Probation

Sexual Exploitation of Children-DC Public Safety-US Department of Justice

October 19, 2011 By Len 1 Comment

Sexual Exploitation of Children – “DC Public Safety”

Welcome to DC Public Safety – radio and television shows on crime, criminal offenders and the criminal justice system.

See http://media.csosa.gov for our radio shows, blog and transcripts.

Television Program available at http://media.csosa.gov/podcast/video/2011/07/sexual-exploitation-of-children-dc-public-safety/

We welcome your comments or suggestions at leonard.sipes@csosa.gov or at Twitter at http://twitter.com/lensipes.

[Video Begins]

Len Sipes: Hi, everybody. Welcome to D.C. Public Safety. I’m your host, Leonard Sipes. Today’s show is about sexual exploitation of children, and you know what? It’s really about a rescue mission. The FBI estimates that on any given day there’s a million pedophiles online looking for your children. The attorney general, Eric Holder, what he did was to frame a national effort to look at what we can do, what we in the criminal justice system can do, and to look at what you as parents can do. To discuss this on the first half of the program, we have Francey Hakes. She is the national coordinator for child exploitation, prevention, and interdiction from the U.S. Department of Justice, and we have Dr. Michael Bourke, chief psychologist for the United States Marshal’s office, and to Francey, and to Michael, welcome to D.C. Public Safety.

Francey Hakes: Thank you for having us.

Len Sipes: All right, did I frame all this issue? I mean, we have a lot of people, a lot of concern, a lot of individuals involved in exploiting our children. So can you frame it for me a little bit, Francey? And can you give me a sense as to the national effort as announced by the attorney general, Eric Holder?

Francey Hakes: Of course. Some people have described the sexual exploitation of our children as an epidemic. I would certainly describe the explosion of child pornography that way. So last August, the attorney general, Eric Holder, announced our national strategy for child exploitation, prevention, and interdiction. It’s the first ever national strategy by any government in the world, and it’s certainly our first. It’s supposed to have three prongs: prevention, deterrence, and interdiction. What we decided to do is bring together all of the federal, state, and local law enforcement partners, all our prevention partners, all our sex offender management partners, our court partners, and most importantly, our parents and community groups together to bring this effort under one umbrella so that we can fight child sexual exploitation on all fronts.

Len Sipes: The numbers that I’m talking about, they’re going up dramatically. The numbers are astounding. We’re talking about a huge number of individuals trying to violate our kids on a day to day basis, and when I say violate, we’re talking about psychological and physical bondage, are we not?

Francey Hakes: Unfortunately, the children that are being sexually abused, especially the ones whose images are being traded like baseball cards across the internet, across the world, are being violated in increasingly violent ways, and we’re seeing increasingly younger and younger children being violated that way, and that is the reason that the attorney general and all of our partners decided to get together and start this effort, so that we could do something about it, and our ultimate goal is to eradicate child exploitation ultimately.

Len Sipes: Michael, you’re the chief psychologist for the United States Marshal’s office. You are an expert. You understand these individuals; child sexual predators probably better than anybody else. Who are they?

Michael Bourke: Well, for eight years, prior to coming to the Marshal Service, I treated these men in federal prison, and the truth is there isn’t really one mind of a predator, you know, so to speak. These men come in from all walks of life, they’re from all socioeconomic groups, they’re both genders, frankly, and these men tend not to burn out like other types of offenders do. So really, when we talk about what is the sex offender, they, they’re folks that are our neighbors; they’re folks that are our coaches and civic leaders in our communities in some cases. So they, most individuals that offend against children are actually known to those children and some have a very positive relationship in other ways with those children.

Len Sipes: Well, help me frame it Michael, because on one hand, we have, according to the FBI, a million pedophiles online, and they’re trying to entice these kids into meetings, and they’re trying to entice them to exchange images. These images are going to haunt them for the rest of their lives. On the other hand, most sexual exploitations involved people who were known to the victim. They’re the neighbor. They’re the uncle. They’re the coach. I mean, what do you say to parents? I mean, the numbers seem to be overwhelming. What are the chief lessons to be learned here, and what prevention lessons can we put on the table?

Michael Bourke: Yeah, I think, and Francey may have something to add to this, but from my experience, parents need to be aware of what their children are doing online. They need to be aware of who their friends are online, with whom they’re chatting at night, they should be paying as close attention to those friends as they do if their child’s going to go spend the night at someone’s home, and frankly, a lot of parents are a little intimidated by some of this advanced technology on the internet, children have a lot of access and avenues by which to access the internet, including mobile devices, and parents need to just get a little, get some additional education, and they need to pay attention to what these kids are doing online. It’s a very dangerous place.

Len Sipes: They’ve got to be aggressive. We run, by the way, in this program, we run a commercial about parents intervening with their kids and their online experiences, but the parents need to be aggressive. Is that the bottom line? I mean that’s the principal prevention method, if parents are aggressive in terms of what their kids are doing, and keeping an open line of communication, so if that child is approached, he can go to the parent and tell the parent about this experience. Am I right or wrong?

Michael Bourke: Yes, I think that’s accurate. And also that relationship is very important between the parent and child as well. For the parent to have a relationship with the child where the child feels comfortable coming to the parent and saying, someone attempted to solicit, or asked me to send them a dirty picture.

Len Sipes: Right.

Michael Bourke: or something like that, so that the parent can take action because so much can occur despite parents best efforts…

Len Sipes: Right.

Michael Bourke: these children can access the internet in a number of locations in a number of ways.

Len Sipes: Right.

Michael Bourke: so building that relationship and that type of rapport with the child is very important.

Len Sipes: Francey, you mentioned at the beginning of the program that The Department of Justice, for the first time, is bringing a coordination of effort in terms of parents, in terms of community organizations, in terms of law enforcement, in terms of everybody within the criminal justice system. What is the bottom line behind that coordination, is it to be a more effective tool for prevention, a more effective tool for apprehension and prosecution? What is it?

Francey Hakes: Well, like I said, in the beginning, it’s really three prongs. There are three main focuses of the national strategy: prevention, deterrence, and interdiction. Interdiction is traditional law enforcement investigation and prosecution. I’m a federal prosecutor, and I’ve been prosecuting these cases for 15 years. That’s obviously very important and will continue to be very important. But we’re never going to investigate and prosecute our way out of the problem. The numbers are simply too large. So deterrence is very important, and that’s where the United States Marshal Service and others, our state and local partners, through their sex offender management and monitoring, they are so key, and one of our best tools is going to be prevention. We’d rather not have the victims to have to rescue in the first place. We’d rather the children be empowered to protect themselves. We’d rather the parents have the tools that they need to know how to protect their children, and so that’s why organizations like the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, Netsmarts, these organizations give out free materials, they have websites, they give out free materials for parents, teachers, students, and groups to obtain the information that they need to protect themselves online. It’s not just the parents, it’s not just the students, it’s not just the teachers. It’s all of those groups, plus our community groups, that need to have the materials necessary to protect themselves, not just online, but in their day to day activities, I think sometimes in this internet world, we’ve become, and Dr. Burke is correct, that children have access to the internet through so many devices now that it’s, sometimes, I think, a little terrifying. But we also have to remember that the majority of children who are being sexually abused are being abused by those that they know, and so arming them with the knowledge, the empowerment, the understanding of what is right and what’s wrong and what’s okay to tell, who to go to, a trusted adult, those things are very important.

Len Sipes: Having those age appropriate conversations with the kids, informing them, but not scaring them.

Francey Hakes: Exactly right.

Len Sipes: Now, so all these statistics that I mentioned at the beginning of the program, one million pedophiles, and a 914% increase in the number of child prostitution cases, do we have the capacity to deal with this? Is the criminal justice system at the federal, state, and local level overwhelmed by this process? Do we have the wherewithal to deal with this effectively, or are we fighting an uphill battle?

Francey Hakes: Well I think, sometimes in prosecution, we always used to call it shoveling smoke because it seems like the more you shovel, the more that there is. And I think with respect to child sexual abuse it’s been around for a long time, we hope that we can eradicate it, and where I think, we’ve started well, we’re on a good path. Are we somewhat overwhelmed? I think it’s overwhelming. I don’t think we’re overwhelmed. There are huge amounts of effort going on at the federal, state, and local level, but the key here is what the national strategy was designed to produce, and that is partnerships, collaboration, and cooperation at all levels of government, including globally. This has become, of course, an international problem with the advent of the internet.

Len Sipes: A global issue, right.

Francey Hakes: It is an absolutely global issue. And so we’re working with industry on ways to solve the problem. You probably heard the announcement last week from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, and Facebook and Microsoft. Microsoft has invented a new technology called Photo DNA. They donated it to the National Center. The National Center, in turn, gave it to Facebook, and Facebook is going to employ this technology throughout their systems which will search for and find known images of child pornography so that they can be eradicated from their systems.

Len Sipes: Wonderful. Michael -

Francey Hakes: So these are things that we have to do to work together and really think creatively between law enforcement, community, and industry.

Len Sipes: Michael, can we persuade people who are child sex offenders, who are pedophiles, not to get involved in this, or is that drive, that’s going to be with them for the rest of their lives–can the system have an impact on their behavior? Can we persuade them not to do this–that we’re taking sufficient actions that’s likely for them to get caught, can we persuade them not to do this?

Michael Bourke: Yeah, it’s a great question, Leonard. I think the answer is, it’s fairly multifaceted, but the short answer is that there is no cure for pedophilia. There’s no cure for these fantasies and these drives, per se. There is, however, for any of these individuals, a possibility of managing that behavior. This is not something inevitable, this is a choice, these men are responsible for those choices, and women, and we can assist them in doing that with creative external management. By that, I mean things like the registrations and outpatient treatment programs and things like that. With proper external management and proper internal management, these men are capable of living a life in which they never harm a child.

Len Sipes: Right, so treatment does work. That’s one of the things I did want to get across. Treatment does work, and we within the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, our sex offender agency, we’re going to talk about that with two people involved in that unit on the second half, but treatment does work, we can really persuade individuals who are on the edge. The commercial that will run between the first and second half, we’ll talk about ìwhen did you become a child sex predator?î Obviously, we’re under the opinion that we can persuade people who are on the edge not to do this. This is wrong; you’re going to get locked up. We can meaningfully intervene.

Michael Bourke: Right, well there are individuals that, with those proper things in place, have a choice not to re-offend.

Len Sipes: Okay.

Michael Bourke: That’s correct.

Len Sipes: The final part of it is aggressive prosecution. We need to go after them in every way shape and form and that’s what we’re trying to do with the federal, state, and local level, is to set up these dummy operations to pretend that you’re the 14 year old, the 13 year old, to monitor whatever it is that we can monitor, and to go after these people and arrest them and prosecute them. Is that correct?

Francey Hakes: Well that’s right, and that’s one of the reasons why we place such a high emphasis on technology and training for our law enforcement and for our prosecutors, because this is often a very high-tech crime, and we need a high tech solution, and that’s why we’re working with industry on things like I talked about, the Photo DNA initiative, but there are lots of other tools that law enforcement uses to keep up with the bad guys who are trying to assault our children. There are very sophisticated groups out there that have banded together to discuss their deviant fantasies and to plan ways to sexually assault children, and we have to find ways to be just as sophisticated to break their encryption, to get into their passwords, to find a way to infiltrate these groups, and we are doing that at the national level in order to make clear to these would-be predators that they have nowhere to hide, and that’s why it’s so important for us to have very strong, firm sentences as well, because that is part of our deterrent prong.

Len Sipes: Okay, we have one minute. So through the national effort, for what attorney general Eric Holder announced, the Office of Justice Programs, US Marshals Office, Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, we can look them in the eye and say that we’re gaining ground, that we have the wherewithal to come after you guys. Stop it.

Francey Hakes: I think the message is, to the would-be pedophile out there is you’re probably talking to a law enforcement officer, and watch out for the knock at your door.

Len Sipes: Cool. Michael?

Michael Bourke: I agree. United States Marshal Service has also set up what we call the National Sex Offender Targeting Center. It’s a multi-agency, multi-disciplinary intel and operational hub. We’re looking in all corners for these men. We are going after them when they fail to register, and we’re putting all of our efforts toward this problem.

Len Sipes: We have to close now. I really appreciate this stimulating conversation. Ladies and gentlemen, Francey Hakes, National Coordinator for the Child Exploitation Prevention and Interdiction from the US Department of Justice, Dr. Michael Bourke, Chief Psychologist for the United States Marshals Office. Stay with us on the second half of the program as we talk to individual parole and probation agents, what we call community supervision officers, who supervise sex offenders on a day to day basis. Please stay with us.

[Music Playing]

Len Sipes: Welcome back to D.C. Public Safety. I continue to be your host, Leonard Sipes, and we continue to explore this topic of sexual exploitation of children. The first half, we talked to two individuals from the Department of Justice, and we framed the numbers, and the numbers are truly staggering, but what does that mean in terms of the local level? We talked about the importance of partnerships, and we talked about the importance of people at the local level enforcing laws and providing treatment services. To talk about what it is that we do here within the District of Columbia; we have two principals with us today. We have Ashley Natoli, a community supervision officer for the sex offender unit of my agency, the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, and Kevin Jones, another community supervision officer for the sex offender unit, and to Ashley and Kevin welcome to D.C. Public Safety.

Ashley Natoli: Thank you.

Kevin Jones: Thank you for having us.

Len Sipes: All right, Ashley, give me a sense as to this issue of the sex offender unit. What is it that we do? What is it that we do in the District of Columbia that’s unique?

