Coerced abstinence

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Coerced abstinence is a drug rehabilitation strategy which uses frequent monitoring and immediate punishment to reduce drug use among participants. This strategy can dramatically reduce recidivism rates among chronic drug users, especially those on probation and parole. [1] Most probation agreements mandate drug treatment, but a coerced abstinence program mandates only abstinence which is enforced through regular, predictable drug testing. Under this system, failed tests swiftly result in a brief period of incarceration - usually for a few days. This policy option is advocated by a crime policy expert Mark A. R. Kleiman. [2]

Contents

Theory

Currently, most drug courts require defendants to attend drug treatment and to return to court periodically and report progress to a judge. The extent of progress influences later sentencing. These programs are often not available to serious offenders. Drug court programs place as much emphasis on program attendance as they do on abstinence. Because these programs have limited resources and the focus is treatment rather than abstinence, many in treatment can merely estimate the likelihood of being tested and then choose to take the risk of continued use. Although the penalty for getting caught is quite high, the chances of being tested are usually quite low.[ citation needed ]

Behavior in the face of risks tends to follow what is known in psychology as prospect theory; People tend to be more averse to harms which are certain than more severe harms which are merely probable. [3] According to Prospect Theory, coerced abstinence is effective at getting people off drugs because the frequency and certainty of a sentence is a much more significant deterrent than severity of the sentence. In other words, if virtually every time probationers fail a drug test, they go immediately to jail (even for just a few days) probationers will use less drugs than if they are only occasionally caught even if the penalty is significantly higher. [4]

One problem with implementing a coerced abstinence program is that initially the scope of the program must be sufficiently small to track down those who do not show up for tests. Probation officers are already overworked and police do not make warrant service a high priority. [5] Designing a good program is quite difficult since sanctions must be swift and sure. Another problem with coerced abstinence is the political feasibility. Because the program ascribes neither to the disease model of addiction (which requires drug treatment[ citation needed ]) nor to a morality-based model (which mandates long and hard sentencing), it may simply be too ideologically neutral[ dubious ] to be a successful part of a political platform.[ citation needed ]

Programs using coerced abstinence

The Hawaii State Judiciary has implemented a probation program which relies on the theory of coerced abstinence called H.O.P.E. (Hawaii's Opportunity Probation with Enforcement). The program has achieved promising results among paroles with a history of methamphetamine use and inspired other pilot programs in the United States. Evaluations of H.O.P.E. indicate that participants spend on average 130 fewer days in prison than participants in traditional community supervision programs. [6]

See also

Related Research Articles

Probation in criminal law is a period of supervision over an offender, ordered by the court often in lieu of incarceration.

Drug rehabilitation is the process of medical or psychotherapeutic treatment for dependency on psychoactive substances such as alcohol, prescription drugs, and street drugs such as cannabis, cocaine, heroin or amphetamines. The general intent is to enable the patient to confront substance dependence, if present, and stop substance misuse to avoid the psychological, legal, financial, social, and physical consequences that can be caused.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Drug court</span> Type of court

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Probation and parole officer</span> Officials who supervise the conduct of offenders on community supervision

A probation or parole officer is an official appointed or sworn to investigate, report on, and supervise the conduct of convicted offenders on probation or those released from incarceration to community supervision such as parole. Most probation and parole officers are employed by the government of the jurisdiction in which they operate, although some are employed by private companies that provide contracted services to the government.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Deterrence (penology)</span> Use of punishment as a threat to deter people from offending

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">2000 California Proposition 36</span> 2000 California ballot proposition

California Proposition 36, the Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act of 2000, was an initiative statute that permanently changed state law to allow qualifying defendants convicted of non-violent drug possession offenses to receive a probationary sentence in lieu of incarceration. As a condition of probation defendants are required to participate in and complete a licensed and/or certified community drug treatment program. If the defendant fails to complete this program or violates any other term or condition of their probation, then probation can be revoked and the defendant may be required to serve an additional sentence which may include incarceration. The proposition was passed with 6,233,422 (60.86%) votes in favor and 4,009,508 (39.14%) against on November 7, 2000 and went into effect on July 1, 2001 with $120 million for treatment services allocated annually for five years. The act is codified in sections 1210 and 3063.1 of the California Penal Code and Division 10.8 of the California Health and Safety Code.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mark Kleiman</span> American professor, author, and blogger (1951–2019)

Mark Albert Robert Kleiman was an American professor, author, and blogger who dealt with issues of drug and criminal justice policy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Parole and Probation Administration (Philippines)</span>

The Parole and Probation Administration, abbreviated as PPA, is an agency of the Philippine government under the Department of Justice responsible for providing a less costly alternative to imprisonment of first-time offenders who are likely to respond to individualized community-based treatment programs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Drug Court of New South Wales</span>

The Drug Court of New South Wales is an inferior court constituted as a court of record within the Australian court hierarchy with its jurisdiction limited to New South Wales, Australia. It is a specialist court that deals with criminal offences in which the defendant has an addiction to illicit drugs. The Court exercises both local and district court jurisdiction and has a similar status to the District Court of New South Wales.

