T.H.E. | Relevant Research

What about probation, parole and treatment? Does that stop the offender's pattern of abuse?

In January 1999, Dr. James Tanner analyzed the polygraph records of 128 randomly selected sex offenders -- 41% admitted to committing new sex offenses while in treatment.

In 1997, Prentkey studied 136 rapists and 115 child molesters who were discharged from the Massachusetts Treatment Center in Bridgewater between 1959 and 1985. After 25 years, analysis revealed 52% had new sexual offense charges.

What about the simple solutions?

Simple solutions either do not work or are not allowed by society.

There are at least three kinds of "simple" solutions and even they are not so simple when one tries to put them into practice.

Change the perp - Chemical or surgical castration. Chemical is not reliable but can be helpful; surgical is cruel and inhumane and also unreliable.

Locate the perp - Electronic monitoring and global position satellite systems (GPS). Electronic monitoring provides incomplete control but is still helpful in some situations. Sex offenders most often abuse people they know, and electronic monitoring does not protect against this.

Warn everyone - Community notification. People cannot be expected to know what to do with the information, and community notification often leads to vigilantism. There are so many sex offenders (3000+ in the Denver Metro Area) community members will be overwhelmed.

As long as we are going to try to control sex offenders while they are participating in the community (and not in prison), it is only logical to think that these offenders can figure a way around mechanical controls. Unfortunately, the task of controlling sex offenders remains extremely complex; to think otherwise is wishful thinking.

So why have sex offenders in the community at all?

At a minimum, there is no reason to allow people who prey on us to be in our community unless they can work and earn their keep. We want them to pay for as much of their containment and control as we can facilitate. Prison does not allow for this.

If we are ever going to learn something new about managing a dangerous population it will have to be in a setting where they can participate in the community in tightly controlled ways. The setting has to be one where we can move the offender back and forth from none to some community participation. Prison does not allow for this.

Teaching Humane Existence wants to create a situation in which sex offenders succeed their way out of containment (versus the current situation where they are failing their way into greater containment).

At court sentencing, approximately 30% of sex offenders go to prison and 70% go back on the streets on probation. Almost no sex offenders are placed in a residential community-based setting.

CATCH-AND-RELEASE
Stop Treating Sex Offenders Like Trout.

We Are Currently Placing Most Sex Offenders
Where They Will Offend Again (On Probation).

Why do we keep doing what does not work? Why does the "system" keep failing us?

Summary: There are many reasons why the professionals involved in sex offender management are failing to control sex offenders. Most of the reasons stem from the natural inclination to believe that we are effective at our jobs. Also sex offenders are good at "helping" us believe we are effective. Heck, they have been duping people for years.

The criminal justice and mental health systems do not protect us. They do not do so for several reasons:

Professionals need to feel effective. Professionals (judges, probation officers, and therapists) believe that what they are doing is adding value and "must" be helping produce meaningful change in sex offenders.

Professionals feel responsible for providing hope. It feels inhumane to most people (including professionals) to tell another person (even a sex offender) that there is no hope that he can return to a normal life. Thus, what typically happens is the professional, in an effort to gain the sex offender's cooperation in the process of change, tries to give the offender "hope" that he can regain control of his lifestyle. But to a sex offender, "normal life" is a concept he will eventually pervert.

Desire for closure. Our system bases success upon seeing completion. This means that the desire for case closings leads to "seeing" changes that are not real or lasting.

Denial of the problem. Because the problem of sex abuse is so ugly, and there is no cure, professionals like everyone else tend to use various forms of denial and minimization to cope with the knotty dilemma of what to do with sex offenders.

The problem seems too big and requires dramatic shifts. The legislature, governmental agencies and professionals are oriented to work within very tightly constricted budgets and are expected to respect the professional turf of each other. It is very hard for these professionals to think sufficiently outside the box.

No resources. There is no community-based residential setting where sex offenders in our community can live for life.

CONTINUUM OF CONTAINMENT, CONTROL, & SAFETY
Change Point-of Entry into the Community at Time of Sentencing

The message of the previous graph: Currently we are engaged in the policy of "minimal intervention" and are using an inadequate level (too low) of control and containment for the sex offenders in the community. Research has demonstrated that these sex offenders are reoffending. We should be using a high level of control and containment where we can establish safety.

The SOLUTION to managing sex offenders in the commmunity:
Sex Offender Containment and Research Facility (S.O.C.R.)

S.O.C.R. is:
1) A proposed facility for housing sex offenders who are already given community placement.
2) 24 hr/day staffed residential campus for employable sex offenders.
3) The sex offender will live at the facility until the end of his sentence or for life.
4) More restrictive than probation
5) Less costly, more flexible, and less restrictive than prison.
6) Sex offenders pay their own way.
7) Houses 300 sex offenders.
8) State-of-the-art management and treatment.

S.O.C.R. is for sex offenders who are:
1) HANDS-ON (touching or raping victims), and
2) REPETITIVE (offended more than once).
3) Basically, the MOST DANGEROUS sex offenders, who, unfortunately, make up the MAJORITY of sex offenders.

This new facility will require new kinds of links to the criminal justice and mental health systems. This facility will have enough separateness to be immune from political pressures, but have enough oversight to ensure wholesomeness.

S.O.C.R. will create a new therapeutic community way of managing sex offenders. It will be oriented to control sex offenders for their entire lives.

Every aspect of the proposed Sex Offender Containment and Research Facility is about controlling a public health threat. It is not coddling. It is for life. Yet, it is the most humane solution.

Why me? Why is this a concern for the business community or the average citizen?

For government to direct dollars to the housing and control of sex offenders in the community (S.O.C.R.), that change has to be signaled by the citizens in the community. Controlling sex offenders is a stewardship issue. The community has an equal responsibility to take on the ugly problems as well as the more socially acceptable ones.

All of our governmental systems, including criminal justice and mental health, are driven by public demand. It was M.A.D.D., a private citizen group, that forced the "sobriety while driving" standard. Drunk drivers are most naturally the purview of criminal justice but it took mothers to change the law.

We need your help.

For more information, please contact:

Teaching Humane Existence (T.H.E.)
7995 East Hampden Avenue, Suite 208
Denver, Colorado 80231
phone 303.504.6188
fax 303.504.6219