Ashley Natoli: Well, we supervise offenders who have either been convicted of a sex offense, had an arrest for a sex offense, or an offense that is sexual in nature. They come to our unit and are supervised in our unit. There is roughly about 450 active cases in our unit right now, about 670 total of all sex offenders right now.

Len Sipes: Now, the interesting thing is what we at CSOSA do, and this is different from a lot of parole and probation agencies throughout the country, is that if you’ve had a sexual conviction in the past, not your current charge, but 15 years ago, if you had a sexual conviction, or if you had an arrest, you come to the sex offender unit, right?

Ashley Natoli: That’s correct.

Len Sipes: All right. Kevin, I want to talk to you. This is something that’s intrigued me from the very beginning of my time in corrections, that is, is that so many of the offenders on the sex offender unit are so compliant. They dress well, they work, they show up on time, they dot their I’s, they cross their T’s, and they give every appearance of people who are compliant vs. other offenders, sometimes it’s pretty obvious that they have issues. With the sex offender unit, the sex offenders, they can give the impression that nothing’s wrong with me, just spend your time with more troublesome people. You don’t have to really spend that much amount of time with me, look at me, I do everything right. Am I in the ballpark?

Kevin Jones: You’re in the ballpark exactly, Leonard. These guys are the most compliant guys on our caseloads. They actually drug test as scheduled, always on appointments, on time. They’re in the office, they appear to be, have all their ducks in a row. I think our main focus is, what are you after you leave our office? So that’s why we use a lot of our safety tactics, are that, we have a lot of collateral contacts with the offenders and the offenders’ families, and we really get to see what kind of guys they are once they leave our office.

Len Sipes: Now, I guess I shouldn’t brag, but then again, I am the host of the program, and this is our agency, so I am going to brag. We have one of the best sex offender units in the country, in my opinion, and what I’ve heard that from a lot of people, one of the best sex offender units. We have very high levels of contact. We drug test the dickens out of them, we submit them, they have to submit to lie detector tests, polygraphs. We put them in treatment, sometimes through the treatment process we find out about other things, we search their computers. We put them under surveillance, if necessary; we work with local law enforcement in terms of joint supervisions. We go to their home unannounced. You guys do it, and sometimes with our partners in the Metropolitan Police Department, they’re under a lot of supervision, right?

Ashley Natoli: That’s correct.

Len Sipes: Okay, and what does that do for that person, either one of you?

Kevin Jones: That person, as we do unscheduled contacts, it kind of keeps them off balance. Again, he has to be held accountable for, if he has no contact with minors, we assure that by doing home visits, and when we’re in home visits, we’re actually looking for things that might kind of be off the beat, maybe a possible toy, things of that nature in someone’s home, and at that point, they’re questioned.

Len Sipes: Now it’s also extraordinarily difficult, at the same time, with handheld computers, commonly known as smartphones. I mean, the smartphone that I carry every day is as powerful as a desktop computer five years ago. You can do anything you want with a smartphone. So yeah, we have the right to search their computers, but they may not be operating off their computers. They may be operating off of a portable device, correct?

Kevin Jones: That’s correct.

Len Sipes: How do you deal with that?

Ashley Natoli: We look at the smartphones and the handheld devices similar to a computer. We have the ability to search those just as we would a computer, and in most instances, the offenders will be having these handheld devices as opposed to having a computer,

Len Sipes: Right. And the other thing that we are aware of too is a lot of the gaming consoles, such as Play Station 3′s, can be manipulated into being a computer as well, so we have to be looking out for a lot more than just a laptop in the home. We have to be looking into what they’re using as a phone, what they have, and then we’re asking the questions and following up with the searches. And that becomes the intriguing part of this, because it truly is a cat and mouse game. Now I don’t want to overplay my hand here. These individuals, in many cases, are compliant. You’re supervising them, they are in treatment, treatment does work, you can take individuals, and they can control their impulses. They don’t necessarily have to be out there offending. But this is truly the, Dr. Bourke mentioned it in the first half, this is the master psychological game. It is a psychological game, is it not, of cat and mouse, of looking for nuances of listening to individual little things that may not mean that much to another community supervision officer, but to you, means a lot. Am I right or wrong?

Ashley Natoli: That’s correct.

Kevin Jones: Yeah, that’s correct.

Ashley Natoli: A lot of these offenders, they are masters of manipulation and deception, and that’s, in most instances, in a lot of instances, how they ended up offending in the first place, because they have an incredible ability to groom these victims, and they’ve mastered the art of manipulation, and so we have to be aware of that so we aren’t taken advantage of.

Len Sipes: Well, tell me a little bit about the grooming of the victims, because we didn’t get involved in that in the first half. They will go online with them, and they will have, not just hours of conversations, but days or weeks or months of conversation before they ask for a photograph, or then that photograph moves on to a more sexually suggestive photograph. This is a process. They’re very patient individuals. Correct?

Kevin Jones: That’s correct. A lot of the guys that are in the grooming process while on sex offender treatment, a lot of that comes out in the treatment process, and once you find out that a guy might be on supervision, an offender might be on supervision for one offense, during that sex offender treatment process, you will find out that this offender has had multiple victims that he has proposed and that he has groomed, and this makes this offender a little more dangerous than what, from the outside, what it looks like to just this one victim.

Len Sipes: And again, I mean, the idea of going in unannounced, putting on a GPS tracking device, but all of that, we talk about the technology, and I don’t want to get too far ahead of myself with the technology, it strikes me, the most important ingredient we have here in terms of protecting the public is the savviness of the people who are supervising these sex offenders. Do I have it right? It really doesn’t matter about the computer part, the GPS, and the tracking devices, and the lie detector tests, what really matters is your ability to read the tea leaves as to whether or not this person is truly compliant or not. Am I right or wrong?

Ashley Natoli: That’s correct. You have to be very patient and very thorough and leave no detail unturned. Like with the GPS, we’re not just looking at, are they complying with their curfew, are they charging their device, we’re looking at, where are they going during the daytime. So you actually look at all their tracks so you can know, did this offender go to the park, or was this offender near a school, so we’re aware of that, and we can put alerts on there so it helps us to identify that, but we have all this information, and if we’re not doing the right thing with it, then

Len Sipes: And the neat thing about it is we can overlay Google Earth, so we’re taking a look at that intersection, and we’re not quite sure he’s hanging out at the intersection, but when we overlay Google Earth, a-ha, there’s a playground that didn’t show up on a regular map. So we do have the technology tools to try and keep up with the individuals, but it’s really is more understanding who that person is. How long does it take until you get a sense as to that sex offender? How long does it take before you feel that you’re inside that person’s head, that person’s mind, that person’s modus operandi?

Kevin Jones: Well, again, with the treatment modal-, coupled with the GPS, you can probably feel your offender out, I guess, in about two months, maybe, to that nature, and a lot of it is, you’re questioning his every move, which makes him uncomfortable, which is, at the same time, holds him accountable for where he’s going, so as long as he’s knows that he’s being tracked, and that we have exclusion zones from the zoo, from parks, and things of that nature, then that kind of keeps him in compliance.

Len Sipes: And we’ll get word from the Metropolitan Police Department and other law enforcement partners that we saw the guy spending way too much time outside of the St. Francis School. It was a block away, and maybe he has a legitimate reason for being there, maybe he doesn’t, but that’s also the law enforcement partnership feeding us information, right?

Kevin Jones: Yes.

Ashley Natoli: Yeah, definitely.

Kevin Jones: And apart with the law enforcement contact, we do unscheduled accountability tours, and that’s with our partnership with Metropolitan Police Department, and at that time, we also have what we call GPS clean sweep tours, where we will come do unscheduled accountability tours on an offender who has a GPS curfew of 7:00, just to make sure that they’re in place, that there’s no type of shielding, anything of that nature, and we also are really big on the Halloween project, where, that we will come to the offender’s home between the hours of 3 and 11, and he is to be in that home at that particular time.

Len Sipes: Right, and we have found violations on the Halloween tour. We have found kids inside the home, and we have found them, they’re not supposed to be giving out candy, they’re not supposed to be decorating homes.

Kevin Jones: Lights supposed to be off.

Len Sipes: We roll up to the house, and there’s decorations, and there’s candy, so we’re trying to protect the public in that way. The other major thing that we’re trying to do is look at social media, look at Facebook, but there are literally hundreds of sites that kids go onto. I was reading this morning about going onto gaming sites. You know, it’s not a chat room, it’s not Facebook, it’s now gaming sites. So we’re now in the process of taking a look at social media and tracking that person through the social media process, correct?

Ashley Natoli: Yes.

Kevin Jones: That is correct.

Len Sipes: Okay, and there’s a certain point where we are going to be expanding this to other offenders beyond sex offenders, but that’s part of their world, and that’s part of the experience of kids, and if they’re going to be there, we need to be there, right?

Ashley Natoli: That’s correct.

Kevin Jones: Yeah, and we actually have a mechanism where we are monitoring Facebook, and we’ve had situations where we’ve seen our offenders who may have no contact with minors, and in his profile sheet, he’ll be holding

Len Sipes: Right!

Kevin Jones: a child.

Len Sipes: Right.

Ashley Natoli: And it’s not as simple as just searching them by their name. You’re searching their aliases; you’re looking, searching by email addresses and different things, because a lot of it is not going to just be given to us. We have to find the information. It’s there if we search for it, deep enough.

Len Sipes: Right. We’re not going to give away our secrets in terms of how we’ve figured this out, but Cool Breeze was his moniker, nickname seven years ago, and son of a gun if he’s not using Cool Breeze in terms of his Facebook interactions, so there are all sorts of ways of getting at this issue. So the bottom line is this. What do we tell parents? I mean, you guys are there protecting their kids, you’re protecting all of society, just not the kids, but you’re protecting society, protecting kids from further activities on the part of these individuals. You know them better than just about anybody else in the criminal justice system. What do we tell parents? One of my chief messages is having an open conversation, so if somebody approaches that child, that child talks to the parents.

Ashley Natoli: I agree, and I also think parents need to be aware that this is something real and that happens every day, and that a lot of people think, oh, it won’t happen to me, or it won’t happen to my children, but you need to be aware that it is a problem and it will happen, and you need to know what’s going on so that you can educate your children appropriately and know that this is real.

Len Sipes: Well, the FBI is saying one million predators. That’s just an unbelievable number of people. I mean, they’re attacking your kids, correct, Kevin?

Kevin Jones: That’s correct. And a lot of it is, just like we were stating, collateral contacts. You have to build a collateral contact with the offenders’ family members.

Len Sipes: Right, and employers and friends.

Kevin Jones: Employers, friends, significant others.

Len Sipes: The bottom line is that you’ve got to get, and we’re going to close with this question, you’ve got to get a complete psychological profile of who that person is. You’ve got to know that person better than their own mother knows that person, correct?

Kevin Jones: That’s correct.

Len Sipes: All right, we’re going to close on that. Ladies and gentlemen, Kevin Jones, community supervision officer for the sex offender unit, my agency, Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, Ashley Natoli, the community supervision officer, again, with the sex offender unit. Thank you very much for watching, and please, protect your children. Please have an open and honest conversation and age appropriate conversation with your children. Watch for us next time when we explore another very important topic in our criminal justice system. Please have yourselves a very, very pleasant day.

[Video Ends]

Filed Under: Criminal Justice, Internet Crime, Interviews with Policy Makers, Interviews with Staff, Parole and Probation, Probation, Sex Offender, Sex Offender Registry, Video Podcast

Drug Courts in Washington, D.C. “DC Public Safety”

January 3, 2011 By Len 2 Comments

Welcome to DC Public Safety – radio and television shows on crime, criminal offenders and the criminal justice system.

See http://media.csosa.gov for our television shows, blog and transcripts. We now average 200,000 requests a month.

This radio program is available at http://media.csosa.gov/podcast/audio/2010/11/drug-courts-in-washington-d-c-dc-public-safety/

We welcome your comments or suggestions at leonard.sipes@csosa.gov or at Twitter at http://twitter.com/lensipes.

[Audio Begins]

Len Sipes: From our nation’s capital, this is DC Public Safety. I’m your host, Leonard Sipes. Today, ladies and gentlemen, we’re going to talk about drug courts. Drug courts seem to have a pretty impressive research history from the U.S. Department of Justice and other sources essentially stating that people involved in the drug court process do well, better than the people who do not go to drug court, people involved in substance abuse, they go to drug court, they interact with the judge, they interact with supervision staff, and generally speaking, the outcomes are positive. To talk about the program that we have here at the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, we have two principals with us today. Carline Claudomir and Amanda Rocha, they’re both community supervision officers assigned to our drug court, but before we get into the program, our usual commercial, we are up to 220,000 requests for DC Public Safety radio, television, blog, and transcripts. If you need to get in touch with us, and we really appreciate all of the emails, we really appreciate all of the comments in the comment line, and whether it’s criticisms, or whether it’s platitudes, we embrace whatever it is that you have to say to us, and we take it very seriously, and we appreciate all the suggestions in terms of future programs, you can get in touch with me directly via email: Leonard, L-E-O-N-A-R-D – dot-sipes – S-I-P-E-S – @csosa.gov, or you can follow us via twitter at twitter.com/lensipes or you can go to the site itself, www.csosa.gov and look for the radio and television programs, or you can go to media.csosa.gov directly and take a look at these programs and comment through the comment line and back to our guests, Carline Claudomir and Amanda Rocha, welcome to DC Public Safety.

Carline Claudomir: Hi, Len.

Amanda Rocha: Hi, Len.

Len Sipes: All right, Carline. How many times did I butcher that first name? And last name? Carline Claudomir!

Carline Claudomir: Yes.

