Community Correction Officer Perceptions Of Ex-Offender Reentry Needs And Challenges

Research into community corrections officers’ perceptions of the needs of ex-offenders has largely been overlooked. While some empirical research has emerged regarding federal parole officers’ perceptions, it is conceptually incomplete. A gap in the literature remains regarding the concordance or discordance between offenders and community corrections officers’ perceptions of offender needs and the opportunities for success upon release. Using a sample of community corrections officers in Seattle, Washington, this research examined officer perception of ex-offender needs, the value officers’ placed on the specific needs, and the opportunities available for offenders to meet their needs. Differences between officers emerged including the finding that female officers rated needs and challenges for offenders significantly different than male officers. Policy implications of the research are discussed. This research was made possible due to a grant award from the College of Arts and Sciences at Seattle University. This research was first presented at the 2005 Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences Conference in Chicago. We are grateful to Mac Pevey and Keven Bovenkamp from the Washington State Department of Corrections and Bill Corn and Tim McTighe from United States Probation and Pretrial Services for their support, assistance, and for making the study possible. A special thanks to our research assistant Tania Reyes who was instrumental in collecting the data for this investigation.     

A Comparative Perspective of Community Policing in Taiwan and Washington State

This study explores the attitudes and behaviors of Taiwanese police officers regarding community oriented policing (COP) by comparing their attitudes and behaviors with those of officers in Washington State. Data used in the study were collected from 375 Taiwanese line officers assigned to the city of Tainan and 167 American line officers from various police and sheriffs’ departments in Washington State. The study finds that (1) Taiwanese and American officers hold similar opinions of COP’s potential to reduce crime; (2) both groups are similarly involved in implementing the various strategies of COP; yet (3) American officers are more involved in formulating (planning/devising) COP strategies; and (4) are more receptive to citizen involvement in COP; while (5) Taiwanese officers are more receptive to civilian oversight, and (6) are more amenable to applying COP outcomes for evaluative purposes than are their American counterparts. Policy implications and areas for future research are discussed.

Effect of Psychopathy, Abuse, and Ethnicity on Juvenile Probation Officers’ Decision-Making and Supervision Strategies

Probation officers exercise substantial discretion in their daily work with troubled and troubling juvenile offenders. In this experiment, we examine the effect of psychopathic features, child abuse, and ethnicity on 204 officers’ expectancies of, recommendations for, and approach to supervising, juvenile offenders. The results indicate that officers (a) have decision-making and supervision approaches that are affected by a youth’s psychopathic traits and history of child abuse—but not ethnicity; (b) view both abused youth and psychopathic youth as highly challenging cases on a path toward adult criminality; and (c) have greater hope and sympathy for abused youth than psychopathic youth. For abused youth, officers are likely to recommend psychological services and “go the extra mile” by providing greater support, referrals, and networking than is typical for their caseload. For psychopathic youth, officers expect poor treatment outcomes and are” extra strict,” enforcing rules that typically are not enforced for others on their caseload.     

Using the good cop/bad cop profile with the MMPI-2

The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) has been widely used in a variety of ways to screen candidates for law enforcement positions. This study extends the use of the MMPI Good Cop/Bad Cop (GC/BC) profile (Blau, Super, & Brady, 1993) to the MMPI-2. The MMPI-2 profiles of 39 veteran police officers were used to predict their performance (No Apparent Problems, Borderline, or Serious Problems Possible), and these predictions were compared with supervisors’ ratings of the officers’ actual performance. The MMPI-2 predictions were accurate for 46% of the officers, a rate that was significantly better than chance (p=.024). Based on the current data, the best selection outcome would be obtained by accepting officers whose MMPI-2 profiles place them in the No Apparent Problems or Borderline groups, and rejecting officers whose profiles suggest Serious Problems Possible. This could be accomplished simply by rejecting any officer who obtained a score above 65T on any of the clinical scales. This selection strategy would have resulted in the acceptance of 22 officers, 19 of whom were highly rated by their supervisors, and the rejection of 17 officers, 11 of whom were rated as borderline or poorer by their supervisors. It would also result in the erroneous rejection of 6 officers who were highly rated by supervisors. AUTHOR NOTE: An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 1994 annual meeting of the Society for Police and Criminal Psychology, in Roswell, New Mexico. The authors wish to thank Jim Herndon, Ph.D., for this comments on this study.     

