Roxanne Lieb - July 2003

Washington State's law for sexually violent predators was enacted in 1990; since then, 14 other states have passed similar laws authorizing civil commitment for dangerous sexual offenders following their prison terms. Although the law has survived constitutional challenges at both the state and in the U.S. Supreme Court, a related set of court actions has addressed whether the treatment program is adequate. In 1994, the federal district court placed Washington's program under injunction and appointed a special master to ensure that the state improve deficiencies in the program. As of 2003, the federal court continues to oversee the state's program, with a threat of fines totaling several million dollars if the injunction terms are not met. Over an eight-year period, the special master delivered 19 reports to the court, documenting the program's deficiencies as well as its successes in meeting the court's orders. This article reviews these reports and court orders, detailing the court's requirements for an adequate treatment program.

Polly Phipps, Gregg Gagliardi - May 2003

In 1999, the Washington State Legislature enacted Substitute Senate Bill 5011, which mandates improving the process of identifying and providing additional mental health treatment for mentally ill offenders being released from the Department of Corrections (DOC) who pose a threat to public safety. This interim report describes the ongoing process of identifying and selecting “dangerous mentally ill offenders” (DMIOs); provides a profile of DMIOs; and documents the type of pre- and post-release services, treatment, and supervision received by DMIOs. Finally, it focuses on program improvements that have been accomplished and summarizes continuing program challenges.

Robert Barnoski, Steve Aos - March 2003

The 2002 Washington State Legislature directed the Washington State Institute for Public Policy to “report on the cost-effectiveness of existing drug courts in Washington and their impacts on reducing recidivism.” Developed during the 1990s, drug courts use frequent courtroom activity and drug treatment resources in an attempt to modify the criminal behavior of certain drug-involved defendants. The questions for this evaluation are whether drug courts—when compared with regular criminal courts—reduce recidivism and produce more benefits than costs. We found that five of the six adult drug courts we evaluated appear to be cost-beneficial additions to Washington’s criminal justice system. The Institute’s report is contained in two documents: a 12-page report and a technical appendix. A separate executive summary is also provided.

Roxanne Lieb - January 2003

This chapter describes the approach used in the United Kingdom to assess and monitor released sex offenders in the community. The chapter was originally published in Sex Offenders in the Community: Managing and reducing the risks. (2003) Amanda Matravers, Ed. Cullompton, English: Willan, pp. 207-232.

Steve Aos - January 2003

In 1999, the Washington Legislature passed, and Governor Locke signed into law, the Offender Accountability Act (OAA). The Act primarily affects how the Department of Corrections (DOC) provides community supervision to adults convicted of felony crimes. The OAA directs DOC to classify all felony offenders according to the risk they pose to re-offending in the future and the amount of harm they have caused society in the past. The OAA then directs DOC to allocate more of its community-based resources to the higher-risk offenders. The primary goal is to reduce the subsequent criminal behavior of these offenders when they are back in the community. In this report, we present the first information on how well DOC’s risk assessment tool—the Level of Service Inventory-Revised (LSI-R)—predicts actual recidivism. We also describe some of the technical statistical steps we are taking to ensure that the OAA’s outcomes can be reliably evaluated.

Steve Aos - January 2003

This report reviews basic information on Washington’s criminal justice system and the level of crime in the state. The purpose is to provide policymakers with a “big picture” summary of long-term trends and relationships.

Polly Phipps, Gregg Gagliardi - March 2002

In 1999, the Washington State Legislature enacted Substitute Senate Bill 5011 to improve the process of identifying and providing additional mental health treatment for mentally ill offenders being released from the Department of Corrections who pose a threat to public safety. This report focuses on the implementation of the Act and includes an assessment of how the process of defining, identifying, and selecting "dangerous mentally ill offenders" (DMIOs) has been carried out. The report also describes the treatment and services provided to an early group of released DMIOs.

Steve Aos - January 2002

In 1999, the Legislature passed the Offender Accountability Act (OAA). Fundamentally, the OAA concerns economics; that is, it affects how the Washington Department of Corrections (DOC) spends its budget. It directs DOC to focus more resources on higher-risk offenders and - because state agency budgets must balance - to spend fewer dollars on lower-risk offenders. The Institute was directed by the Legislature to “conduct a study of the effect of the use of community custody…on recidivism and other outcomes.” In this report, we evaluate the implementation of one cornerstone of the OAA: the formal process DOC is using to assess the risk levels of offenders - DOC’s “Risk Management Identification” (RMI) system. This report tests the degree to which the RMI system measures what the Legislature intended. We analyzed the first substantial group of offenders classified by DOC. We found that DOC’s RMI system does a reasonable job of classifying offenders pursuant to the policy directives of the OAA.

Steve Aos, Polly Phipps, Robert Barnoski, Roxanne Lieb - May 2001

This report describes the Institute's latest analysis of the costs and benefits of crime prevention and intervention programs. It contains a summary of the findings as well as a detailed technical discussion of the model used to estimate costs and benefits.

David Boerner, Roxanne Lieb - January 2001

Lessons from Washington State's sentencing reform in the early 1980s are summarized in this 2001 article.