Len Sipes: Okay. And I know I’m going to get the emails saying, Leonard, you can not pronounce names correctly! Amanda, you’ve been before our microphones before, correct?

Amanda Rocha: I have, Len.

Len Sipes: You’ve done some other stuff for us.

Amanda Rocha: Yes, I have.

Len Sipes: All right, so you’re star of stage and screen.

Amanda Rocha: Oh, no!

Len Sipes: And you’re very used to the microphone process. Drug courts. You know, ladies, the research on drug courts is positive, Carline, and the first question’s going to go to you. The research is positive. Drug courts do seem to work. Individuals going into the drug court process do seem to do fairly well. The whole idea behind, or the history of drug courts, for the audience, was to try to provide an alternative to incarceration, and an alternative to doing nothing. If you take a look at national research, out of all of the offenders caught up in the criminal justice system, 11% get drug treatment.

Carline Claudomir: Yes.

Len Sipes: Now, the overwhelming majority of people caught up in the criminal justice system do not get drug treatment. That’s amazing to me. That’s amazing to me, considering all the social ills that are out there. But here, what we do is provide drug treatment, and in some cases, we simply provide supervision services. We do whatever is necessary to stabilize that person with a substance abuse history, correct?

Carline Claudomir: You’re correct.

Len Sipes: All right, tell me about it.

Carline Claudomir: My name is Carline Claudomir, and I work with the STAR/HIDTA team. STAR/HIDTA stands for Sanction Team for Addiction Recovery. Our program entails the clients being assigned by either their judge and their attorney, or coming through transfer from other teams at CSOSA, or through our pre-trial drug program. Once they come to STAR/HIDTA, they are signing a contract stating that there are a number of things that they will and will not do while on probation, and they understand that there’s immediate consequences for any positive drug test or noncompliant behavior.

Len Sipes: Okay, so if they screw up, there are immediate consequences –

Carline Claudomir: Absolutely.

Len Sipes: – and that’s what seems to work, correctly?

Carline Claudomir: Yes, it’s the blessing and the curse for some of the clients.

Len Sipes: Because we need to understand that people with substance abuse histories, shall I say, always screw up. Recovery, problems are part of the recovery process, so it’s not, go to drug court and never do drugs again. It’s go to drug court and work with that person as that person faces their addiction history and relearns how to live life without drugs.

Carline Claudomir: Yes, and a lot of times, when they come to us, they sit, stand up in court before the judge and say, Your Honor, yes, I want to do probation, Your Honor, yes, I want treatment, then they come to the office, and then they reread the contract and realize it’s not only treatment!

Len Sipes: Oh, my heavens! What have I gotten myself involved in?

Carline Claudomir: Yes, it’s treatment and sanctions, so if you continue to use drugs, unfortunately, there are jail sanctions involved, which are treatment, tough love all the way.

Len Sipes: You’re tough love all the way, but that’s what is necessary. Amanda Rocha, in terms of that sense of tough love, correct?

Amanda Rocha: Yes, absolutely. It really does help to have that median sanctioning, because it puts a little fear in the offenders so that they don’t go back and use, it gives them that second thought before deciding to use, oh, that’s three nights in jail if I go ahead and do that, or oh, you know what? I’m on my fourth sanction or fifth sanction, and now it’s seven nights in jail. So they don’t want to continue going back and forth. It gets old for them to have to do that, and so kind of helps them along the way a little bit.

Len Sipes: Well, I think it’s important for people to understand just that, because, you know, this whole concept of treatment, the research is pretty clear that the reason why most people don’t get drug treatment is not its availability or lack of availability. The principal reason for why people don’t get drug treatment is that they don’t feel they need drug treatment, and in many cases, in terms of the criminal justice system, we basically coerce them into a) getting drug treatment, b) sticking with it because of the sanctions along the way. If you have a positive urine, we don’t care if it’s for marijuana, we don’t care what it’s for. If you have a positive urine, this is what’s going to happen to you, and those punishments, if you will, are going to increase as you continue your substance abuse, correct?

Carline Claudomir: It’s the accountability factor, and a lot of times, they come to us never having to be held accountable for their drug use, never had to be held accountable for their actions, and when they come to us, they realize every time they mess up, there is no passes, there are no passes, so immediately, you go see the judge, and you can explain to the judge why you felt it was okay to make this decision, regardless of the consequences.

Len Sipes: You know, the interesting thing is that there’s an increasing number of research programs out there, studies that, interestingly enough, it’s the judge who seems to be at the centerpoint of a lot of these mental health courts, substance abuse courts, reentry courts, there’s something magical about the judge being involved in this process, I think.

Carline Claudomir: It’s the authority, because if I say he needs treatment and the judge says he needs treatment, that holds a lot of weight. You don’t want to go to a judge and say, no, he doesn’t need treatment. No, it doesn’t work that way. The judge says he needs it, then you’re going to listen, because they’re in the midst of the battle.

Len Sipes: Okay. Now it’s extraordinarily confusing for the people of this audience, because it goes way beyond Washington D.C. 20% of our audience is international, and the Washington, D.C. Metropolitan area is not our top city in terms of people listening to this program. So we have to explain that under the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, administratively, we have an entity called pre-trial services who are their own independent agency with their own board and their own mission, but they fall under the generic auspices of the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, both are federalized, and they also have a drug court program focusing on pretrial individuals, correct?

Carline Claudomir: Yes.

Len Sipes: Okay, and I know you can’t speak for them, but in essence, the gig is that the person goes before a judge, and if he completes, or she completes the provisions of the drug court program, the charges are dropped.

Carline Claudomir: It has an affect on the charges or what is actually ending sentencing.

Len Sipes: All right, there you go. It has an effect. You should be a public affairs officer. But ours, what we’re talking about is post-conviction. We’re talking about probationers.

Amanda Rocha: Yes.

Carline Claudomir: Yes.

Len Sipes: Okay, and the probationers, we’re talking about, the incentive here is early termination, it’s where the judge or the attorney feels that this person has a substance abuse background, not necessarily currently doing drugs, but having a substance abuse background, and this person may not be new to the criminal justice system. This person may have multiple arrests and multiple contacts with the criminal justice system, correct?

Amanda Rocha: That is correct. We have people who are 18-years-old up until, well into their 60s, so yeah, it could be somebody who is their first charge, or it could be somebody who’s, it’s their 20th.

Len Sipes: Right, and that part, by the way, the process in terms of people in their 40s, 50s, and 60s and older. I’ve had a chance to encounter them, in terms of the write-alongs that I’ve done with our folks, and that’s sad, don’t you think? I mean, when you walk into this apartment of this guy who’s been through heroin, who’s been through crack, I mean, these older heroin addicts, these older coke guys, you know, they just have the hardest time staying away from drugs. It’s just amazing to me to go into the home of a 50-year-old and 60-year-old because they continue to do drugs.

Carline Claudomir: Can I go back to the incentive process?

Len Sipes: Yes.

Carline Claudomir: I always hear the biggest incentives for our program is the fact that you can come off of drugs, and you can be successful in the community without using illicit substances. We actually have a client right now, he is part of the TAP program, but we also see some of those clients sometimes, and he’s working, he’s successful, he’s drug free. That is the biggest incentive. Most of our clients, however, see early termination, and that’s their goal, and they don’t actually think of, to get there, I have to also be drug free.

Len Sipes: Here’s my guess, and either one of you, feel free to tell me whether I’m right or wrong. My guess is that they think that they’re entering this program, and the early termination is the only thing that’s on their mind, and getting off of drugs is way, way, way, way, way back on the list of –

Carline Claudomir: – priorities.

Len Sipes: Yeah, priorities, because a lot of people, they’ve done drugs the good part of their lives. You know, 12, 13 years old, starting alcohol, 14, 15, starting marijuana, 16, 17, graduating to the harder drugs, a lot of these individuals that we supervise here at the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, and this applies to any parole and probation agency in the country. You know, they work with people who don’t know how to live life without self-medication.

Carline Claudomir: And unfortunately, in their minds, they believe it’s recreational, even though they have a 20-year history of drug abuse and treatment situations, they still believe it’s recreational, I can stop at any point in time.

Len Sipes: I can handle this.

Carline Claudomir: And unfortunately, when they get in front of, into the STAR/HIDTA program, and there’s consequences, and they realize, well I’m just going to jail because I can’t stop using, is that really worth it? And that’s when it may click in their mind, okay, I really do, I have a problem. I can’t do this on my own.

Len Sipes: We, we have this come to reality be, again, I’ve used other terms, but I don’t want to be disrespectful. Where that becomes a defining moment in their lives, does it not, that they have lived their life with the needle, lived their life with a powdery substance, lived their life smoking reefer, they really don’t know what to do without drugs.

Amanda Rocha: And I think, for example, we have somebody assigned to us right now. Her grandmother had a history, apparently she’s not using now, but of use. Her mother is actively using, and she’s a young girl, 19 years old, and is using, so that, not only has she been using for a good amount of her short life that she has had so far, but she also has been living with this substance abuse through her generations.

Len Sipes: Right. I guess that’s the point that I’m trying to get across to the audience, because we have this extraordinarily simplistic sense as to the problem that we have with people, the 16,000 people that we supervise on any given day, and most of the people in the audience that I talk to understand that out of the 7 million people under correctional supervision, 5 of those 7 million are on community supervision. So when we talk about corrections in this country, the overwhelming majority of these individuals are in the community being supervised in the community. The overwhelming majority of these individuals have substance abuse histories. The overwhelming majority of these individuals just don’t smoke a joint every couple weeks. That investment in drugs is a long term early age of onset life altering experience, but they don’t know how to have a life without drugs. So every time the boss gets in their face, they smoke a joint. Every time life takes a turn, the needle goes in their arm. That’s who they are, that’s what they are in terms of their own self definition. Now am I exaggerating, or am I in the ballpark?

Carline Claudomir: No, even when they’re successful, the way they celebrate is by using drugs!

Len Sipes: That’s right! They reward themselves. We had a case one time when I was with the Maryland Department of Public Safety. The guy comes out of prison, reunited with his family, he’s going to drug treatment, he’s working, he’s getting along with the kids, and he’s doing so well, that what he does is fire up a joint to celebrate! And he kept pulling positives for marijuana! First positive, second positive, third, fourth, fifth, sixth. Now there’s a certain point where we’re sitting down and saying, my man, you’re very close to going back to prison, and your wife let you come home, and the kids, you’re getting along with the kids, and you’re working every single day, and you’re going to drug treatment, and the drug treatment folks say that you’re progressing, and you’re within a hair’s breadth of going back to the prison system! What’s up with you?

Carline Claudomir: Well I have clients like that right now in my caseload. I had a client who, by some confusion, believed that her termination date was a month earlier, and so when I called her in, I said, I need you to come in and drug test, because I’m sorry, you actually terminate in May instead of April, and that drug test was positive for marijuana, and her explanation was, I thought I was off of probation! But she had not tested positive in close to 7 months!

Len Sipes: But that’s not the point!

Carline Claudomir: It’s not the point!

Len Sipes: So you, the criminal justice system, in essence, in these drug courts or other modalities that we have here at CSOSA, when we involve people in long term residential group substance abuse, that is, for the first time in their lives many of these individuals come face to face with the prospect of never using drugs again, and facing the prospect as to why they use drugs to begin with. That is a pretty scary place to be, is it not?

Amanda Rocha: I would think so, yeah. Some of the offenders have already had drug treatment, though, and this is their second time coming around, because like you were saying, it is a scary thought, so maybe that first time they weren’t open to it. They didn’t really reap the full benefits of receiving that treatment, so here they are, back in the criminal justice system, and we’re giving them another chance, and we’re hoping that this time, they are receptive, and they do keep that open mind, and they aren’t so put off by the whole idea of addressing that issue.

Len Sipes: We’re halfway through the program, ladies and gentlemen. This is DC Public Safety today. We’re talking about drug courts. We have two principals with us. We have Carline, let’s see if I can actually pronounce Carline’s last name correctly, Claudomir, and Amanda Rocha, both community supervision officers with drug court. Again, there are two drug courts in the District of Columbia, ours under the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, which is post-adjudication, which means the person’s on probation, and we also have one on the pretrial side of it, and the whole idea is, when the judge or the attorney takes a look at this individual’s background, they say that this person’s involvement in criminal activity is principally due to substance abuse, and that person may not be new to the criminal justice system. This may be the person’s fifth, sixth, seventh, twelfth time, but he has a substance abuse history, she has a substance abuse history, and what we try to do is to get them involved in treatment, but the interesting part of it is that treatment may not be the first stop, correct? We have other, we assess the individual –

Carline Claudomir: When they come in to this, the HIDTA drug program, initially, some clients actually are [INDISCERNIBLE] from either the pretrial or from a request from their judge. A lot of our clients come in, and we assess their drug, their current drug test to see, what level they would actually go into. Some clients come in and never drug test positive, and they had dealt with their issues prior to coming to –

Len Sipes: Or they make the voluntary decision to stop as long as they’re under supervision. So the interesting part, this was the point I was trying to get to, and both of you were looking at me, so why did I, the interesting part of it is research years ago that basically said offenders take vacations from their drug use all the time. There’s a certain point where even the person involved in substance abuse will say, I’m doing it too much. I need my wife or my significant other, or for whatever reason, I’m going to be drug tested, I’ve got to stop for the next 3 or 4 months, and then oftentimes, the person goes right back to it. So this sense of an uncontrollable craving for drugs, that craving is always there, but the person can stop for a certain amount of time.

