NCJ Number
235494
Journal
Journal of Offender Rehabilitation Volume: 50 Issue: 1-4 Dated: February - March 2011 Pages: 66-80
Date Published
2011
Length
15 pages
Annotation
This article discusses reintegrating long-term prisoners back into the community.
Abstract
Successfully reintegrating long-term prisoners back into the community often presents significant challenges for service providers. Ex-prisoners typically experience high levels of social stigma; present with multiple needs; and can struggle to find meaningful employment, stable accommodation, and to maintain supportive relationships. There have, however, been relatively few published evaluations of the outcomes achieved by postrelease services on managing the risk of reoffending and, as such, it is difficult for service providers to meet these multiple and complex levels of need in ways that might be considered to be evidence based. In this article we describe a specialized prerelease support, reentry, and reintegration service that is offered to long-term prisoners, many of whom have been legally labelled as "dangerous." The current model of service delivery is reviewed and discussed in the context of current theories of offender rehabilitation and reintegration. These are then used to discuss the way in which services for this group of offenders might best be conceptualized. (Published Abstract)