RETHINKING REENTRY EDITED BY BRENT ORRELL Foreword by Paul Ryan AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE RETHINKING REENTRY EDITED BY BRENT ORRELL Foreword by Paul Ryan January 2020 AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE © 2020 by the American Enterprise Institute. All rights reserved. The American Enterprise Institute (AEI) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit, 501(c)(3) educational organization and does not take institutional positions on any issues. The views expressed here are those of the author(s). American Enterprise Institute 1789 Massachusetts Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20036 www.aei.org Contents Foreword .................................................................................................................. v Paul Ryan Introduction ........................................................................................................... 1 Brent Orrell 1. Considering Reentry Program Evaluation: Thoughts from SVORI (and Other) Evaluations ....................................................................................... 7 Pamela K. Lattimore 2. Triaging of Services for Individuals Returning from Prison ................. 39 Edward Latessa 3. Integrating Lived Experience into Reentry Evaluation Design ............. 72 Nancy La Vigne and Janeen Buck Willison 4. Implementation and Intervention Sciences: New Frontiers to Improve Research on Reentry ......................................................................... 88 Faye S. Taxman 5. The Next Generation: An Automated Risk-Needs-Responsivity Assessment System for Correctional Populations ...................................... 119 Grant Duwe 6. What If People Decide to Desist? Implications for Policy .................... 140 Shawn Bushway 7. Creating Cognitive Behavioral Communities in Prison ......................... 163 Christy Visher, Daniel O’Connell, and Hannah Cortina 8. Identity and Agency: A New Approach to Rehabilitation and Reentry ................................................................................................................ 191 Brent Orrell iii iv RETHINKING REENTRY Acknowledgments ............................................................................................. 199 About the Authors ............................................................................................ 200 Foreword PAUL RYAN hile the media tends to sensationalize political conflict, 2018 saw a Wmoment of bipartisan collaboration and consensus with the passage of landmark legislation, the First Step Act, which reformed our nation’s criminal justice system. The political uniting of the left and the right to modernize elements of our justice system was one of the least-covered events of 2018, and yet, it might be one of the most consequential from a public policy perspective. So, how did Democrats and Republicans agree on a controversial, hot-button topic? One reason policymakers were willing to take a political risk was because of both practical and intellectual research in the field of criminal justice. My own experience is instructive: In 2007, I was one of several conserva- tives who voted against the Second Chance Act, but around that time, a sea change was occurring in this policy space. Beginning with Texas in 2007, a whole swath of generally conservative- leaning states reformed their laws in ways that better protect their citizens and ensure victim’s justice while ensuring a fairer system. These states focused on how they could reduce the need to imprison nonviolent offend- ers and reattach people to the workforce. And where these laws have been passed, we generally have seen reduced recidivism, crime, and costs asso- ciated with jailing offenders. The scholarly work done around these issues was key to policymakers when we passed the First Step Act with the strong support of Presi- dent Donald Trump, losing only two Republicans in the House of Rep- resentatives and passing 87–12 in the Senate. That is strong bipartisan consensus. But the First Step Act, as its name implies, is only the beginning. States continue to move forward in developing innovative ways to decrease v recidivism and reform their criminal justice systems with an eye toward ensuring the safety of their citizens and justice for all. This volume will be key in pushing future reform efforts and ensuring that the legislative changes enacted yield tangible results. The research con- ducted by the volume’s authors provides policymakers with the knowledge they need to understand what does and does not work in anti-recidivism efforts. But, it does not stop at just describing the difficulties and prob- lems associated with preventing recidivism; this volume provides a path forward on new ways to provide risk assessment, which is a key concern to policymakers. Importantly, it also takes on the decidedly less glamorous work of ensuring fidelity in program implementation. Evidence that new programs work is only as good as the faithful replication of program con- tent by program implementers. This volume also identifies best practices on ensuring faithful replication of reentry programs. Finally, this volume ties it all together with a new model for prisoner reentry. Brent Orrell provides a road map to federal and state policymakers for a new approach to anti-recidivism. This new approach unifies a num- ber of methodologies—such as case management, cognitive behavioral therapy, and substance abuse treatment. While modest in initial scope by cautiously calling for an experimental approach with rigorous evaluation, it calls for large-scale reform in how we approach prisoner reentry. If pur- sued and successful, it could fundamentally shift how we deliver prisoner reentry services in America. Good policy begins with good evidence. With this volume, AEI has pro- vided policymakers and practitioners with a wealth of information on how to pursue better programs for formerly incarcerated individuals. vi Introduction BRENT ORRELL olicymakers and researchers have been searching for a solution to Ppersistently high rates of recidivism for decades. While the number of incarcerated individuals under federal and state jurisdiction has decreased in recent years and is currently at a 10-year low,1 the United States still incarcerates more people per capita than any other nation.2 This level of incarceration has real consequences. By some estimates, nearly 70 million Americans have a criminal record.3 According to a Bureau of Justice Statistics report, if you are a male born in 2001, there is a one in nine chance you will find yourself in prison in your lifetime. We see wide variations when broken down by race, with white men having a one in 17 chance of experiencing imprisonment, while black and Hispanic men have a one in three and one in six chance, respectively. Women have considerably better odds at a one in 56 chance, although the number of incarcerated women has jumped significantly over the past few decades.4 Unfortunately, the vast majority of the nearly 600,000 people released from federal and state prisons every year cannot successfully transition back into our neighborhoods and communities, often swiftly return- ing to incarceration for new crimes. A 2018 Bureau of Justice Statis- tics report reinforces this dismal reality. The study examined nearly 68,000 people released from state prisons in 2005 and found that 83 per- cent—roughly equivalent to five out of six—were arrested again within nine years of their release.5 Why the recidivism rate has remained so high has puzzled criminolo- gists, practitioners, researchers, and justice authorities for decades. Some have argued that the justice system is excessively “sticky,” essentially trap- ping those with criminal records in a cycle of crime and incarceration. 1 2 RETHINKING REENTRY Others have pointed to racial bias in the criminal justice system or to the array of social, economic, and family challenges that many reentering indi- viduals face when they return to their neighborhoods and communities. Federal, state, and local governments and private and philanthropic orga- nizations have devoted billions of dollars to strategies and programs tar- geted at stopping the revolving door of crime and imprisonment. To date, the positive results from these programs have ranged from low to nonexis- tent. Whatever the solutions might be, it is safe to say limited progress has been made in finding them. This volume seeks to explore the roots of the reentry challenge and new approaches for trying to break out of the current policy box. It contains chapters by some of America’s leading researchers, policy experts, and evaluators in criminal justice, reentry, and recidivism. Each brings a partic- ular perspective on the reentry challenge and how existing programs and practices might be strengthened or reformed to help improve criminal jus- tice system performance and outcomes. Others propose more significant departures from existing strategies and practices as alternatives to explore. In Chapter 1, Pamela K. Lattimore, senior director for research devel- opment in the division for applied justice research at RTI International and a former senior official at the US Department of Justice, reviews outcomes of several seminal reentry evaluations, with a particular focus on the Serious and Violent Offender Reentry Initiative’s multisite eval- uation. Lattimore synthesizes decades of reentry literature addressing the 1975 finding that “nothing works” in reentry6 and finds that many reentry and recidivism studies had “incomplete implementation for the treatment group(s), partial