Overview of Assessment of Sexual Offenders

Abstract

The most popular topic related to sexual offenders over the past decade appears to be how to assess the risk they present to society (Hanson & Harris, Criminal Justice and Behavior, 27:6–35, 2000; Hanson & Thornton, Law and Human Behavior, 24:119–136, 2000; Beech, Erikson, Friendship & Hanson, Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment, 14:53–165, 2002; Doren, Evaluating sex offenders: a manual for civil commitment and beyond. Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA, 2002; Thornton, Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment, 14:139–154, 2002; Beech, Fisher, & Thornton, Professional Psychology, Research and Practice, 34(4):339–352, 2003; Hanson, Morton & Harris, Sexual offender recidivism risk: What we know and what we need to know. In R. Prentky, E. Janus, M. Seto & A.W. Burgess (Eds.), Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences: Vol. 989. Sexually coercive behavior: Understanding and management (pp. 154–166). New York Academy of Sciences, New York, 2003). However, this is just one of many types of assessments a clinician may be asked to perform related to a sexual offender. For example, assessments are often needed of alleged perpetrators of sexual abuse in child custody situations, and in the 20 states in which sexually violent predator laws were adopted, assessments are needed to determine whether sexual offenders meet legal criteria for civil commitment. In addition, presentencing evaluations are often sought to help with disposition planning, and sexual offenders are also often evaluated prior to their release on probation or parole. Also, once sexual offenders have been civilly committed, they usually require an assessment for treatment planning purposes, since the civil commitment evaluation was likely to focus mainly on risk and legal criteria rather than treatment needs. Finally, assessments are also needed to determine when civilly committed sexual offenders have lowered their risk sufficiently to be released into the community. This chapter will discuss aspects of comprehensive clinical assessments of sexual offenders in a variety of contexts.