A policy evaluation of non-custodial sentencing for first-time offenders: evidence from New Zealand

Psychiatric comorbidity among first-time and repeat DUI offenders

Characteristics of Older Adult First-Time Sex Offenders: Insights From the Missouri Registry

Research examining the connection between the unemployment rate and the aggregate crime is inconclusive. One explanation for the inconsistent findings is that the unemployment rate influences the criminal activity of repeat and first-time offenders in different ways. Results support this thesis by revealing an inverted U-shaped association between the unemployment rate and the probability of repeat offending. The curvilinear relationship likely results from repeat offenders and those lacking a criminal record entering and exiting the labor force at different levels of unemployment. Our findings highlight the role that the unemployment rate plays in affecting repeat offending and underscore the importance of distinguishing between repeat and first-time offending when analyzing the effect of the unemployment rate on crime.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to illustrate how first-time offenders and habitual criminals, while displaying wide differences in offense frequency, appear to follow a similar pattern in committing crime. Design/methodology/approach A conceptual approach is adopted in this paper. Findings It is argued that criminal thinking is the common denominator in both patterns, the difference being that habitual criminals have a higher resting level of proactive and reactive criminal thinking than first-time offenders. With an earlier age of onset, the habitual criminal may be more impulsive and reactive than first-time offenders, which partially explains why most low-rate offenders are not identified until adulthood. Practical implications Because actual and perceived deterrents to crime correlate weakly, if at all, it is recommended that perceived environmental events and criminal thinking be the primary targets of prevention and intervention programs. Social implications Environmental stimuli, such as events that produce general strain, increase opportunities for crime, reinforce criminal associations, irritate the individual and interfere with the deterrent effect of perceived certainty, can both augment and interact with criminal thinking to increase the likelihood of a criminal act in both first-time offenders and habitual criminals. Originality/value The unique aspect of this paper is that it illustrates that certain features of crime and criminality are found across offending levels, whereas other features are more specific to a particular level.

Debate persists as to the amount of influence criminal history should have in determining the severity of imposed legal sanction for a criminal offense. One position maintains that the punishment for repeat and first-time offenders convicted for the same type of offense should be similar, whereas an alternative viewpoint argues that the state should sanction repeat offenders more harshly. We contribute to this discourse by investigating whether the amount of weight given to an offender’s prior criminal record in sentencing affects the likelihood of repeat offending. Although initial findings showed that a substantive negative bivariate relationship existed at the county level between the weight-accorded prior criminal record in sentencing and repeat offending, this association disappeared in a more sophisticated nonlinear multilevel analysis. Our findings suggest that sanctioning repeat offenders more harshly than first-time offenders for similar offenses has little effect on attenuating repeat offending once other factors are controlled.

Objective: To examine the effects of changes to Washington State's ignition interlock laws: moving issuance of interlock orders from courts to the driver licensing department in July 2003 and extending the interlock order requirement to first-time offenders with blood alcohol concentrations (BACs) below 0.15 percent (“first simple driving under the influence [DUI]”) in June 2004. Method: Trends in conviction types, interlock installation rates, and 2-year cumulative recidivism rates were examined for first-time convictions (simple, high-BAC, test refusal DUI; deferred prosecution; alcohol-related negligent driving) stemming from DUI arrests between January 1999 and June 2006. Regression analyses examined recidivism effects of the law changes and interlock installation rates. To examine general deterrent effects, trends in single-vehicle late-night crashes in Washington were compared with trends in California and Oregon. Results: After the 2004 law change, the proportion of simple DUIs declined somewhat, though the proportion of negligent driving convictions (no interlock order requirement) continued an upward trend. Interlock installation rates for first simple DUIs were 3 to 6 percent in the year before the law change and one third after. Recidivism declined by an estimated 12 percent (e.g., expected 10.6% without law change vs. 9.3% among offenders arrested between April and June 2006, the last study quarter) among first simple DUI offenders and an estimated 11 percent (expected 10.2% vs. 9.1%) among all first-time offenders. There was an estimated 0.06 percentage point decrease in the recidivism rate for each percentage point increase in the proportion of first simple DUI offenders with interlocks. If installation rates had been 100 vs. 34 percent for first simple DUI offenders arrested between April and June 2006, and if the linear relationship between rates of recidivism and installations continued, recidivism could have been reduced from 9.3 to 5.3 percent. With installation rates of 100 vs. 24 percent for all first offenders, their recidivism rate could have fallen from 9.1 to 3.2 percent. Although installation rates increased somewhat after the 2003 law change, recidivism rates were not significantly affected, perhaps due to the short follow-up period before the 2004 law change. The 2004 law change was associated with an 8.3 percent reduction in single-vehicle late-night crash risk. Conclusions: Mandating interlock orders for all first DUI convictions was associated with reductions in recidivism, even with low interlock use rates, and reductions in crashes. Additional gains are likely achievable with higher rates. Jurisdictions should seek to increase use rates and reconsider permitting reductions in DUI charges to other traffic offenses without interlock order requirements.