Police Empathy and Victim PTSD as Potential Factors in Rape Case Attrition

This exploratory study investigated whether rape victims’ subjective perceptions of whether to proceed with legal action were associated with their experience of disclosing to the police during their initial interview. Specifically, the study investigated associations between symptoms of PTSD, shame and self-blame post-rape, subjective perceptions of police empathy and subjective perception of victims’ intentions to take the case to court. Participants (N = 22) were found to have elevated levels of PTSD severity, shame and self-blame. Police empathy was positively correlated with victims’ ratings of likelihood of taking the case to court, and negatively correlated with PTSD severity and shame. These preliminary findings suggest that training police officers how to respond more empathically to psychologically distressed rape victims may potentially help reduce victim attrition rates.     

Police officers’ attitudes toward their role and work: A comparison of black and white officers

This study tests whether Black and White police officers differ in job-related attitudes. The analyses focus on officers’ attitudes toward police role, selective enforcement, legal restrictions, and departmental problem-solving efforts. Survey data were collected from the Indianapolis Police Department (IPD) during the summer of 1996. Findings show that compared to White officers, Black officers tend to have a broad role orientation, be less selective, and have positive attitudes toward legal restrictions. Implications for future research and policy are also discussed.     

Tokenism and job satisfaction for policewomen

Women law enforcement officers from New Jersey and Pennsylvania participated in a self-administered anonymous survey. The objective of this study was to capture the respondent’s attitudes toward work and ascertain their levels of job satisfaction using Wharton and Barton’s (1991) job satisfaction scales. Their levels of job satisfaction were correlated with the proportion of women in their respective departments. Using Kanter’s (1977) concept of tokenism, it was found that those women who made up less than 15% of their department experienced less job satisfaction, greater levels of job-related depression, and lower self-esteem than those women working in departments where their numbers comprised greater than 15% of their departmental sworn personnel.     

Officer work orientations, perceptions of readiness and anticipated effectiveness of an agency-wide community policing effort within a county Sheriff’s office

Across occupations of every form, including those in criminal justice, administrators, managers, and supervisors frequently introduce changes to the structure and/or processes of the work environment. These changes may be seen as necessary to enhance worker productivity, but may be viewed by some workers as an unwanted disruption to their routines. Should employees interpret changes in such a manner, they can, and often do, negate these reforms. Employee work orientations (i.e., philosophical approaches toward work) undoubtedly play a role in such an interchange because they influence both how employees behave on the job and how they perceive their job. The move toward community-oriented policing constitutes a major paradigm shift to the practice of law enforcement. This structural and procedural change to the routines of policing could be perceived as threatening to those law enforcement officers whose work orientations are inconsistent with the philosophical foundation of community-based policing. The presence of a sufficient number of such officers could doom this movement to failure. This study uses survey data collected from a sample of sheriff’s deputies involved in an agency-wide community policing effort. In this study we examine the effects of deputies’ work orientations on their perceptions of the agency’s readiness for and the anticipated effectiveness of this initiative. The findings suggest interesting differences in the efforts of a traditional crime control orientation versus a more progressive community service orientation toward policing.     

Perceived effects of concealed handgun ownership by private citizens among law enforcement officers in Texas

On January 1, 1996, a new law took effect in Texas granting certain state citizens the privilege to carry a concealed handgun on their person for the first time since 1871. As a result of this dramatic shift in state law, Texas is now among the growing number of states across the nation who have adopted similar statutory provisions in one form or another. While at least one empiricals study of citizen’s attitudes toward concealed handgun ownership was conducted prior to the law’s effective date, no similar efforts were undertakens to assess the beliefs, perceptions and attitudes of the state’s law enforcement officers about this important social policy. The present study was therefore undertaken in response to the lack of serious attention which the issue of concealed handgun ownership among private citizens has received as it directly relates to the law enforcement profession. Subjects for this study (N=327) were drawn from four Texas law enforcement agencies representing various organizational sizes and missions. While the responses of officers who participated in the study indicate optimism about the law’s potential to deter various types of crime, they also reflect a certain degree of concerns about concealed handgun ownership among private citizens especially as this policy directly relates to perceive inadequacies in statemandated requirements and issues affecting officer safety.     