Carline Claudomir: It depends on the person, but yes, sometimes we do have clients who may have tested positive three or four times at the very beginning, and we never, and then complete their whole probation with no, with no positive drug tests, but then we’ll see them later on in court, and they got another charge, and they tested positive at some other point after they leave the STAR/HIDTA program.

Len Sipes: So with the criminal justice system has the wherewithal, and mothers have the wherewithal, and pardon my sexism, wives have the wherewithal, and in the case of women offenders, husbands have the wherewithal, people who have a certain amount of power regarding the offender, have the ability to get that offender to stop doing drugs, at least for a certain amount of time.

Carline Claudomir: Specifically when the consequences is jail time. A lot of our clients, after they sit, do their first sanction which is a jury box sanction for three days, and they see the judge stepping back, client after client after client for a positive drug test for three nights or seven nights or 14 nights or 28 nights, they look at that and say, oh, I’m not going to do 28 nights for a positive marijuana. I can stop for –

Len Sipes: That’s the point, isn’t it?

Carline Claudomir: Yeah.

Len Sipes: Isn’t that the point? I mean, it’s like we have these endless debates about substance abuse and what works and what doesn’t work. Well, holding a 28 day setback, as we refer to it, of spending 28 days in jail for smoking a joint seems to be an awfully heavy price to pay, and a lot of these individuals under our supervision consciously make the choice not to continue to smoke marijuana because they simply don’t want to spend 28 days in jail, correct?

Carline Claudomir: Correct, but the flipside is those who actually are in the grips of their addiction, no matter how many sanctions you provide, they’re not going to stop.

Len Sipes: They’re not going to stop.

Carline Claudomir: And those are the ones we really try to focus on and really try to get them out of the community immediately, because every time they pick up, they’re, one, they’re breaking the law, and they’re violating their probation contract, and they’re violating probation, and they’re hurting themselves, and they may become a threat to the community, so we try to get them out of the community as fast as we can through treatment.

Len Sipes: All right, and then some cases, through residential treatment.

Carline Claudomir: Yes.

Len Sipes: Okay. So let’s walk through those steps, those sanction steps, because we have, sitting in the jury box for three days, which is a real pain.

Carline Claudomir: First violation.

Len Sipes: Okay. Second violation –

Carline Claudomir: – is going to be 30 days on GPS with [INDISCERNIBLE] conference.

Len Sipes: So 30 days being tracked electronically through global positioning system satellite tracking, so wherever you go, you’re tracked.

Carline Claudomir: With a curfew.

Len Sipes: With a curfew.

Carline Claudomir: And sometimes, a stayaway. You can’t go to the neighborhood where you usually get your drugs from.

Len Sipes: There you go.

Carline Claudomir: If you do, we know where you are.

Len Sipes: There you go. So he’s being watched all the time. Okay, so that’s pretty cool. Now the next sanction after that?

Carline Claudomir: Third sanction is three nights in jail.

Len Sipes: Three nights in jail. In the D.C. jail.

Carline Claudomir: D.C. jail.

Len Sipes: Well that’s a lovely place to visit! Is it on the weekend, during the week?

Carline Claudomir: It’s whenever they get their sanction.

Len Sipes: It’s whenever they get their sanction.

Carline Claudomir: It starts immediately.

Len Sipes: Okay. Fourth?

Amanda Rocha: It would be a case staffing. So Ms. Claudomir and I, or our supervisor or other team members get together and discuss this individual’s case to see what we can do at this point, because in the past, what has been going on isn’t working. So a plan, in a sense.

Len Sipes: Is that, is that where you give your riot act pronouncement to the individual, basically saying, hey, you’re this far from going into prison?

Carline Claudomir: They’ve been getting it the whole time! And we tell our clients when they come in, if we get to the case staffing stage, please understand you’re leaving the community and going to treatment. There is no if, but, can I, can I get one more chance? No, your chance was when you stood in front of the judge and said you would be clean and sober.

Len Sipes: And there’s a certain point where we will send them away to residential treatment.

Carline Claudomir: That’s the case staffing stage.

Len Sipes: That’s the case staffing stage. Okay, after that, what happens?

Amanda Rocha: Then we have the seven nights in jail sanction.

Len Sipes: Okay, and then it just basically goes from 7 nights to 14 nights to an entire month sort of thing.

Amanda Rocha: That’s right, and if somebody gets placed in residential treatment and gets discharged unsuccessfully or voluntarily chooses to leave, then that would be 15 nights in jail.

Len Sipes: The average person listening to this program, people within the criminal justice system are going to say, eh, that’s pretty much common business, drug positives and sanctions. The average person outside of the criminal justice system listening to this program would be appalled. They’re going, how many positives, how many bites at the apple are you giving this guy? You’re telling me that he’s got 15 prior contacts with the criminal justice system, and now we’re up to our fifth and sixth drug positive? For the love of good god, put that person in prison! Obviously, that person doesn’t want to comply. Obviously, that person is posing a public safety risk. Just put him back in prison.

Carline Claudomir: But see, you look at the context of the situation, the average individual on probation actually provides a number more of positive drug tests are a lot more noncompliant. We get them immediately, after the first, second, third, fourth, fifth. So in the context of probation, sometimes a client won’t be able to go before the sentencing judge until the 20th plus drug test because we can’t get a show cause until then to tell the judge he is noncompliant with probation.

Len Sipes: Okay, but that’s a technicality, and I’m glad you brought that up, but the principal issue here for the average citizen is, you know, are, the people that we have under supervision are not exactly the most popular people on the face of the earth.

Carline Claudomir: No, but they are your neighbors.

Len Sipes: Well, that’s a good point. That’s a good point. But my, the other point is that, you know, when we go out, the citizens asking them to support, whether it’s mental health programs or substance abuse programs or educational programs or vocational programs, the response oftentimes is, Leonard, we’re going to give to the church, we’re going to give to the schools, let the money go to the kids, let the money go to the elderly, I’m really not all that enthused about giving criminals. Money for programs, so the point is, is that there’s a frustration level and a tolerance level on the part of the average citizen as to how many chances we’re going to give that individual from the standpoint of public safety, and we need to explain why we do that.

Carline Claudomir: Public safety is our number one concern, so we always talk to our clients in regards from the aspect. When you become a threat to public safety –

Len Sipes: Boom, you go.

Carline Claudomir: – you need to leave the community.

Len Sipes: That’s right.

Carline Claudomir: But up until that point, we have to work with you, because once you leave probation, you’re done with this. You go back into that same community, because you don’t walk around with a sign saying, I am a criminal. You walk around into those churches, into those schools, pick up your children, those same places that the public wants to provide their money, those clients are there with them.

Len Sipes: 1 out of 45 individuals, according to national research are on probation right now or community supervision. Now, if you can, these are active. So if you count people who have been caught up in the criminal justice system, it’s at least 1 out of 20. So every time, regardless of where you go, where you shop, those, you’re going to encounter hundreds of individuals who have been caught up in the criminal justice system. So I think the rationale is, is that we want them to quit drugs, we want them to become taxpayers, not tax burdens, we want them to stop criminality, and I think that’s what we try to do with these individuals in drug court.

Amanda Rocha: That’s right. We want them to make that lifestyle change, so they’re not back in and out of the system.

Len Sipes: We want them to toss off substance abuse for good.

Amanda Rocha: That’s right.

Len Sipes: And stop messing with us.

Carline Claudomir: The problem is, sometimes it doesn’t happen in one try. I have sat in drug court and did my cases in drug court and have turned to the left, and looked into the jury box and saw a client I had a year ago who got off on early termination who is now back on pre-trial.

Len Sipes: That’s exactly right. And it is the process of recovery, and when we do live talk radio, people have a hard time listening to this, because their sense of the criminal justice system is, you’re getting a break, buddy, and maybe one, maybe two, but you hit three, and I want you to go back to prison. I think the average person in the larger community, not in the criminal justice system, feels that way. So we have to be accountable to the average citizen and explain to them that recovery, in terms of substance abuse, is a messy process that takes, in many cases, two, three times at treatment, and in many cases, involves multiple positives for drugs until we can convince that person to stay away from drugs, at least for the period of their supervision, or go to jail.

Carline Claudomir: I have a client who has been on probation since 1995, and he has been through every team at CSOSA, and when he finally made it to STAR/HIDTA, and he started messing up, and we did the warrant initiatives and went into his home and arrested him, and we brought him in front of his judge, the judge said, no, we’re going to give him one more chance, and that is it. One more chance. And it just continues on. But I will say that after this last opportunity, he has been clean and sober for 7-8 months, is working full time, and now, he is back, part of society. But see, it didn’t work the first, second, third, 10th, 15th time.

Len Sipes: You know, the interesting part of this is that the average person hearing it has a low frustration level for people caught up in the criminal justice system, but that is our reality. Our reality is that we have individuals who don’t know how to live life without a needle. They don’t know how to live life without a hallucinogen. They don’t know how to do it, and what we do is we teach them how to live life without using drugs, and that created a much safer society, a much saner society in the long run, and we turn people who are tax burdens into taxpayers, and I think that’s the heart and soul of it. It’s messy, it’s sloppy, sometimes it’s hard to explain to the general public, but we take individuals who are problems and we turn out individuals who are no longer problems, and we do that more often than we don’t, correct?

Carline Claudomir: And sometimes we’re the only ones who hold up that mirror to that individual and make them see how sloppy and messy they are, and they have been living their life, and hold them accountable, and when they think they’re almost done, hold them accountable even more and make them be the successes that they say they want to be when they first came to probation.

Len Sipes: It’s a fascinating process. Most of the people that I’ve encountered after a certain point, especially the older guys, sick and tired of being sick and tired. They are. I mean, it is just a terrible process of being arrested and rearrested and rearrested and reincarcerated and reincarcerated. These aren’t necessarily violent criminals. Most of these people are involved in nonviolent crimes, but there’s a certain point where they just get sick and tired of being constantly put through the criminal justice system, and they finally quit. They finally make that break. So I think what you’re doing is intervening in that process earlier, if at all humanly possible to get them to that point where they understand that they’re sick and tired of being sick and tired, correct?

Amanda Rocha: Well, and also, think about the example that I gave before where this young adult has this generational, you know, substance abuse that she’s been around, and those people who have dropped out of school in the sixth grade, or who have all these different issues, and they’re using to kind of, you know, make themselves feel better about the issue, or they’re trying to fit in with their peers, or with their family. So you have all these issues that are going on, and part of probation’s job is to address those issues, get them into an employment training program, get their GED, so now that they have these positive things in their life that they didn’t have before that would help them to stop using or even wanting to go back and use.

Len Sipes: Or put them back in jail or prison, and either one protects public safety.

Carline Claudomir: Yes.

Len Sipes: That’s the bottom line. All right, ladies and gentlemen, we’re out of time. Carline Claudomir, and I said it for the first time correctly, community supervision officer with our drug court unit. Amanda Rocha, also a community supervision officer with our drug court unit. You can find information about CSOSA at www.csosa.gov. You can also access the radio, television shows, the blog, and transcripts through the CSOSA website, or directly through www.media – M-E-D-I-A – dot-csosa – C-S-O-S-A – dot-gov. You can follow us on Twitter at twitter.com/lensipes, and you can also email me directly, Leonard – L-E-O-N-A-R-D – dot-sipes – S-I-P-E-S – @csosa.gov. Ladies and gentlemen, I want everybody to have themselves a very, very pleasant day.

[Audio Ends]

Filed Under: Courts, Drug Treatment, Education and Vocational Assistance, Interviews with Staff, Parole and Probation, Probation, Reentry, What Works Tagged With: Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, CSOSA, D.C., drug court, Washington

What Works: Evidence-Based Practices in Community Corrections

November 22, 2010 By Len Leave a Comment

“What Works: Evidence-Based Practices in Community Corrections” is part of the” DC Public Safety” television series.

Please see http://media.csosa.gov for our radio shows. See www.twitter.com/lensipes.

We welcome your comments and suggestions at leonard.sipes@csosa.gov.

This show provides an overview of “what works” in community corrections through an examination of research-based practices. Participants include:

Nancy G. LaVigne, Ph.D. Director, Justice Policy Center, The Urban Institute
Thomas Williams, Associate Director, Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency
Debra Kafami, Ph.D, Executive Assistant, Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency

The program is offered by the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, a federal executive branch entity in Washington, D.C.

This television program is available at http://media.csosa.gov/podcast/video/2010/11/what-works-evidence-based-practices-in-community-corrections/

The show is hosted by Leonard Sipes. Timothy Barnes is the Producer.

Transcript available at

[Video Begins]

Len Sipes: Hi. And welcome to DC Public Safety. I’m your host Leonard Sipes. You know, today’s program is pretty interesting. It’s about what works in community based corrections or evidence-based corrections. There’s quite a bit of research out there now that indicates that you can reduce crime, you can reduce recidivism, you can help the cost to states in terms of the criminal justice system, that you can take tax burdens and turn them into tax payers. But the problem on the part of the practitioner throughout the country is that they are having a hard time taking all of this research and turning it into day-to-day practice.

And to talk about that whole concept of taking the research and turning into day-to-day practice, we have three principals with us today. We have Dr. Nancy La Vigne. She’s the Director of the Justice Policy Center at the Urban Institute. We have Thomas Williams. He is the Associate Director of Community Supervision Services for the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, my agency. And we have Debra Kafami. Dr. Kafami is the Executive Assistant in Community Supervision Services at Court Services, and Offender Supervision Agency too. Nancy, and to Tom, and to Deb, welcome to DC Public Safety.

Debra Kafami: Thanks, great to be here.

Thomas Williams: Thank you Len, glad to be here.