Traditionally, sentencing research demonstrates a positive relationship between prior record and sentence severity. The current research, however, demonstrates that under certain circumstances offenders with a prior record, but no prior incarcerations, are sentenced less severely than similarly situated first-time offenders. The analysis demonstrates that first-time and experienced offenders commit the same types of offenses. However, first-time offenders are more likely to be convicted of more serious charges and subsequently sentenced to longer prison terms than experienced offenders. It is suggested that repeat offenders, having familiarity with the courtroom workgroup and its nuances, are better able to manipulate the system to their advantage.

Research has demonstrated that repeat offenders are generally punished more severely than first-time offenders. In the present article, we argue that this should particularly be true if the offender is a member of one’s own social category. A group of 86 students were told about a fellow student who hid books from the university library. The student was either an ingroup or an outgroup member and was either a first-time or a repeat offender. As expected, repeat ingroup offenders were more severely punished than first-time ingroup offenders; this effect was mediated by anger/outrage and societal concerns. If the offender was an outgroup member, however, criminal history did not influence punitive reactions.

When youth commit serious violent or sexual offenses, this often generates a call for more severe punishments and longer detention sentences. An important question is whether (long) detention sentences are effective in decreasing recidivism among serious young offenders. To estimate recidivism rates in serious young offenders and elucidate the link between sentencing (in terms of custodial vs. non-custodial and length of imprisonment) and recidivism, three multilevel meta-analyses were conducted. With a systematic literature search, 27 studies and four datasets were traced, involving N = 2,308 participants, yielding 90 effect sizes for overall recidivism, 24 for specifically violent recidivism, and 23 for the association between length of imprisonment and recidivism. The average weighted overall recidivism rate was 44.47% (95% confidence interval [CI]: 37.59–51.46%) over an average period of 8.68 years. The rate of violent recidivism was estimated at 30.49% (95% CI: 20.92–40.52%), over an average period of 11.45 years. Recidivism rates were higher when recidivism was defined as an arrest for any new offense rather than for a specific offense and in studies conducted in the United States versus European studies. Violent recidivism rates were higher in studies with longer follow-up periods. Based on the limited available studies, no difference in recidivism rates following custodial and non-custodial sentences were found, nor an association between length of imprisonment and recidivism. To increase rehabilitation chances for youth offenders, further research is warranted to better understand the impact of sentencing and to ascertain what is needed to make custodial and non-custodial sentences more effective.

The literature on the optimal enforcement of law considers a regulator determining both the sanction placed on a caught offender as well as a selection of a probability of apprehension. This approach originated by Becker (1968) leads to two results that do not match observation. First, since the marginal cost to the sanction is zero while there is a substantial cost to enforcement one should expect full compliance with a law using maximal sanctions and minimal enforcement. Second, both sanctions and the probability of apprehension increase with repeated violations. The inverse relationship between the two predicted from Becker's analysis contradicts this observation. Here I present both a rationale for the lack of full compliance as well as the relationship between increasing sanctions and increasing apprehension with repeat offenses. The literature on optimal enforcement considers only the population's response to the enforcement. By considering the enforcement official's response to the frequency of violations the strategic interactions of the players in a game is considered. In such a game the probability of apprehension arises from the mixed strategies in the game. I show that full compliance is not an equilibrium regardless of the magnitude of the sanction. If no individual violates the law then it would no longer be best for the enforcement official to expend the resources to induce full compliance. Furthermore, in a dynamic game the rate of apprehension is greater for a second offense than a first time conviction. If the population differs in its gain from breaking the law then those with a greater benefit to the violation are ex ante more likely to break it. As a result, the enforcement official must target them more so that in equilibrium they offend at the same rate as the others. As a consequence, disproportionately more of those caught breaking the law are those targeted in the enforcement. Therefore, a greater proportion of one-time violators will be caught with a second offense than those with no convictions are caught for a first offense. This result holds for any magnitude of the sanction and even holds for schedules that increase in severity with the number of prior convictions.