Gateway to Reform? Policy Implications of Police Officers’ Attitudes Toward Rape

Research has shown that prosecutors rely more heavily on victim characteristics and other extralegal factors than on criteria set forth by the law, when evaluating the merits of a rape case. Little is known, however, about the factors police officers use when assessing the merits of a rape case. The current study contributes to what is known about police officers’ attitudes toward rape. A survey was administered to 891 sworn police officers in two states in the southeastern United States. The surveys were designed to assess police officers’ acceptance of rape myths. Police officers who accept more rape myths were less likely to believe victims who did not adhere to the stereotyped “genuine victim.” This research contributes to what is known about the factors affecting police officers’ decision-making in rape cases. This study has implications for assessing the effectiveness of rape law reforms, inasmuch as these reforms are conveyed through police work.     

Job satisfaction: The gender perspective among police officers

Although women constitute more than 50% of the United States’ population, their percentage among police officers is approximately 9%. Despite being relatively new to policing as fully accepted officers, their growth in numbers should be higher. Nevertheless, such growth may be stagnant. The reasons for this phenomenon are still under examination, and any research that can shed light on this quandary is useful. This article examines job satisfaction among police officers and whether there is a difference by gender. The belief is that if job satisfaction among women police officers is low, this could reflect why more women are not entering law enforcement. However, the data analyzed from a purposive sample of 2,309 male and 309 female officers suggest that there is little difference in job satisfaction solely by gender.     

Religiosity and stress for police officers

Much of the research which has been conducted to date regarding stress and police officers has focused on identifying the presence of stress, associating stress with specific stressors, and comparing levels of stress between police officers and members of other professions. This project focused on the influence of one potential mediator of stress—religious activity. Data were collected from a population of law enforcement officers from a medium sized city and from a comparison group of firefighters from the same city. The data indicate that religiosity has two factors (1) traditional beliefs and activities and (2) religious satisfaction and perceived influence of religion on subject’s everyday lives. The second factor was found to be negatively related to stress for police officers. As religious satisfaction and perceived influence increase, stress increases.     

Spousal violence: Police officer attitudes and arrest response

Conclusion On the 15 propositions, three propositions were found to support the general hypothesis. The findings indicate that as police officers showed an increase in attitudes supporting spousal violence the following occurred: (a) “frequent calls for police assistance from the household” became less important to police officers who were deciding to arrest; (b) “Jail overcrowding” became more important to police officers who were deciding not to arrest; and (c) “participant’s first encounter with the police” became more important to police officers who were deciding not to arrest. The other 12 propositions did not support the general hypothesis which suggested that the priority of all extralegal factors would relate to the ABUSE score.     

Corruption among narcotic officers: A study of innocence and integrity

This study focuses on the influencing components producing corruption among narcotic law enforcement officers, and it is the second article of a three part series among 255 officers. It was postulated that income and stress among of narcotic officers gives rise to corruption. Although, corruption was defined as police brutality, personal use of contraband, and abuse of due process rights, the data was insufficient to support the hypothesis. It was revealed, however, that corruption did exist among narcotic officers, but its causal factors were related to an officer’s lack of experience, innocence, and integrity. Recommendations are that narcotic officers be selected based on their experiences especially military service. Further research should be conducted examining the link between military training and quality narcotic law enforcement service. Author Note: Dennis J. Stevens, Ph.D. is an associate professor of criminal justice at the University of Massachusetts at Boston. In addition to teaching traditional and nontraditional students, he teaches and counsels law enforcement officers in police academies such as at the North Carolina Justice Academy and felons at maximum custody penitentiaries such as Attica in New York, Eastern and Women’s Institute in North Carolina, Stateville and Joliet near Chicago, and CCI in Columbia, South Carolina. He is a former group facilitator for an organization that specializes in court ordered abuse counseling. He can be reached at dennis.stevens@umb.edu     

The impact of TASERs on police use-of-force decisions: Findings from a randomized field-training experiment

This paper presents findings from a randomized field-training experiment designed to study the impact TASERs on police officers’ use-of-force decisions. Officers were randomly assigned to either a treatment group (with TASERs) or a control group (without TASERs) and then participated in training scenarios involving different levels of suspect resistance. The study investigates whether and to what extent officers armed with the TASER use it as an alternative to other types of less-lethal force (e.g., empty hands, pepper spray, and the baton) and the firearm, controlling for the level of suspect resistance. The findings indicate that officers who were armed with the TASER were significantly less likely to deploy pepper spray and the baton in response to aggressive physical resistance. Additionally, the results show that officers equipped with the TASER were less likely to discharge their firearm when confronted with suspect resistance that was potentially lethal. No differences in police behavior occurred in response to passive suspect resistance.     

