NCJ Number
145065
Journal
Crime and Delinquency Volume: 39 Issue: 4 Dated: (October 1993) Pages: 447- 461
Date Published
1993
Length
15 pages
Annotation
Probation, despite having acquired a new language and despite increases in its use especially for felony offenders, has experienced a decline in funding.
Abstract
From 1981 to 1983, the use of probation in the United States increased by 23 percent, in California from 1974 to 1983, it increased by 63 percent while the prison population increased by 48 percent. By 1983, 55 percent of the corrections population was on probation, thus making it, rather than imprisonment, the most common court disposition. Meanwhile, the public has become cynical about the effectiveness of probation and has clamored for the imprisonment of criminals, yet taxpayers have been ambivalent about paying for more prisons and jails. Probation thus has little legislative clout, yet it has become a dumping ground for cases not deemed worthy of punitive processing. The expanding caseload and shrinking funding have meant that many active cases have gone without supervision. The author reviews notes from interviews of probation officers in four counties in northern California. 1 endnote and 14 references