It is a shared practice among various and diverse penal systems around the world to punish recidivists more harshly than first-time offenders. Despite the breadth of this practice, philosophically justifying this extra punishment has been constituting a rather demanding intellectual task, especially for retributive scholars. According to the archetypical retributive scheme of punishment, the latter is justified and only because offenders deserve it (Moore, 2009: 31). This is the heart of the problem for the retributivist: Can retributivism account for the increased punishment of recidivists, even if they engage in precisely the same criminal act with a first-time offender? Purporting to spark the dialogue towards responding to this question, this essay scrutinises four retributive accounts of the recidivist premium, namely Punishing Bad Character theory, Punishing Disobedience theory, Recidivism as Omission theory, and finally, the theory. All of the theories which are analysed seek to ground harsher punishment for recidivists by addressing the way in which culpability can be enhanced due to the offender’s prior convictions. Acknowledging each account's conceptual limitations, this essay concludes that the most plausible retributive account for the foundation of the recidivist premium is served by the Notice theory, according to which the repeat offender is more culpable due to his/her premeditation to reoffend, albeit having experienced firsthand formal criminal punishment and thus supposedly having gotten to appreciate the implications of his/her wrongdoing.

A comparison of first-time offenders, repeat offenders, and frequent utilizers of the criminal justice system

The benefits associated with focusing strategies and interventions on family violence offenders early in their offending careers are well established. Yet accurately identifying first-time family violence perpetrators is difficult because of the high under-reporting of family violence. This study involved the analysis of police narratives completed for first-time family violence perpetrators, as identified through police offence records to determine their accuracy in identifying first-time family violence offenders. The findings demonstrate that a reliance on the use of police offence record information in isolation may lead to many ‘false negatives’ and a failure to identify recidivist offenders who may reduce the effectiveness of tailored intervention programs. The use of multiple sources of data and better use of police narratives within offence records are recommended as ways to more accurately distinguish between first-time offenders and recidivist offenders.

Teen Courts are an effective judicial alternative for many youth offenders. The majority of youth courts deal solely with first-time offenders. However, repeat offenders are at a greater risk for future crime. Is Teen Court effective with more experienced offenders? In this study, the authors examine the outcomes of 26 Whatcom County Teen Court offenders with at least one prior conviction. The sentence completion rate was higher and the recidivism was lower for the Teen Court offenders when compared with a sample of first-time Court Diversion offenders. This objective evidence of program success is augmented by an offender's perspective on his or her court experience. These perspectives as well as the continued voluntary involvement with Teen Court are discussed in relation to empowerment theory.

Having studied criminology textbooks and research publications regarding the personality of the criminal, its classification and typology, the author draws attention to the fact that they discuss the opposition between, on the one hand, repeat crimes and the personality of a repeat offender and, on the other hand, all other crimes and the personality of an offender «in general», rather than fist-time crimes and first-time offenders, which would be more logical. The author concludes that it is necessary not only to counteract repeat crimes but, primarily, to prevent them though a more effective reaction to first-time crime and its subject — a first-time offender. An overview of textbooks and research publications in criminology shows that the topic of first-time offenders, either as an independent object, or in comparison with repeat crimes, is never even outlined. As for special research which could discuss this problem, primarily, research devoted to the personality of the criminal, to repeat offenses, it does not contain any definite information regarding the differences between secondary (repeat) and first-time crimes, or the necessity and expediency of a selective reaction to the first-time offences. Publications devoted to repeat offences, the personality of the repeat offender, limit their object to analyzing the behavioral pattern of persons who already committed a crime in the past and then commit a new crime. Persons without a record of previous convictions who commit a crime, as a rule, stay out of the scope of such research and of criminology in general. The author puts forward an idea that the personality of a first-time offender is not studied in criminology because there seems to be no practical benefit from such work, unlike the benefits of studying the personality of a repeat offender. It is stated that, traditionally, the threat of new crimes from repeat offenders has caused greater concerns than the threat from first-time offenders. The author claims that the solution of the latter problem predetermines the solution of the former as it acts, at least, as one of the most efficient tools that could have an impact on it.