Len Sipes: We have this really interesting conversation that all four of us have had over the course of years of taking this massive amount of research from the Department of Justice, from the Urban Institute, from Pew, from lots of other organizations, and the struggle that we have to make it practical, to make it real, to read through all the volumes of material, and to get down and take a look at it, and say, “Boom, okay, this is something I can use at the state or local level.” Nancy, now the Urban Institute– You sort of specialize in that. And you’ve been doing this sort of research for decades.

Nancy Lavigne: That’s right. The Urban Institute is a non-profit, non-partisan research organization based in Washington as you know. We’ve got policy centers across a wide array of topics from education policy to health policy to tax policy. And as director of the Justice Policy Center in the Urban Institute, I direct evaluation and research, a team of over 35 researchers. And one of our main goals is to find out the truth, what does work, and why does it work? And on what populations? And in what context?

Len Sipes: Right. And so the average person sitting– I’ve give you an example of a couple years ago. Tom, and I, and Deb, all three of us come from the Maryland Department of Public Safety. I’m sitting there in the Secretary of Public Safety’s office, and he says, “I got off the phone with the governor. The governor saw this program about boot camp on ABC Evening News. And now he wants us to do boot camps.” And I’m sitting there going, “Well, what is the evidence on boot camps? What is the research?” It was the governor who came along, and said, “I’ve got a great idea. Let’s do boot camps,” rather than the research pushing us in that direction. That’s how the criminal justice system seems to work correct?

Nancy Lavigne: Right. And that’s an interesting example because of all the different kinds of interventions out there. I think the research is most definitive on boot camps and that they don’t work. I know that as a researcher, but does the practitioner community know that? I don’t think so. I don’t think we’re getting the word out the way we need to be.

Len Sipes: And one of the things, interestingly enough, you take a look at the DARE Program, which is a police-oriented, police-run program for kids to teach them about the dangers of substance abuse. Now the DARE research seems to be pretty negative, yet DARE thrives. So there are other dimensions here. There is the evidence-based part of it, and there’s the practical, reality base to interpret what people want, what they’re comfortable with. Tom, now you went to China to talk about evidence-based procedures. You lectured in that country. You’ve written articles. You’ve gone to conferences throughout the country talking about evidence-based procedures. I know you’ve had this conversation with people in the field in terms of how you take all of this research and make it practical to make it real.

Thomas Williams: Well, that’s correct, Len. I was in China three years ago lecturing on evidence-based practices. And actually, part of my discussion with the Chinese there, the delegation, was actually giving a historical perspective about evidence-based practices. As you know, some of your viewers probably know as well, prior to Lipton, Martin and Wilks coming out with the “Nothing Works” document that actually revolutionized basically the way that we deal with offenders in a criminal justice way, we had a single theory with regards how we manage offenders basically from a prison standpoint. And that is an indeterminate sentencing. So you went into prison, you got rehabilitated hopefully and you came out and that continued.

But unfortunately with that “Nothing Works” theory that came out, that really revolutionized things for which it was a whole metamorphosis of now we just put a man and through away the key.

Len Sipes: That was during the 1970s, correct?

Thomas Williams: That’s correct.

Len Sipes: With landmark research basically suggested that they took a look at all the evaluations and they came to the conclusion– Now he would say that that conclusion was exaggerated. But there was a point where the consensus from the criminal justice systems and in criminology was that there’s no sense trying to help individuals while in prison, and while they come out of prison, commonly know as re-entry. Because nothing does work. But we’ve moved way beyond that now, correct?

Thomas Williams: Well, and that’s the point I was getting ready to make the next point, is that there’s been a whole body of research now that basically says that when you provide intensive supervision services, in addition to special design programs, you are going to have dramatic reductions in re-arrests and also recidivism rates, recidivism meaning those persons who go back to prison. So that whole body of knowledge now is a wealth of knowledge that’s out there that a lot of criminal justice professionals are now using to develop programs within their own individuals entities.

Len Sipes: And what I want to do is briefly run over, take 15 seconds and go over some of the programs that have worked. The Washington State Institute for Public Policy in 2006, they came a long with a very brief, but a very comprehensive piece of research taking a look at the individual programs in terms of what works and what doesn’t. And also, at the same time, talking about the percentage reductions. But beyond that, we’ve had drugs courts, cognitive behavioral therapy, which is teaching individuals how to think differently about their own lives, Project Hope in Hawaii. We’ve had re-entry programs in San Diego, jobs through the Department of Labor, jobs programs, substance abuse treatment, mental health courts. All of these programs have shown that it’s possible to reduce recidivism, it’s possible to reduce crime, not by leaps and bounds. Because the research seems to indicate that there’s a 10 to 20 percent reduction in recidivism. So the possibility is there. Debra?

Debra Kafami: What we seem to be talking about is results-based management. What gets measures gets done. And it’s so important because if you can look at your results, you can distinguish your successes from your failures.

Len Sipes: And that’s one of the things that I’m really impressed by. You’re in charge of our SMART System. You’re the basically the person who has helped design the SMART System which is our own book-keeping system which has our own internal management system. And all the way throughout this process in the 6.5 years I’ve been with CSOSA, you’ve said, “Unless you measure it, it doesn’t happen.” What happens, what gets done is what gets measured. Correct?

Debra Kafami: Correct. And like I said, it’s so important so you can distinguish the successes from the failures. Because if something is successful, it can be replicated. And if it’s a failure, they want to know so you can go back and fix it.

Len Sipes: Right.

Debra Kafami: Sometimes a very good program works well in one area of the country, but you bring it to another place and implement it the same exact way and it may not work. So you may not want to just totally throw the program away. But you can work and figure out what went wrong, and try and correct it and make it work.

Len Sipes: And boy did you just hit the nail on the head, Dr. Kafami or Debbie. Because that’s the conversation I have with practitioners all the time. And any one of you can jump in on this. It’s that Project Hope in Hawaii, where you take probationers who have a meth problem. And if they mess up, you immediately put them in a local incarcerated setting. And you do provide treatment. And eventually they have good outcomes. And different people are saying, “Well, Leonard, you know that’s a wonderful idea. But I don’t have the jail space to move people in there every time they mess up while they’re on community supervision.” So as Debbie said, because it works in Hawaii, doesn’t mean it’s going to work in DC, doesn’t mean it’s going to work in Rhode Island. And that’s the frustration on the part of parole or probation people throughout the country. How do I take all this research and distill it and apply it to my particular situation?

Thomas Williams: Right. But I don’t think this argument, on the one hand, jail or prison versus community corrections. Certainly I think we need both. I mean, there’s a certain segment of the population for which they do, unfortunately, need to be incarcerated. Because they won’t change, they’re not willing to change, and they have no desire to change. For that group with regards to the accountability that we need, in community corrections, need to have with regards to the public, and also letting the public know that we’re serious about quote-unquote changing behaviors. We do need to, unfortunately, incarcerate that segment of the population.

Len Sipes: There’s no question that we have to incarcerate. There’s no question that there are people out there who pose a clear and present danger to our society. And they have to go to prison. There’s no doubt about that. But the overwhelming majority of the people under correctional supervision in this country are on community supervision, they’re supervised by parole and probation agencies. Like 85 percent are being supervised by parole and probation agencies.

So when people think of corrections, prisons, which is the first thing that comes to their mind, is a tiny part of it. The overwhelming majority of people under correctional supervision belong to us. And the practitioners are saying, “What do I do with all these people?”

Nancy Lavigne: Right. Well, I think we can take this apart into different pieces of the challenges that practitioners face and trying to digest all the research that’s out there and use it in a meaningful way. For one, as a researcher and an academic, I know what the research is because I get the journals in the mail and I can read them and understand them. For practitioners, they may see a study here or there. It’s usually not written in a way that’s accessible.

And in addition, there’s just a bunch of different studies, and some say something works, and some say the same thing doesn’t. And so it’s very hard for someone to say, “In the balance, what really does work and why and how and on what population?” So one thing we’re doing at the Urban Institute is trying to cull all the research out there on the topic of prisoner re-entry. Now it sounds narrow, prisoner re-entry. But as you know, prisoner re-entry encompasses everything.

Len Sipes: It’s huge.

Nancy Lavigne: It’s housing, it’s mental house treatment, it’s substance abuse. It’s everything. It’s in-prison programs. It’s programs after release. It’s programs for literacy, for employment and so forth. So we’ve identified over 1,000 individual studies that fall under this umbrella of re-entry. And those are studies that are truly evaluative in nature. Now what we’re doing is reviewing each and every study and rating it according to its level of rigor. Because that’s another challenge for the practitioner community. They see a study and it says something works, and they don’t have the knowledge to understand whether that’s a definitive–

Len Sipes: It’s methodologically correct or not? Yes.

Nancy Lavigne: Of course. So we’re reading them and we’re going to compile all that information and develop it into an online, searchable website that’s part of the National Reentry Resource Center. So this is all funded under the Second Chance Act.

Len Sipes: Right. And it’s all being funded by Department of Justice and the Assistant Attorney General.

Nancy Lavigne: Yes.

Len Sipes: She’s really focusing on making the research come alive.

Nancy Lavigne: Yes.

Thomas Williams: Let me just cut in. What we just touched on just a minute ago are the challenges that folks who are coming back from prison have with regards to trying to reestablish themselves within a community. Issues of substance abuse, issues of employment, issues of housing are major issues, interpersonal relationships, and who do I associate with when I do come back to the community?

We’ve got all bodies of research now on those individual topics and collectively to kind of help the practitioner. And I think one of the things that kind of argues against a practitioner sometimes is, how do I actually take this research and apply it to my day-to-day job? And then number two, how do I actually target the right population? Because you could have a program that you think is good because you read the research, but then if you target the wrong person, then you’re not going to have the results that’s expected.

Len Sipes: And that’s my point, again, going back to our Maryland Department of Public Safety days when the public safety secretary– A new piece of research would come out from the National Institute of Justice. He’d plop it on my desk, and go, “Sipes, give me a two-page summation on this.” Because he didn’t want to go through this telephone-sized book filled with facts and figures and the methodological review. He just wanted to know what the lessons were and how we could apply those lessons within the Maryland Department of Public Safety. And Deb, I think the practitioner community is overwhelmed by the research. And they just don’t understand how to use everything that’s before them. It’s like having this gigantic feast and you have toothpicks to eat. I mean, you just can’t distill all of this information.

Debra Kafami: You can’t do everything at once. You just don’t have the resources to do everything. And there’s not just one magic bullet: “Do this program; everything will be better.” And it takes time. And many times you just don’t have that luxury. People want to see the results, they want to see it now. But sometimes it could take three years at least from beginning of a program to start to see some tangible results.

Len Sipes: Okay. And we’re going to be talking about resources on the second part of it. Because the other big complaint on the part of the practitioner community throughout the country is, I don’t have the resources to implement all of this. First, they’ve got to get through the research. They’ve got to understand the research. They’ve got to understand how to apply the research. And then they’ve got to come up with the resources. And ladies and gentlemen, we’ll discuss that resource question when the second segment of DC Public Safety– Stay right there, we’ll be back with this intriguing conversation on what works in terms of community-based corrections. We’ll be right back.

[Music Playing]

Hi, welcome back to DC Public Safety. I continue to be your host, Leonard Sipes. Our guests continue in the second half of the segment.

Dr. Nancy La Vigne. She’s the Director of the Justice Policy Center for the Urban Institute. Thomas Williams, he is the Associate Director of Supervision Services from my agency, the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, and Dr. Debra Kafami, Executive Assistant again for Court Services and Offender Supervision. And to Nancy, and to Tom, and to Deb, welcome back to DC Public Safety.

Debra Kafami: Thank you very much.

Len Sipes: All right. So in terms of this discussion, it’s going to be seen in the District of Columbia, it’s going to be seen throughout the country. So what we have, and Debra talked about it, at the end of the first half is, okay, so we have all these studies. And Nancy, Urban Institute is doing a wonderful job and Department of Justice and the National Resource Center, everybody’s doing a wonderful job of taking all of this evidence and distilling it down into useful lessons for practitioners in the field. So that’s lesson number one, correct? Okay.

Lesson number two is when I talk to my peers in the field, they say, “Leonard, okay fine. The evidence says that you need to design a program around that individual. No more cookie-cutter drug treatment. If that woman has had a history of sexual abuse in her younger years, which is not unusual for the female offenders that we have under our supervision, the reason for doing drugs is tied into the fact that she was sexually molested at nine and ten years of age. That substance abuse program needs to be designed with her specific conditions in mind. They can’t be cookie cutter. But I don’t have the money to do it. I refer her to a community health program. And four months down the road, they put her into a group program that meets twice a week for one hour at a time. And it’s cookie cutter and it’s not designed for her. So I know the evidence that design a program specifically for her but I don’t have the money to do it.” What do we tell a person under those circumstances?

Nancy Lavigne: I think you’re thinking too big. I don’t think you should be thinking about new programs. I think you should be thinking about how we can advise the field on using existing resources and programs more wisely.

Len Sipes: Okay.

Nancy Lavigne: We do a lot of partnerships with practitioners and it’s often to evaluate existing programs or to assist people in measuring success. They say, “We can’t measure success. We don’t have the resources. We don’t have the expertise.” And I said, “Well, how do you know you’re even serving the right population to begin with? You should be collecting that data to begin with. Because that’s the same data we need to evaluate the program.” “Oh, well yeah, I guess we’re not collecting that.” And when we go back and look and see whether there’s a one-per-one match between people who have, for example, histories of substance abuse and whether they’re getting treatment, we’ve been stunned to find that as many as 50 percent of people who are enrolled in treatment don’t have those extensive histories. So there’s a mismatch and–

Len Sipes: We may be taking the wrong people to go in to begin with.

