The Most Reviled of Crimes, There Is Much We Still Don’T Understand
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Features CRIME CRIME A MONTH AFTER SUCCESSFULLY Are paedophiles’ brains different? What role does ARGUING TO HAVE HIS ELECTRONIC the internet play in creating non-contact (child MONITORING BRACELET REMOVED, exploitation material) offenders? Is it possible to CONVICTED SEX OFFENDER GRAHAM treat sex offenders in denial? These are among KAY WAS BACK IN STRIFE. The claim that the questions that will be debated when 300-odd he had grabbed and kissed a teenage girl in a delegates converge on the Lithuanian capital of supermarket was relatively tame for a man who Vilnius for the upcoming biennial conference of had served 18 years in jail for raping six women at the International Association for the Treatment knifepoint in the 1990s. He’d also been discovered of Sexual Offenders (IATSO). The program will with a prostitute in his home, in breach of some explore the latest research and practice, and forge of the 42 conditions on his extended supervision new policy directions, organisers say. order. He found himself back behind bars. After time in Amber Laurel Correctional Rehabilitation nation Centre in Emu Plains, Kay will be re-released Few sex offenders voluntarily seek treatment. For this month. A media firestorm will surely most, the first time they find themselves sitting follow; the one thing guaranteed to stoke opposite a therapist is after the steel doors have greater public outrage than sexual offending is slammed shut behind them. Some question sexual reoffending. Recall the outcry following the efficacy of mandated treatment, but Seidler The most revelations that convicted murderer Steven says it doesn’t matter what gets them there. Hunter’s parole had expired nine days before he “It’s common for even reluctant participants killed another woman in 2011, or that Adrian to develop intrinsic motivation through the Bayley was on parole for sex crimes when he challenging nature of the group process, and the reviled raped and murdered Jill Meagher in 2012. demands it places upon them,” she says. High-profile predators evoke understandable Standard treatment provided in prisons public fear, but this takes us no closer to involves group programs based on cognitive of crimes understanding or managing the broader problem behavioural therapy (CBT) and relapse of sex offending. James Cook University prevention principles. Participants learn to Sex offenders are arguably the Psychology Professor Andrew Day has conducted identify and challenge cognitive distortions most loathed members of society, extensive research into perceptions about sex (thinking errors), and recognise and plan around offenders, and concludes that there’s a huge gap high-risk situations. The development of victim but much of what we think we between what we think we know and what the empathy, relationship and intimacy skills, and know about them is wrong, research tells us. Day points to a 2008 study the capacity to emotionally self-regulate, also writes DENISE CULLEN published in Psychology, Public Policy and Law, form core components of such programs. which showed that more than 95 per cent In NSW, the Custody Based Intensive of people arrested for sexual offences had no Treatment (CUBIT) program for high risk sex previous such convictions. The majority of child offenders involves up to four sessions per week sex abuse victims are targeted by family members of group therapy for nine to 12 months. CUBIT or acquaintances, not strangers. Less than 1 per targets issues such as sexual behaviour, drug- and cent of murder cases involve rape or sexual assault. alcohol-related offending, anti-social attitudes, Dr Katie Seidler, a clinical and forensic and coping skills, according to a Corrective psychologist, challenges the myths that sex Services NSW spokeswoman. Most offenders offenders are untreatable, and that the most who commence treatment see it through to the effective response is to “lock ‘em up and throw end, with completion rates well over 90 per cent away the key”. “If you did absolutely nothing each year. with sex offenders – no sanctions, no treatment, no supervision – more than 80 per cent of offenders will not reoffend,” she explains. “Sex offending has one of the lowest recidivism rates across all crime categories. By comparison, 40 to 50 per cent of violent offenders, and 70 to 80 per cent of drug offenders, reoffend.” Yet when it comes to the most reviled of crimes, there is much we still don’t understand. 