The very high rate of human immunodeficiency virus infection experienced in Uganda during the 1980s and early 1990s created an urgent need for people to know their HIV status. The only option available to them was offered by the National Blood Transfusion Service, which carries out routine HIV tests on all the blood that is donated for transfusion purposes. The great need for testing and counseling resulted in a group of local non-governmental organizations such as The AIDS Support Organisation, Uganda Red Cross, Nsambya Home Care, the National Blood Bank, the Uganda Virus Research Institute together with the Ministry of Health establishing the AIDS Information Centre in 1990. This organization worked to provide HIV testing and counseling services with the knowledge and consent of the client involved.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">LifeRing Secular Recovery</span> Addiction and recovery organization

LifeRing Secular Recovery is a secular, non-profit organization providing peer-run addiction recovery groups. The organization provides support and assistance to people seeking to recover from alcohol and drug addiction, and also assists partners, family members and friends of addicts or alcoholics. It is an abstinence-based recovery program with three fundamental principles: sobriety, secularity and self-empowerment. The motto of LifeRing is "empower your sober self."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Secular Organizations for Sobriety</span> Non-profit network of autonomous addiction recovery groups

Secular Organizations for Sobriety (SOS), also known as Save Our Selves, is a non-profit network of autonomous addiction recovery groups. The program stresses the need to place the highest priority on sobriety and uses mutual support to assist members in achieving this goal. The Suggested Guidelines for Sobriety emphasize rational decision-making and are not religious or spiritual in nature. SOS represents an alternative to the spiritually based addiction recovery programs such as Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). SOS members may also attend AA meetings, but SOS does not view spirituality or surrendering to a Higher Power as being necessary to maintain abstinence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">United States federal probation and supervised release</span> Concept from US criminal law

United States federal probation and supervised release are imposed at sentencing. The difference between probation and supervised release is that the former is imposed as a substitute for imprisonment, or in addition to home detention, while the latter is imposed in addition to imprisonment. Probation and supervised release are both administered by the U.S. Probation and Pretrial Services System. Federal probation has existed since 1909, while supervised release has only existed since 1987, when it replaced federal parole as a means for imposing supervision following release from prison.

A rehabilitation policy within criminology, is one intending to reform criminals rather than punish them and/or segregate them from the greater community.

Hawaii's Opportunity Probation with Enforcement (HOPE) is an intensive supervision program that aims to reduce crime and drug use while saving taxpayers' dollars spent on jail and prison costs. HOPE deals with offenders who have been identified as likely to violate the conditions of their probation or community supervision.

Very Tough Love is a radio documentary and an episode of This American Life (TAL), which originally aired on March 25, 2011. The segment described a drug court and program in Glynn County, Georgia, which conducts itself in a manner unlike other drug courts throughout the United States. Offenders with no prior criminal record or history of drug abuse or addiction, charged with possession of small drug quantities, would wind up under drug court control for five years or more. In most other jurisdictions, the same offenses would result in probation or a drug education class. These charges went contrary to drug court philosophy, according to standards set by the National Association of Drug Court Professionals.

In the United States, drug courts are specialized court docket programs that aim to help participants recover from substance use disorder to reduce future criminal activity. Drug courts are used as an alternative to incarceration and aim to reduce the costs of repeatedly processing low‐level, non‐violent offenders through courts, jails, and prisons. Drug courts are usually managed by a nonadversarial and multidisciplinary team including judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys, community corrections, social workers and treatment service professionals. Drug court participants include criminal defendants and offenders, juvenile offenders, and parents with pending child welfare cases.

Angela Hawken is a professor of public policy and director of Litmus at the Marron Institute of Urban Management at New York University. Her research focuses primarily on drugs, crime, and corruption, and combines experimental and quantitative methods.

Swift, Certain, and Fair (SCF) is an approach to criminal-justice supervision involving probation, parole, pre-trial diversion, and/or incarceration.

References

  1. Angela Hawken, "HOPE for Probation: How Hawaii Improved Behavior with High-Probability, Low-Severity Sanctions" (http://www.globaldrugpolicy.org/4/3/3.php Archived 2011-07-23 at the Wayback Machine )
  2. Kleiman, Mark A. R. "Coerced Abstinence: A Neo-Paternalistic Drug Policy Initiative"(http://www.spa.ucla.edu/faculty/kleiman/Coerced_Abstinence.pdf Archived 2006-09-13 at the Wayback Machine )
  3. Kahneman, Danial and Tversky, Amos. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk". Econometrica. 47, 2 (1979), 263-91.
  4. Kleiman, Mark A. R. When Brute Force Fails. p. 40. Princeton University Press (2009)
  5. Kleiman, Mark A. R. When Brute Force Fails. p. 35. Princeton University Press (2009)
  6. Angela Hawken, "HOPE for Probation: How Hawaii Improved Behavior with High-Probability, Low-Severity Sanctions" (http://www.globaldrugpolicy.org/4/3/3.php Archived 2011-07-23 at the Wayback Machine )