Nancy Lavigne: –and resource allocation. And that’s another way that you can use evidence to improve practices that doesn’t require new resources.

Len Sipes: So the evidence says, “Be sure you pick the right people to go into the right programs to begin with?”

Nancy Lavigne: That’s right. It’s being smarter with the resources you currently have.

Thomas Williams: Well, if you think about the Drug Court movement over ten years ago, that’s basically how the Drug Court movement got started. Certainly there was a little bit of money that came from the federal government to help support that.

Len Sipes: Right.

Thomas Williams: But there’s the whole issue of collaboration. And as we just discussed here a few minutes ago is targeting the right people for the right program, and making sure that the program fits the needs that you’re trying to address. So one way that you can do that is basically having a good assessment system, a good assessment protocol where you’re actually trying to identify the risk to re-offend, and how do you minimize that risk to re-offend? By the same token, identifying the particular needs that are specific to that group or that population that you’re looking for, and put that person in that particular program. Then you can match up those two things and then have most of the literature saying that you will have. But the whole issue of collaboration is important, because one entity can’t do it alone. Criminal justice entities cannot do it by itself. It needs the collaboration of the systems that are out there to help support what we’re trying to do in terms of that behavior change. But also as important as that is the social support that needs to come following that. So as we have the services, as we’re providing the services, as we’re now having that level of success, what is following that program either by the family members or the community that’s going to help sustain that success that we have?

Len Sipes: Okay. And I think you just summarized the principal findings in terms of the evidence-based process. Somebody said some time ago that in terms of the substance abuse end of it, that the National Institute on Drug Abuse and SAMSA has had the last four decades to think through this process.

And they do give out very specific guidelines in terms of how to handle the individual, how to assess the individual, how to design a program for that specific individual, follow up. So they are very, very specific.

And supposedly we, in community corrections, are in our infancy in terms of developing this evidence-based approach. But SAMSA, in the National Institute of Drug Abuse, they’re the leaders, so to speak, in terms of taking a population in need and figuring it out, exactly what works for them. And so what we have to do is do that for mental health, what we have to do in terms of jobs, what we have to do in terms of supervision techniques. And what you’re saying at the same time is that not everybody gets the same levels of services.

Thomas Williams: And they don’t and they shouldn’t get it. Anyone that assesses at the high level of supervision with intensive or maximum, whatever it’s called. But wherever the high level is, that’s the group that you want to target. And you want to put those persons into your high-end, costly programming. The low-end of the spectrum that’s a low-level supervision, you might just want to provide life skills to them at best. But the literature really tells us that if you have someone who’s assessed at the low level, you really shouldn’t be spending any resources on them at all.

Nancy Lavigne: That’s right. In fact it can actually be harmful. If you look at the literature on halfway houses, it’s pretty definitive that the lowest level offenders who are coming back to the community do worse off when they have to go into halfway houses. And the theory is that it’s preventing them from finding jobs, keeping jobs, reuniting with family in a way that’s detrimental.

Len Sipes: Well, there was a book years ago called Radical Non-Intervention, and the message of that book and this is a book that’s 40-years-old, was be careful as to who you put into particular programs. You may not want to intervene in the lives of certain people. They’re marginally involved in the criminal justice system, you do as little with them as you possibly can. The more you try to help them, the more you try to supervise them, the more they get sucked into the criminal justice system. So it’s picking the right person to receive the right services, correct?

Debra Kafami: It’s not so much picking but identifying the right person through a validated risk and needs assessment instrument like Tom said. You want to focus on those high risk offenders, and you’ll get the biggest bang for your buck.

Len Sipes: Okay.

Thomas Williams: Let me go back to the 1980s to the RAN study that was done on intensive supervision where basically because the staff were able to have a lower case load and follow people more closely, they had high levels of re-arrest, or re-offending, technical violations I should say.

Len Sipes: Right. They put more people back in prison.

Thomas Williams: Right. But the important thing about that is that the services weren’t there. So they had high-level folks that they were monitoring, which they should be doing, trying to keep tabs on what they were up to and trying to make sure they were reporting for their appointments and things like that, or going to services. But the more they watched them, the more technical violations actually were recorded, which eventually led them to be revoked. But the problem was that the services for these high-end folks was not provided.

Len Sipes: Right. And that’s the same research that applies to boot camp, that you can’t just supervise people intensely because the more you supervise them, the more violate them. There’s got to be a combination of supervision and programs. And that’s what seems to work, correct?

Debra Kafami: Yes. And the programs really need to be cognitive-based programs.

Len Sipes: Cognitive-base, and I talked a little bit about that at the beginning of the program, means helping them think through their issues to be sure that they see the world better, make better decisions.

Debra Kafami: Yeah. It’s a program where there’s a lot of role-playing and skill development for the offenders. They have to be able to go out in the community and deal with issues in an appropriate manner. And they need skills to do that.

Len Sipes: So in the closing minutes of the program, is there today one document – and I know Nancy, you were talking about Urban is working on it, Justice is working on it, the National Center is working on it – but in essence we’re working towards one comprehensive approach. So it’s no longer the people in Milwaukee or in Alaska or wherever they happen to be; they’re going to be able to have resources in the near future that gives them the best available evidence in terms of how to proceed, correct?

Nancy Lavigne: Yes. But my fear is that once we get all this evidence out there, the Project Hope is a perfect example of this. Everyone’s latching on to it as this silver bullet that’s going to reduce recidivism. And I think that’s really ill-advised. It gets back to this validated risk and needs assessment tool. You really need to know what population you’re dealing with. And each person has different needs and risks. And Project Hope may work for some but not others. I fear that once we get all this wonderful information out there, people are going to pick and choose, “I want to do this program because it has the biggest impact on recidivism,” rather than, “This is the population I’m trying to deal with. Now what program fits their issues and their needs?”

Len Sipes: So the lesson seems to be from the three of you as that, A, we are going to have that assessment, we just need to provide guidance in terms of how to use the evidence; and B, Tom you mentioned the partnerships, the parole and probation agencies aren’t there by themselves. They really have to coalesce with the people providing the mental health services, the people providing the job services. There really has to be that. I think they will begin to coalesce once the research is placed in one easy-to-read venue, correct? Look, the jobs people, they’re burdened. They’re under and enormous burden. And you go them, as we did at Maryland Public Safety, and they’re not overly-enthusiastic about taking on a new role.

Thomas Williams: I just want to kind of dovetail a little bit on what Nancy said, I think the hope or the future for those who are managing or directing criminal justice agencies is pretty good. I think we’re in a pretty good space right now. The research is coming out. I think there’s a lot of interest in Congress now about those offenders who are returning and what do we do to put them on a different plane so that they can then be successfully in the community. And I think from the standpoint of the Justice Department, the various agencies under the Justice Department, are actually giving guidance on this whole issue, I think is so fundamentally important.

So even though a probation director may want to do something, as Nancy indicated before and Debbie, you many not have to do it on a larger scale. But you can target your population on those persons who are the most riskiest to re-offend And then once you target on that most risky population, using the research and using the funds that will be coming from Congress. We will start to see dramatic effects. I would like to go back to the 70′s when we had a single theory in this country for managing offenders within the country.

Len Sipes: It seems to me now that with President Obama’s Administration there is strong support for re-entry. It seems to be with Assistant Attorney General Laurie Robinson over at the Department of Justice, she’s a strong proponent of the evidence-based process, and research, and reentry. The Second Chance Act that went through Congress, we now have hundreds of billions of dollars for states and jurisdictions throughout the country to implement re-entry based programs. Match all that up with the fact that the states can no longer afford to incarcerate. In fact, states are cutting back on their budget by, again, tens of millions of dollars in individual states.

They can no longer afford the level of incarceration. So we now seem to be at an appropriate time where evidence-based and re-entry practices now just come together at a very opportune time. But the individual practitioners are still saying, “Len, help me understand this research and where am I going to get the money?” So it’s still coming down to that. What we’re saying to them is that there’s hope in terms of the coalescing of the research; there’s hope hopefully in terms of the money. But you have to do partnerships, you have to take this research and get together with your fellow agencies and make it come alive. Is that it, Deb?

Debra Kafami: Exactly. The collaboration is key to implementing evidence-based practices successfully.

Len Sipes: Right. Parole and probation agencies are just not going to do it on their own. It has to be the governor of that particular state coming together, and saying, “You guys have got to get together and do this.”

Thomas Williams: As well as the community stepping up as well. When that person comes back to that community, he wants to feel apart of that community. And the family support that’s actually needed to support that person once they go through the various programmings is so fundamentally important.

Len Sipes: Okay. Tom, you had the final word. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for being with us on DC Public Safety as we explore this whole concept as to what works in corrections, evidence-based corrections. Watch for us next time as we explore another very important part of our criminal justice system. And please have yourself a very, very pleasant day.

[Video Ends]

Series Meta terms: Criminal, Justice, what, works, drug, treatment, educational, vocational, assistance, employment, interviews, policy, makers, staff, probation, parole, reentry

Filed Under: Criminal Justice, Drug Treatment, Education and Vocational Assistance, Employment, Interviews with Policy Makers, Interviews with Staff, Parole and Probation, Probation, Reentry, Video Podcast, What Works

Community Based Support for Offenders and Their Families

November 18, 2010 By Len 1 Comment

Welcome to DC Public Safety – radio and television shows on crime, criminal offenders and the criminal justice system.

See http://media.csosa.gov for our television shows, blog and transcripts.

This television program is available at http://media.csosa.gov/podcast/video/2010/07/community-based-support-for-offenders-and-their-families/

We welcome your comments or suggestions at leonard.sipes@csosa.gov or at Twitter at http://twitter.com/lensipes.

[Video Begins]

NARRATOR: In January 1997, former President Bill Clinton outlined their vision to revitalize Washington D.C. From this vision, CSOSA was created by the National Capital Revitalization and Self Government Improvement Act of 1997. The central mission of CSOSA is to increase public safety, prevent crime, reduce recidivism, and develop collaboration with the community to expand the capacity to assist offenders and their families.

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON: Hello, this is Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton. We are very fortunate in this city to have a fully funded federal agency, CSOSA, which supervises our residents on probation or returning to us from prison, and they do a lot more. That residential treatment center, built from federal appropriation from the Congress, is very important, because it not only takes people off of drugs, it keeps them from going back to prison. That leaves a lot more, a lot more than only community and faith based groups can do. There‚Äôs a lot you can do. There‚Äôs a lot that‚Äôs already being done by faith based groups, by community groups, and helping with job training, even with jobs, with housing, with mentoring, with reaching out to these D.C. residents. Won‚Äôt you help us?

NARRATOR: CSOSA provides probation and post-incarceration supervision for approximately 16,000 adult offenders in Washington, D.C, and provides comprehensive public safety oriented programming and treatment services combining strict accountability with meaningful opportunity. Each year, approximately 650,000 offenders return from federal and state correctional institutions throughout the country. Approximately 2,000 offenders return to the District of Columbia each year. Most need supervision, services, and support to remain drug and crime free. An individual‚Äôs passage through the criminal justice system from arrest to prosecution to sentencing through incarceration and release involves several agencies. Judge Satterfield recognizes the need for innovative collaboration of the entire community.

LEE SATTERFIELD: When it comes to the individuals that we see more often in our family court and in our criminal division, they typically are young people, they typically are male, and they typically have a host of number of issues that, if they could get resolved, could help them stay out of the system, and I‚Äôm talking about things such as education, many have dropped out of high school, have been truant since they were in middle school, so they lack the type of education that would help them maintain employment. I‚Äôm talking about employment. Employment is a necessary thing for anybody, and for anybody to become a productive citizen, employment is always something that is necessary. And then many of our people that come before us, whether in our adult court or in our family court may have issues involving substance abuse, that they need drug treatment for the drug addiction that they have. In addition to education, mental health, drug treatment, and those factors, we have things such as housing that‚Äôs also important as well, and so these are the kinds of things that I would ask the community to focus on in helping us help others who are coming back to our community having gone through the criminal justice system or the juvenile justice system. Your help is needed to help all of our citizens here in the District of Columbia.

NARRATOR: The results CSOSA seeks depend in part on cooperation from and effective collaboration with community based organizations. Partnerships with community based organizations result in increased employment, training, and support programming for such services as housing, food distribution, healthcare, and clothing distribution, to name a few.

ASHLEY MCSWAIN: Basically, Our Place was brought into existence to provide supports for women who were being released after a period of incarceration, and so Our Place provides baseline support, so when you are released from custody, you need clothing, identification, you need resources, access, and relationships. We have a clothing boutique where the women come in who don‚Äôt have a lot of options for clothing. We have a boutique that provides those things. If a woman is interviewing for a job, she can come in and get clothing for that interview. We also provide legal support. We have a full time lawyer on staff. We provide supports around employment, and we also provide HIV and AIDS awareness programs.

DAWN: Our Place offers women that are coming back into the community many different things. It gives you a lot of opportunities to get your life back together, but other things, there are other needs that women like me have.

PATRICIA: When I came here for the first time, they, I did my intake, they‚Äôre very warm and welcome, which is very helpful, because getting back to society, it‚Äôs kind of hard, so they make you feel like that you are welcome back.

NARRATOR: These resources create a bond between the offender and his or her community and a chance to interact with the community in a positive way.

BRENDA JONES: Our current program is called Moving On: A Life Changing Program. This program targets adults and parents living east of the river, and also ex-offenders and their families. We provide workshops, year round workshops, weekly workshops, parenting, and also on empowering oneself. We do that for the sole purpose, again, of helping persons who have made decisions in the past that might have gotten them in difficult situations now, helping them to make better decisions in the future.

