Differentiating Sexual From Other Violent Offence Types for Case Assessment, Planning, and Management

• Published date: 01 August 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/0306624X221086549
• Author: Laurence L. Motiuk,Leslie Anne Keown
• Date: 01 August 2023
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/0306624X221086549

International Journal of

Offender Therapy and

Comparative Criminology

2023, Vol. 67(10-11) 1106 –1119

© The Author(s) 2022

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DOI: 10.1177/0306624X221086549

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Article

Differentiating Sexual From

Other Violent Offence

Types for Case Assessment,

Planning, and Management

Laurence L. Motiuk1 and Leslie Anne Keown1

Abstract

Core components of the Intake Assessment (IA) process in the Canadian federal

corrections system were examined to determine whether a simplified algorithmic

equation for individuals sentenced for sex crimes could be tailored and differentiated

from other violent offence types. Two major offence type categories, namely sexual

and other violent were constructed for 2,896 adult male first releases for 2016 to

2017 and 2017 to 2018. A restricted set of static risk indicators, dynamic need ratings,

and other actuarial measures as well as whether or not there were any returns to

federal custody were extracted for each case. A combined risk index yielded robust

predictions of custodial return for sexual and other violent offence types with significant

and robust AUCs of 0.77 and 0.71, respectively. Analyses showed that five-level risk

groupings could be derived independently for the two offence type categorizations.

Keywords

risk assessment, sexual offenders, case planning, case management, corrections

Introduction

Internationally, criminal justice policy makers and practitioners have had a keen inter-

est in the safe reintegration and risk management of persons sentenced for sex crimes

and other types of violent offences because of the enormous costs and harm to victims.

While sexual and violent offending continue to present a serious social problem, low

public tolerance for these type of offences, as well as focused media and political

1Correctional Service Canada, Ottawa, ON, Canada

Corresponding Author:

Laurence L. Motiuk, Correctional Service Canada, 340 Laurier Avenue West, Ottawa, ON K1A 0P9,

Canada.

Emails: larry.motiuk@csc-scc.gc.ca; larrymotiuk5@gmail.com

1086549IJOXXX10.1177/0306624X221086549International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative CriminologyMotiuk and Keown

research-article2022