Effectiveness of citizen police academies in changing the attitudes, beliefs, and behavior of citizen participants

The purpose of this study was to determine whether the citzen police academies (CPA) in two cities were effective in changing participants’ attitudes, beliefs, and behavior toward police. Pre-and post-test questionnaires were used to obtain participants’ ratings of their attitudes and beliefs concerning police officers and their willingness to cooperate with police. Participants were also asked to indicate what cooperative behaviors they had actually engaged in before and/or during the CPA. At the end of the CPA, participants in both cities rated themselves as having more positive attitudes toward police, and more willingness to engage in behaviors that would help police. There was also an increase in actual performance of some cooperative behaviors during the CPA. These changes did not seem to be overly dependent on the jurisdiction (large versus small city), the demographics of the CPA participants, or the specific characteristics of the CPA curriculum.     

Gender differences in mediation of severe occupational stress among correctional officers

This study explored gender differences in how correctional officers react to severe occupational stress and addressed differences in coping processes and social support utilization. The subjects were 244 correctional officers (167 men and 77 women) employed in Kentucky medium security institutions for male offenders. The study employed a survey administered to the volunteering participants. The Ways of Coping Questionnaire was used to assess coping processes used to deal with a stressful work event, and the Maslach Burnout Inventory was used to assess severe occupational stress. Statistical analyses revealed that correctional officers experience high levels of occupational stress but did not indicate gender differences in emotional exhaustion or depersonalization. The results indicated that female officers more frequently than male officers processed stress by seeking social support, while male officers more frequently than female officers processed stress by “planful problem solving.” No differences were found in correctional officers’ relationships with oppositesex peers. The results suggested that male and female correctional officers follow traditional sex roles in coping with occupational stress, but they revealed no differences in how they are affected by occupational stress in terms of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and personal accomplishment.     

The Impact of Psychological Consequences of Rape on Rape Case Attrition: The Police Perspective

This paper examines whether the psychological sequelae of rape relate to rape case attrition by leading police to see the victim as less reliable. A mixed methods approach with two linked studies, one qualitative and one quantitative, was used. In Study 1, the qualitative study, interviews with 12 specialist police officers were analysed using Framework Analysis. In Study 2, the quantitative study, 76 specialist officers completed an online questionnaire to assess the generalisability of Study 1’s findings. In Study 1, officers’ perceptions of victims clustered into three stereotypes, which we label “the real victim”, “the mad discloser”, and “the bad discloser”. Victims who exhibited signs of shame, self-blame, and post-traumatic stress reactions which impeded their ability to give a coherent account of the rape were perceived as less reliable “mad” or “bad” victims. The findings of Study 2 supported these results. Although police interview strategies have improved in recent years, there is evidence that signs of trauma and shame in the victim are sometimes misinterpreted as signs of lying. This may affect attrition by impacting on victim-officer relationships. Further training on recognising trauma and understanding its consequences is recommended both for specialist officers and front-line staff.     

Toward a Balanced Approach: Defining Police Roles in Responding to Domestic Violence

Responding to domestic violence poses unique challenges to law enforcement officers. Prior research has focused on issues such as officer safety and arrest policies but overlooked a critical component—the officers’ perception of their role in responding to domestic violence incidents. This study explores how police officers define their roles through the use of focus group interviews with detectives assigned to a domestic violence unit. Findings include the identification of three role perspectives. Recommendations for a more balanced approach of these role perspectives in responding to domestic violence crimes through the use of more effective training, supervision, and evaluation are proposed.     

Alienation and the correctional officer: A multivariate analysis

The increased pressures which have been placed upon correctional institutions in the 1980’s have made the retention of quality correctional officers imperative. Yet many of these officers find prison work to be an unsatisfying experience. This paper attempts to measure levels of alienation among correctional officers and identify factors which may be related to its occurrence. The amount of alienation experienced by 126 correctional officers at a Western state prison was measured utilizing Dean’s Alienation Scale. Alienation levels were found to be related primarily to institutional, and opposed to non-institutional, variables. The implications for correctional administration are discussed.