DARYL SANDERS: So, a few of our services that we provide, particularly around this area, is our fatherhood initiative, where we are training and working with fathers to become better fathers. At first, you want to do that by working with them to become better men. So the collaborative has trained all of the men within our organization to work with this population, to strengthen them, become better fathers, of course will make them stronger and better men, so that‚Äôs one particular area. We also have housing programs for this population as well. We have an intake program, so all of our services are provided through our intake department, but again, more services are needed. The collaboratives cannot do this alone. The issues are so, so intricate, and again, people think that, oh yes, yeah, they‚Äôre home, and things are fine. No, there are many, many supports that are needed, there are many, many connections that need to happen that have been severed, and more support and more services are needed in this area for sure.

DERON TAYLOR: Our program is geared toward assisting men and women who have had challenges, either obtaining or maintaining employment due to a criminal history or substance abuse history. Our goal is to place these men and women with community agencies that are willing to help them in providing job service training or workshops for one year.

SHAKIRA GANTT: And our mission is to reduce the incidence of childhood abuse and neglect. One of the ways that we do that is through supporting parents. The Georgia Avenue Collaborative offers many community based activities and fun events that will allow you to find out about resources, to get referrals, for job information, or even to develop your resume or to continue your education. Although the collaborative has been around for 10 years providing these services to our reentering citizens, we have found increasingly that what we provide is really not enough for the need that is coming in. We‚Äôve got an increase of residents coming in asking for these services, and the challenge has been figuring out how to really service them all, because things are so spread thinly that there just isn‚Äôt enough to go around, and so we‚Äôre really reaching out and asking for other organizations and agencies and entities to step forward.

Thomas Waters: Marshall Heights Community Development has been in existence in excess of 30 years. It provides wraparound services. It‚Äôs like a one-stop center.

RICHARD MAHAFFEY: I‚Äôm a Ward 7 resident and also an ex-offender. I‚Äôve lived in Ward 7 most of my life. My aunt lives in Ward 7 also, and she had told me about a program going on. I was told about a program and a wiring class, and I was called and told that I would be able to get into it, and I was pretty happy about that, me and my family, because with just my wife working, things have been a little rough, and this program has helped us out gratefully.

NARRATOR: When members of our community make unfavorable decisions and are held accountable by the criminal justice system, it is CSOSA‚Äôs commitment with assistance from the community to help rebuild lives, heal individuals, and bring restoration to families and the community. The Advisory Neighborhood Commissions play a vital role in the strategy as well by communicating the need to extend resources. Gaining their support is integral to CSOSA‚Äôs long term success in achieving their goal of reducing recidivism and reintegrating the offender into the community.

BETTY PAIR: The success of that program and the success of the people involved depends on education, training, and housing, and if those things are provided, the program will be successful.

MARK DIXON: We welcome them back in the community. We need to do more things for them. If we could have more people to come together, more churches come together, more community organizations, it would help, it would help this tremendously. Then they won‚Äôt try to go back. So we can do more things, the community could come together more and help support these people, work with CSOSA, work with other organizations that are out here, then we could help these brothers or sisters.

MARY JACKSON: I‚Äôve worked with CSOSA for quite a while. Matter of fact, since its conception. Ward 7 open its arms to CSOSA and its returning citizens years ago.

SANDRA ‚ÄúSS‚Äù SEEGARS: Some of the impediments that face the ex-offenders when they come back into the community is housing, not necessarily a criminal record, but credit worthiness, whereas they mess up their credit when they go in normally, and even ex-offenders who are not, who are not sex offenders, they‚Äôre welcome back into the community, but it‚Äôs the credit.

WILLIAM SHELTON: Most of the challenges that I really see are individuals staying home. I think that we really have to face a reality of whether or not, not only in this city, but if this country has really embraced the fact that our young people are going, they are incarcerated, and they are returning home, and whether or not we‚Äôre going to put together resources to really address and deal with that.

NARRATOR: Working collaboratively with CSOSA, the community has an opportunity to establish itself as a mighty cornerstone in a foundation of supportive reentry services. We have certainly been encouraged by the results of the participating organizations and institutions, and we look forward to expanding their capacity to provide value added services and include additional quality organizations. Please consider joining CSOSA as we work to rebuild lives, reestablish values, restore social order, strengthen families, and change the communities in which we live and cherish.

CEDRIC HENDRICKS: One of the very important jobs that I have is to work with our colleagues to build and strengthen partnerships with community based and faith based organizations, organizations that can help our clients meet their important social needs. Among those needs are obtaining employment, expanding the level of education, strengthening ties with family members, and putting behind them crime and incarceration going forward as productive, contributing members of this community. So I‚Äôm here to invite all community based and faith based organizations to join us in a partnership, expand the range of resources and services that we have to offer, and help make this city a safer place in which to live.

[Video Ends]

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Filed Under: Corrections-Prisons, Courts, Criminal Justice, Drug Treatment, Education and Vocational Assistance, Employment, Faith-Based Initiatives, Interviews with Offenders, Interviews with Policy Makers, Interviews with Staff, Parole and Probation, Probation, Reentry, Video Podcast, Women Offenders

Hiring People on Community Supervision

May 21, 2010 By Len 1 Comment

Welcome to DC Public Safety – radio and television shows on crime, criminal offenders and the criminal justice system.

See http://media.csosa.gov for our television shows, blog and transcripts.

This television program is available at http://media.csosa.gov/podcast/video/2010/05/hiring-people-on-community-supervision/

We welcome your comments or suggestions at leonard.sipes@csosa.gov or at Twitter at http://twitter.com/lensipes.

- Video begins -

Len Sipes: Hi, everybody, and welcome to D.C. Public Safety. I’m your host, Leonard Sipes. We have a really interesting show today. The show is about hiring people under community supervision and what we are doing with this show and a lot of the things that we’re doing in terms of radio shows and our website and our phone number is we’re crowd sourcing this issue. You in the business community, we want you to come and tell us how we can do it better; the people who hire the people from the community. We want you to tell us what we can do to do a better job of making sure, out of the 16,000 people under supervision in the District of Columbia on any given day, that as many of these individuals as possible have jobs. The research is very clear that the more of these individuals that have jobs, the less the recidivism rate, the less crime we have, and the less taxpayers have to shell out of their own pockets. So, it’s a win-win situation for everybody. To discuss this issue today, we have two principles with us: Eric Shuler, senior program analyst from my agency, the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, and William Winchester, director of job training and green job development for housing evaluation plus. To Eric and William, welcome to D.C. Public Safety.

William Winchester: Thank you very much, Leonard.

Eric Shuler: Thank you.

Len Sipes: Gentlemen, this is a tough topic. A lot of people have stereotypes and some of the stereotypes are justifiable about the 16,000 offenders that we have, people under supervision, under our supervision on any given day at the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency. But, Eric, the bottom line is that we do have thousands, thousands ready to go to work today who are beyond social issues, who are beyond substance abuse issues. They want to work. They would make good employees. They’re ready to go today. Correct?

Eric Shuler: Absolutely. And we have a need for employment opportunities for those thousands who are ready to go.

Len Sipes: Okay.

Eric Shuler: Through our process of partnerships with the community and the employers, we’re looking for those opportunities.

Len Sipes: And getting people to come to us and tell us how to do it better is going to be sort of the theme of the radio shows that we’re going to put up, the television shows that we’re going to put up. And, ladies and gentlemen, what I do want you to know; Eric is giving out his personal telephone number in terms of his desk, 202-442-1112, 202-442-1112. That’s Eric’s telephone number, www.csosa.gov. Look for hiring people under supervision. Go to that section in our website, as we have this conversation over the course of the next six or seven months. So, how can we convince people that to get beyond this stereotype of our individuals and the people under our supervision are just all unemployable? Is that a stereotype or not?

Eric Shuler: It is a stereotype and it’s one that we’re going to have to face head on. We have thousands of people who are qualified, skilled, have been assessed, and screened. And we’re interested in delivering our best people and letting people understand and employers understand specifically that we can be a reservoir of talent for their business.

Len Sipes: In essence, we’re not asking for a handout. What we’re saying to employers is that give us an opportunity to put our best people in your hands. We’re going to help you along the way. You can come back to us if there are issues. We’re going to be partners with you in finding that individual and while that individual is on the job. Correct?

Eric Shuler: Right. We have a system of assessment, counseling, matching, skills enhancement, and placement assistance that lets us be able to partner with employers and, when I say partner, I mean we work with them. It’s like a network; the Verizon network, for example. We have a network of people behind these individuals to manage, to work with, to teach them, to carry them along the path of being independent and successful within the employment arena and within their lives.

Len Sipes: Again, with the phone number, 202-442-1112, www.csosa.gov. William, you’re the person who basically does some hiring, does some training. What lessons from your part of the world, what instructions do you have to us in government in terms of making sure that as many individuals under our supervision are hired as possible?

William Winchester: Send us your best. Send us those individuals who you have screened that understand that we understand that they’ve had problems, that they’ve had issues. That’s not our issue. Come ready to work. Come diligent. Be truthful. Be forthright and we can go from there because we will train them. They don’t necessarily have to be totally qualified. Just come with the understanding of being able to be on time, show up every day, do some due diligence, and be there and be ready to go to work.

Len Sipes: I think most employers are going to tell us this: Exactly what you just said, William. I think most employers are going to say, you guarantee me that he or she will show up on time, sober. Give me my eight hours; don’t be distracted throughout the course of the day by phone calls or any other issues. Do what it is that I need you to do and I will employ you and I will train and I will set you up with a career, but you’ve got to bring, not necessarily construction skills, not necessarily truck driving skills, not necessarily specific job skills, you’ve got to bring the right attitude.

William Winchester: Correct. And attitude is most important. If you come willing to work and willing to learn and willing to accept whatever the circumstances are that has happened to you, we’re not judging you for those things. What we want is if we’re going to pay you for you to be able to help us to go to the next level.

Len Sipes: Eric, and that’s one of the things we were talking about before the show. I mean, we do have literally thousands. And isn’t that the dilemma? We have a public perception of offenders and I understand that public perception and I’m not going to disagree with that public perception. But, at the same time, the sort of tragedy, social tragedy, is that we have thousands who don’t fit that stereotype, who are ready to go today. William and I were talking about that attitude. They have that attitude. They’re ready and willing to go to work now.

Eric Shuler: Correct. And what we want to assure the public and the employers is that we have a system of qualifying, a system of, if you will, polishing the apple.

Len Sipes: Tell me about it. What do we do?

Eric Shuler: Well, we have a system that allows us to do an in depth assessment of their literacy skills. We have occupational assessments that we do, nationally recognized. And it gives them a certificate of employability. We also do the workshops that work on core skills, which most people call life skills, but they’re the core of the person, those things that are innate, that need to be present for you to be successful. And those are the things that William was alluding to that employers are looking for. Of course, employers will tell you, if you deliver me a person who’s willing, who is receptive, we’re willing to train them. And we have thousands who are far removed from their past, regressions, their crimes, who have paid their debt to society, they have worked very hard to acquire necessary marketable skills and we just need the opportunities to bring that about, that opportunity about. And I can say this: There are many benefits also to hiring from these individuals.

Len Sipes: Oh, thank you very much. And we’re going to have information about this on our website, right? Tax credits and bonding.

Eric Shuler: Correct. Tax credits and bonding. And in a short term, if people don’t understand what bonding does. It is provided for any person whose background usually leads employers to question whether or not they’re good employees.

Len Sipes: It limits their liability.

Eric Shuler: It limits their liability and at no cost to the employer or the employee.

Len Sipes: Right.

Eric Shuler: And the tax credits is something that is very valuable to an employer because it allows them to get an individual who’s going to come to help grow their business, help do the tasks that need to be done for them to be successful. And also it gives them a monetary incentive for hiring from our population of people.

Len Sipes: 202-442-1112 is the telephone number of that gentleman, Eric Shuler, of my agency, willing to give out his own telephone number. There will be others who will pick up if Eric’s not there. www.csosa.gov; look for hiring people under supervision. William, we’re going to be reaching out to business people and we want them to be honest with us. We’re not asking for anybody to pull any punches. We want them to say, Leonard, we’re going to hire your people because; we’re not going to hire because. We want an honest assessment from the business community. We want the business community to tell us how we can do it better. Are we opening ourselves up for, what are we opening ourselves up for?

William Winchester: Well, I don’t think you’re opening yourselves up for anything major, but what we would like is that, and we know that people slip; we know that things happen; we know that emergencies happen, so stick with us. Follow the person as well as we’re following them. If there is a problem, you stay in touch with them or you come back, even if they have to be replaced. Give us a person and make sure that that next person is as diligent as that first person versus us having to track them down and chase them down. If you do your due diligence, just to go down that road a little further, it makes us as employers a little more comfortable in picking up and bringing in somebody.

Len Sipes: But I do want to get over this point that we discussed before the show. It’s just not the people that we have under community supervision who we’re concerned about. Either one of you can jump in on this. I mean, look, my own kids drive me crazy in terms of their ability to say, yes sir and no sir, yes ma’am and no ma’am. Show up on time. I’m telling my kids. I said they don’t want to hear from you anything else besides you’re going to give them a productive eight hours. So, it’s just not the people under our supervision. Isn’t this a societal issue?

Eric Shuler: Absolutely, it is a societal issue and it’s something that is across the board. We just happen to have individuals who fall into some of that category, but I guarantee as a microcosm of society you could probably hire 20 people and out of that 20 people you’ll have some of those same issues. What our charge is at CSOSA is having a program, a process, a system of making sure and shoring up these individuals as they try to reintegrate into society and to seek gainful employment.

