When Prisoners Get Out: The Impact of Prison Releases on Homicide Rates, 1975-1999

• NCJ Number: 205741
• Journal: Criminal Justice Policy Review Volume: 15 Issue: 2 Dated: June 2004 Pages: 212-228
• Author(s): Tomislav V. Kovandzic; Thomas B. Marvell; Lynne M. Vieraitis; Carlisle E. Moody
• Date Published: June 2004
• Length: 17 pages
• Publication Format: Article
• Publication Type: Report (Study/Research)
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This study examined whether the release of prisoners affects homicide rates independent of the impact prison releases have on the prison population.

Abstract

Recent criminal justice policy in the United States has focused on building more prisons and incarcerating more offenders. Between 1980 and 2000, the United States imprisonment rate grew by 244 percent. Research has examined the relationship between prison populations and crime rates, especially homicide rates, but no published studies have focused specifically on the effect that prisoner release has on homicide rates. Thus little is known about what happens to the crime rate when large numbers of ex-prisoners are released back into communities. The current research question asked whether released offenders commit more homicides than the offenders currently in prison or entering prison would have committed had they not been incarcerated. In order to probe this question, the authors regressed homicide rates on prison release rates, using State-level panel data from 46 States spanning the years 1975 through 1999. Data were drawn from the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) “Crime in the United States” report. Homicide rates were also regressed on prison population and other control variables such as age-structure variables and economic trend variables. The results fail to find a significant positive relationship between prisoner releases and homicide rates, indicating that released prisoners are no more likely to commit homicide than are prisoners entering or remaining in prison. Other findings indicate that, similar to prior research, the growth in the prison population is related to a reduction in homicide rates. The main policy implication is that the increasing rate of releasing prisoners back into communities, necessitated by increasing incarceration rates, is not resulting in an elevated homicide rate. Furthermore, the findings underscore the argument that prison expansion has been more effective at reducing the homicide rate than the competing alternatives. The question of whether a large influx of prisoners back into communities has affected other types of crime rates is left to future research. Tables, notes, references