36 LSJ I ISSUE 47 I AUGUST 2018 ISSUE 47 I AUGUST 2018 I LSJ 37 Features CRIME CRIME Corrective Services NSW claims a 2010 on high risk offenders after they are released to evaluation found that completion of CUBIT the community. These conditions may include HELPING HANDS reduced participants’ odds of sexually electronic monitoring, internet use restrictions, reoffending by almost 70 per cent. Program We need to see curfews, prohibitions on drinking alcohol, For offenders leaving prison, a major completers are thus more likely to be released to directions not to change one’s appearance, hurdle to re-establishing life outside is parole. Critics claim this encourages offenders sexual abuse and bans on entering suburbs where previous The tendency is for people their lack of prosocial supports. “Many to “fake” their reform. For example, after offences occurred. At 30 June 2016, 55 NSW have burned their bridges,” says Dr serving time in prison for sexually assaulting as a public offenders were subject to ESOs. to turn their backs, but … Kelly Richards. “They’re less likely to fall a young man, CUBIT graduate Keith Thorne Dr Kelly Richards, a senior lecturer in the back into the warm embrace of friends attacked another. He later admitted he’d told health issue, School of Justice at Queensland University of if we give help and support, or family, and getting a job can be his therapists “what they wanted to hear”. Technology, says some offenders like the structure incredibly difficult.” Group treatment programs are also criticised for and to cultivate of such orders which spell out exactly what they we create safer communities. Stepping into this breach is a controversial Canadian program currently being “one size fits all”. Yet sex offenders have can or can’t do. Others, like Kay, strain at the dramatically different risk profiles and treatment conversations leash. Imagine having to seek permission from DR KELLY RICHARDS being trialled in Adelaide. Based on restorative justice principles, Circles needs. One offender may be attracted to children one’s supervising officer before accepting a job of Support and Accountability (CoSA) because he lacks the social and intimacy skills among all offer, having sex, or joining a club. It greatly surrounds offenders with practical required to form satisfying relationships with restricts an offender’s ability to establish the stakeholders, support and friendship. Each “circle” adults. Another may be driven primarily by cornerstones of a non-offending lifestyle – work, Legislation requiring convicted sex offenders to register their personal consists of a handful of trained volunteers deviant sexual interests. partner, and friends. Seidler says it prevents details with police has been introduced to every state and territory in who meet weekly with the offender For their own safety, sex offenders typically such as child offenders from having healthy relationships Australia. In 2012, Western Australia became the first and thus far only to assist with access to medical and find themselves segregated from mainstream and “places them under psychological stress by state to open the contents of its sex offender register to public scrutiny. psychological services, daily tasks such offenders. Corrective Services NSW says protection, imposing ... demands which are unreasonable and However, mounting pressure from victims’ rights groups means it as shopping and banking, and secure housing sex offenders together “means they are often unrelated to their risk”. may only be a matter of time before other states follow. This, says housing and employment. not subject to victimisation associated with the mental health The introduction of increasingly punitive Seidler, is concerning because public sex offender registries don’t make CoSA originated in 1994, in a small nature of their offences and can focus on their legislation continues apace. Child sex offenders communities safer and may have unintended consequences. Mennonite community in Ontario, rehabilitation”. However, this arrangement sets services and the can be prevented from travelling overseas except “Public sex offender registries are used in other countries and we Canada, when a pastor and members of up a strange sort of parallel universe, where in “exceptional circumstances” by the new know that they do not reduce reoffending rates,” Seidler explains. his congregation formed a supportive friendships form on the basis of shared interests, criminal justice Passports Legislation Amendment (Overseas Travel United States-style public registers which allow people to see, at the click circle around a high-profile sex offender as they do anywhere. But insulated from by Child Sex Offenders) Act 2017 (Cth). Tough of a mouse, whether a paedophile lives next door don’t necessarily boost re-entering the community. Since then, condemnation or consequences, deviant fantasies system, or we new laws announced by the NSW Attorney safety. “Public registers don’t target the people who need to know,” adds more than 350 Canadian sex offenders may be normalised, and grooming techniques General in June 2018 demand a maximum life Seidler. “The disadvantaged family with vulnerable children down the have participated in CoSA. Richards is shared. In 2013, convicted Western Australian won’t ever beat sentence for a strengthened offence of persistent street is not going to be checking the register. And what, exactly, are part of a team conducting a preliminary child sex offender Mark Pendleton was further child sexual abuse, introduce new offences for members of the public ... expected to do with that information?” evaluation of the Adelaide program and, sentenced for conspiring with other paedophiles this problem.