Len Sipes: But we do tell them the same thing I told my daughters, correct? Show up, and this is what I heard from an employer at a job fair one day, show up, shut up, do what I want you to do for eight hours. If you do that, we can train you, we can work with you, we can help you build a productive career, but you’ve got to show up and you’ve got to understand that for the next eight hours or more if I need you to, you’re mine.

Eric Shuler: That’s it.

Len Sipes: I mean, that’s what we tell our people, correct?

Eric Shuler: Absolutely, absolutely. It’s a simulation. It is integration. It is the understanding that the job is a part of you learning how to adjust to things. The job is a means to an end. A job is something that you go to. There’s a uniform that you wear, which is the office decor. There is a culture in any organization that you need to ascribe to and this is the important thing that I think William was eluding to that we all need to work very hard to make sure that those doors open, those opportunities are there for them to go in and purport themselves and to showcase their skills and abilities and their willingness to be a part of an organization.

Len Sipes: Now, William, I talk to people under our supervision and I’ve done so for years when I was with other agencies and they will tell me from time to time that I got turned down because of my criminal history. And sometimes I feel that that’s a tragedy because they are far from their criminal activities and a lot of them, their criminal activities were pretty minor. I mean, we do have probationers, people who haven’t been to prison, and I sometimes wonder if they want in with exactly the issues that we’re talking about; yes sir, no sir, yes ma’am, no ma’am, a nicely formatted resume, fully understanding that that person brings you those skills, not how to run a printing press, not how to drive a truck not how to lay concrete, those basic human skills. My guess is that the employer will probably hire that person, but that person’s presentation skills are extraordinarily important.

William Winchester: And that’s first and foremost and the other thing is that they have to understand that throughout their life every single day from 8:00 in the morning to midnight or however long people are looking at them and they will always be looking at them and sometimes, we had a situation where a young man was in the bank and he was hired because he was in the bank, he was acting very good, he wasn’t showing off, he wasn’t clowning, the person saw him, he heard in his conversation that he was looking for a job, the man was right behind him, he had a record; however, because he was showing some diligence, he was showing restraint, he was just out in public, he was hired because he was acting right, because he understood, because he was coming through our program that every single day somebody’s looking at you.

Len Sipes: Is the principal issue, attitude is the principal issue, job skills?

William Winchester: That’s the biggest; it’s attitude. It’s coming to work and understanding that basically you’re on somebody else’s time and you’re responsible for your actions from the time that you get there and even after that. We found out now even with the social networks and Facebook and things that people are looking on these social networks to see how people are responding and how people are reacting because there’s so many jobs and there’s so many opportunities that everybody’s looking at everybody all the time.

Len Sipes: And that becomes worrisome, too, because that presentation skill that you provide to that employer is the same presentation skill that you have to have on your Facebook page.

William Winchester: Correct.

Len Sipes: I mean, you’ve got to be the whole person. That employer is going to be checking into your background.

William Winchester: All the time.

Len Sipes: And so people just need to understand that. Eric, do our folks understand that?

Eric Shuler: They do understand that and it’s demonstrated daily. We have a unit called, the VOTE Unit. It stands for Vocational Opportunities Training and Employment. It is our way of polishing that apple. It is our way of getting them to understand, to modify behavior. And that just what you said, it’s not, I heard William say acting, but what you said was being, and that’s very important because you need to be the kind of person, we all need to be the kind of person that does the right thing when no one’s watching

Len Sipes: Right. Bring your A game everyday.

Eric Shuler: Absolutely, absolutely. And that’s what the multitude of folks that we have, who have gone through the behavioral modification, who have corrected their attitudes towards work, towards society, and they’re just looking for that opportunity and we have thousands. And they’re being subjected to a broad brush painting of lumping all folks together.

Len Sipes: I met a man who was in his early 40s and he’d been, like, 10 years away from his crime. The crime was a non-violent crime. The guy had real presentation skills, so the guy had real occupational skills and he was telling me that he was being bounced, and this is a very tough economy to be out there looking for work, but he was being bounced time after time because of the fact that he had a criminal record. And I said to myself, now this is a shame. I mean, there really is an issue. I’m not going to dispute society’s stereotypes. I understand why they’re there and I’m not going to necessarily disagree with them, but I do understand at the same time him as a human being. He would have made a good employer.

Eric Shuler: Sure.

Len Sipes: Or good employee, I’m sorry.

Eric Shuler: A criminal past or a criminal record is something that you can’t get away from, but you can overcome.

Len Sipes: All right. We’re going to have to leave it there. We’re going to the next segment and we’ll continue this discussion. Ladies and gentlemen, 202-442-1112, 202-442-1112, www.csosa.gov; look for the “hire us” or “hire people under community supervision.” That part of the website we need your opinion. Stay with us. We’ll be right back as we explore this issue some more. Be right back with you.

[Music Playing]

Len Sipes: Hi, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to D.C. Public Safety. I continue to be your host, Leonard Sipes. And we continue to crowd source a very important issue; that is, hiring people under community supervision. We are looking for you, employer, you the person who hires people, you the person from the business sector, from the non-profit sector, from the government sector. We want you to come and tell us either by phone or via the website or through the radio shows that we’re going to be doing, the television shows that we’re going to be doing about this issue. We want you to tell us what it is that we need to do to do a better job of trying to hire as many people as possible, the people who are under our supervision on a day-to-day basis in the District of Columbia, 16,000, the research is clear. If they are hired, the more they work the fewer crimes they commit, the greater their chance for becoming taxpayers instead of tax burdens, the greater propensity of taking care of their kids; 70 percent are fathers and mothers. So, we all have a big stake in terms of what it is we’re doing here. 202-442-1112 is this gentlemen’s personal telephone number at his desk; www.csosa.gov, Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency, look for “hire people under community supervision.” Back with us, Eric Shuler, the senior program analyst for the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency and also Alec Vincent, Manpower Development Specialist for the D.C. Department of Employment Services. Eric, Alec, welcome to D.C. Public Safety.

Eric Shuler: Thank you, Leonard.

Alec Vincent: Thank you.

Len Sipes: All right. We’re going to talk to you, Eric, first and then we’re going to go over to Alec because one of the things that I love about Alec’s background is that he’s currently under supervision with our agency and yet he’s been able to cross that bridge and not only find meaningful employment, he’s working with our folks on a day-to-day basis. The District of Columbia is providing the bulk of these employment services, correct, Eric?

Eric Shuler: Correct. Absolutely. And let me say this, Alec is an example of operating under the framework that most likely will render us able to successfully matriculate ex-offenders into entry level positions as well as the high demand growth opportunities.

Len Sipes: While you mentioned that, entry level high demand. I hear people saying we want living wage, we want living wage. Don’t we want to start off at least with basic work skills and maybe that’s not going to be living wage for the moment but, hopefully, it’ll progress into something that is living wage?

Eric Shuler: Well, absolutely, absolutely. And one of the things we understand at CSOSA and we impart that onto the participants at CSOSA and the people under supervision is that this is a marathon; it’s not a sprint. And it’s key to understanding that. You don’t throw away pennies for dollars and we work very hard to get them to understand the work ethic that allows them to understand that and operate under that guise.

Len Sipes: Okay. But it’s interesting, I know people, before I even came to CSOSA from my job in the state of Maryland who are ex-offenders, who make a lot of money, who are doing very well at their occupations and, in one case and he’ll never do a radio show or television show with me; although, I’ve invited him on many times, sells insurance. And he’s making more money than you and I put together.

Eric Shuler: Yes. Well, it’s funny, Leonard, because in daily life you would be surprised how many people in the walks of life that you pass by, that you interact with on a daily basis who are ex-offenders.

Len Sipes: It’s my contention that every 10 people, every 15 people within any urban metropolitan area, you’re going to encounter a person who’s been in the criminal justice system.

Eric Shuler: Absolutely, absolutely. And at CSOSA one of the things we’re keen on is behavior modification and polishing that apple, meaning directing them into skills, enhancement programs, being the ambassadors to employers, to ask for those opportunities. Let’s get this clear: We’re not asking for a handout. We’re asking for opportunity.

Len Sipes: And we’ve said that. We’ve said that we’re not asking for a handout. We have thousands of individuals ready to go right now whose apples have been polished.

Eric Shuler: Absolutely, absolutely.

Len Sipes: And who are having a struggle in terms of finding employment. That’s why we’re crowd sourcing this entire issue, 202, this gentlemen’s telephone number, 202-442-1112, www.csosa.gov; look for “hiring people under community supervision.” Alec, tell me a little bit about your story here. Currently under our supervision?

Alec Vincent: Yes, I’m currently under supervision at CSOSA and, well, basically, I cam out of prison in about ’04 and, when I came home from prison, of course, before I came home, I already understood that I was going to have to come back into society, implement myself into society successfully, so a part of that preparation for that was to go for higher education. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to complete my degree while I was in, but I started that while I was in to prepare myself.

Len Sipes: And D.C. offenders, to make it clear to the public, they go to the federal prisons, so you came out of the one of the federal prisons.

Alec Vincent: Yes. Came out of one of the federal prisons, actually in Louisiana.

Len Sipes: Okay.

Alec Vincent: So, came back to D.C. and immediately started looking for employment and, of course, I was faced with some of the obstacles that most offenders, or all offenders, are faced with. A lot of the places you go and knock on the door, fill out resumes, fill out applications, I’m sorry, get your resume together. Unfortunately, after being gone for so long, there’s very little that you can have on your resume. That’s one of the barriers that you face.

Len Sipes: How do you handle that question? Well, Mr. Johnson, where you been for the last five years? Prison? How do you do that?

Alec Vincent: Well, actually some cases, I mean, my thing is to be very honest and I’ve been on several interviews and actually was very honest and that a lot of times be the reason why you’re not getting hired and I’ve sat and I’ve seen others that come from that same situation lie about that, based on the fact that after going and knocking on so many doors. I mean, you go and you go to 15 different establishments, whether it be private sector, non-profit, or government, and all of those places you go and some of those places even you have the qualifications to get the job.

Len Sipes: Well, that’s part of the issue here and that’s one of the things I really struggle with because I know thousands of you. I know thousands of Alec’s. They’re in a suit, they’re yes, sir, no sir. They are willing to work. They want to work. There’s no reason why they can’t make wonderful employees. That’s our point; that there’s thousands of you, people just like you right now who are ready to go to work and be good employees. We’re not asking for handouts; we’re asking for tell us what we can do to get folks like you hired because there is a stereotype and that stereotype does cause some people not to be hired. Right or wrong?

Alec Vincent: You’re definitely right. And sometimes, and me personally, understandably those stereotypes because we have had some to come and be afforded opportunities and not take advantage of it and not excel. But you have so many more that’s ready to go or ready to go into those opportunities and take full advantage of it and because of what a few have done, we all kind of suffer.

Len Sipes: Well, that’s again what we were talking about before the show, the production of the show. Eric and I were saying that we remind the people under our supervision that they’re just not dealing with themselves. You’re representing everybody caught up in the criminal justice system and you don’t want to give that employer the reason to say, all right; that’s it. I’m not hiring anybody else under community supervision again.

Alec Vincent: Exactly. And one of the things I did want to speak to. I heard Eric say earlier about polishing the apple. That’s one of the things that’s real paramount, I think, when we talk about dealing with ex-offenders that’s coming back to society, going into the workforce, polishing that apple because some do be a little rough around the edges and don’t have certain skills or they lack certain skills and we’re not talking about hard skills, soft skills. Those things, some just have a problem with getting up in the morning. Those are the things that you have persons that work at CSOSA that’s able to help with those and we have programs, other programs that’s out there to help those individuals. I think that’s one of the things, probably one of the most important things that need to be said to those employers about those persons that’s coming back to society, that they have that support system.

Len Sipes: I’ll ask you the same question I asked William on the first segment. Is it the job skills or is it the whole human being that you bring to that job interview? If our people want in and gave that message, are they going to get hired? That becomes the bottom line, doesn’t it?

Alec Vincent: I think so; I think so. I think it’s a combination of both, but I think, like you said, those other things, those soft skills, of having people that want to come to work, that’s going to come to work and be on time, give you 110 percent at work, and work eight hours, even more if so, if need be.

Len Sipes: All right. Work 10 hours, work 12 hours; you do what is necessary

Alec Vincent: Exactly. And

Len Sipes: Go ahead.

Alec Vincent: Oh, excuse me.

Len Sipes: No, no, no. Go ahead.

Alec Vincent: In the field that I work in, I work for D.C. government, I work with the ex-offender population as well and helping them find employment and I work with other supervisors and part of my job is to meet with supervisors and CEOs and employers daily. And one of the things I find that’s said to me so often is that when we have someone go to that work site and they hire that person and they want another person to come, one of the main things they say is send me somebody that wants to work.

Len Sipes: Got it. And you’ve got the final word. Ladies and gentlemen, again, 202-442-1112, 202-442-1112; that gentlemen’s telephone number on that desk. Brave enough to take on the entire metropolitan area in terms of tell us what we can do to be sure that our folks are ready for your employment. Give us whatever advice is necessary; www.csosa.gov, look for “hiring people under supervision” part of the website. Please have yourselves a very, very pleasant day.

Eric Shuler: Thank you, man.

- Video ends -

Series Meta terms: Employment, Offenders, Parole, Probation, vocational, training, career, guidance, counseling.

Filed Under: Criminal Justice, Education and Vocational Assistance, Employment, Interviews with Offenders, Interviews with Staff, Parole and Probation, Probation, Reentry, Video Podcast

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