConville

Current and future prison designs are examined in this book, within the government's prison building programme, and the confines of current penal philosophies and legislation. America has led the way in prison design, with two main types of architecture predominating: radial layouts (outside cells with windows) and linear blocks (inside cells with grilles). Now, 'new' generation prisons (central association surrounded by small groups of cells) look set to become the fashion. But are they a better answer, and should they be copied worldwide before we know?Architects and administrators show in this book the designs of these 'new generation' prisons and assess their impact. Most countries in central Europe also have a rising crime rate and a demand for new prisons. Contributions from significant architects from the UK, Europe and America comment on these issues.Other topics within the book are: setting current prison architecture and design against an historical setting; looking at penal ideas and prison architecture and design in the post-war period; the psychological effects of the prison environment; the influence of technology and design on security management; and how prison architecture and design can be more flexible and innovative.

Abingdon, Oxon, UK: New York: Architectural Press, 2000. 199p.