Most civilly detained sex offenders would not reoffend, study finds

7-21-2013 National:

Other new research finds further flaws with actuarial methods in forensic practice

At least three out of every four men being indefinitely detained as Sexually Violent Predators in Minnesota would never commit another sex crime if they were released.

That’s the conclusion of a new study by the chief researcher for the Department of Corrections in Minnesota, the state with the highest per capita rate of preventive detention in the United States.

--Study examined 105 sex offenders civilly committed between 2004 and 2006.

--MnSOST-3 used to estimate effects of civil commitment on sex offense recidivism.

--Estimated four-year sexual recidivism rate was 9 percent for civil commits.

--Civil commitment reduced four-year sexual recidivism rate by 12 percent.

--Estimated lifetime sexual recidivism rate was 28 percent.

Using special statistical procedures and a new actuarial instrument called the MnSOST-3 that is better calibrated to current recidivism rates, Grant Duwe estimated that the recidivism rate for civilly committed sex offenders -- if released -- would be between about 5 and 16 percent over four years, and about 18 percent over their lifetimes. Only two of the 600 men detained since Minnesota's law was enacted have been released, making hollow the law's promise of rehabilitation after treatment.

Duwe -- a criminologist and author of a book on the history of mass murder in the United States -- downplays the troubling Constitutional implications of this finding, focusing instead on the SVP law’s exorbitant costs and weak public safety benefits. He notes that "Three Strikes" laws, enacted in some U.S. states during the same time period as SVP laws based on a similar theory of selective incapacitation of the worst of the worst, have also not had a significant impact on crime rates.

The problem for the field of forensic psychology is that forensic risk assessment procedures have astronomical rates of false positives, or over-predictions of danger, and it is difficult to determine which small proportion of those predicted to reoffend would actually do so.

Minnesota has taken the lead in civilly detaining men with sex crime convictions, despite the state's only middling crime rates. Unlike in most U.S. states with SVP laws, sex offenders referred for possible detention are not entitled to a jury trial and, once detained, do not have a right to periodic reviews. Detention also varies greatly by county, so geographic locale can make the difference between a lifetime behind bars and a chance to move on with life after prison.

Ironically, as noted by other researchers, by the time an offender has done enough bad deeds to be flagged for civil commitment, his offending trajectory is often on the decline. Like other criminals, sex offenders tend to age out of criminality by their 40s, making endless incarceration both pointless and wasteful.

The study, To what extent does civil commitment reduce sexual recidivism? Estimating the selective incapacitation effects in Minnesota, is forthcoming from the Journal of Criminal Justice. ..Source.. by Karen Franklin, In the News