Examining Determinants of Parole Conditions Among Federal Releasees

• Published date: 01 March 2019
• Author: Rosemary Ricciardelli,Kimberley A. Crow,Michael Adorjan
• DOI: 10.1177/0032885519825493
• Date: 01 March 2019
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/0032885519825493

The Prison Journal

2019, Vol. 99(2) 219 –240

© 2019 SAGE Publications

Article reuse guidelines:

sagepub.com/journals-permissions

DOI: 10.1177/0032885519825493

journals.sagepub.com/home/tpj

Article

Examining Determinants

of Parole Conditions

Among Federal

Releasees

Rosemary Ricciardelli1, Kimberley A. Crow2,

and Michael Adorjan3

Abstract

The greater number of parole conditions imposed upon a releasee increases

their potentiality for a parole breach or revocation. We analyzed the

files of Canadian federal releasees to learn how closely individuals’ intake

assessments (e.g., risk, need, classification) and current assessments (scored

later, yet, prior to release) predict the number of parole conditions assigned.

Through an assessment of how static and dynamic criminogenic risk factors

affect the imposition of parole conditions, we show that although a former

prisoner’s history (static risk factors) may be considered through risk

assessment, dynamic interventions are the significant predictors—but only

as assessed at intake.

Keywords

risk, need, releasees, parole, statutory or conditional release

1Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada

2University of Ontario Institute of Technology, Oshawa, Canada

3University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada

Corresponding Author:

Rosemary Ricciardelli, Department of Sociology, Memorial University of Newfoundland, 4066

Arts Building, 230 Elizabeth Ave., St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada A1C 5S7.

Email: rricciardell@mun.ca

825493TPJXXX10.1177/0032885519825493The Prison JournalRicciardelli et al.

research-article2019

220 The Prison Journal 99(2)

Introduction

Although risk has arguably always oriented human behavior, the ascendency

of “risk society” constructs risk as a central organizing principle governing

everyday social life (Beck, 1992). Within criminal justice, the “turn” away

from a dominant penal welfarist rehabilitative ideal toward managerialism

and actuarialism was observed early on by Feeley and Simon (1992).

They argued that the rehabilitative emphasis on character transformation

was being replaced by “techniques to identify, classify, and manage group-

ings sorted by dangerousness” (p. 452). In Canadian corrections, however,

people have argued that there is an acknowledgment that an individual’s risk

profile is amenable to change over time as their criminogenic and noncrimi-

nogenic needs change (Ricciardelli 2018). Scholars, such as Hannah-Moffat

(2005) and Andrews and Bonta (2010), among others, explained that profes-

sional discretion is invaluable when working with releasees because it pro-

vides another way to capture and take into account changes undergone by

prisoners when using assessment tools. Nonetheless, as Hanson (2009)

argued, “Most of the current risk assessment instruments show levels of pre-

dictive accuracy superior to that of unstructured professional opinion. The

accuracy, however, is far from ideal” (p. 177; see reviews by Andrews, Bonta,

& Wormith, 2006; Janus & Prentky, 2003; Monahan, 2007; Quinsey, Harris,

Rice, & Cormier, 2006 in support of this position). Recognizing these rather

opposing perspectives and explicit limitations to actuarial risk assessment, in

this article, we seek to understand the role of risk assessment, if any, in

assigning parole conditions. Specifically, we examine the relationship

between assessment scores at intake versus more current scores and the num-

ber of parole conditions awarded to Canadian former federal prisoners based

on assessments of both static and dynamic factors.

Prisoners are assessed for dynamic factors at intake to

identify and prioritize criminogenic needs according to seven dynamic risk

areas (Employment and Education, Marital/Family, Associates, Substance

Abuse, Community Functioning, Personal/Emotional and Attitudes toward

Criminality). The intention is to focus correctional intervention on factors that,

when appropriately addressed, reduce the likelihood of re-offending.

(Correctional Service Canada [CSC], 2014)

Essentially, dynamic factors are used as an indication of a prisoner’s level

of need—assessed by evaluating their ‘social functioning’—in different

realms of societal living. Unlike static factors that change little with time

(e.g., a prisoner’s criminal history, the severity of their crime(s)), prisoners’

dynamic factors (i.e., their needs) are assessed multiple times when in