Counseling Chapter 8 Probation Learning Objectives After Reading This Students Should Able Describe

CHAPTER 8

Probation

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After reading this chapter, students should be able to:

2. Describe the two functions of probation.

4. List the major issues involved in the presentence investigation.

6. Identify the different kinds of probation conditions and explain why they are important.

8. Define evidence-based practice and discuss its importance.

10. Discuss the revocation of probation, including “technical” revocation.

LESSON PLAN

Correlated to PowerPoints

I. The History and Development of Probation.

Learning Objective 1: Describe the history and development of probation, including how it is

organized today.

A. Benefit of Clergy

2. Originally intended to protect those under protection of the church from the

king, it came to be known as the “neck verse” as it saved people from capital

punishment.

B. Judicial Reprieve

1. In England judicial reprieve became widespread in the 1800s.

2. The judge could elect to suspend either the imposition or execution of a

4. The discretionary use of such indefinite reprieves was declared unconstitutional

by the Supreme Court in 1916.

C. Recognizance

1. Boston Municipal Court Judge Peter Oxenbridge Thatcher originated the

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2. The main thrust of reprieve and recognizance was to humanize the criminal law

and mitigate its harshness.

4. John Augustus was the first to formalize court leniency. He wanted to help

clients and get them to reform. He was the first to use the term probation. He also

developed these ideas:

a. A pre-sentence investigation

b. Social casework

c. Reports to the court

d. Probation revocation

D. The Modernization of Probation

1. Augustus and his followers followed the social worker model, which

2. In the 1940s, leaders in probation and other aspects of corrections began to

embrace ideas from psychology about personality and human development.

a. The medical model dominated the literature but not the practice. Still, it

remained influential until the 1960s.

b. The medical model gave way to the reintegration model. This model

assumed crime was a product of social factors such as poverty. The

approach to probation changed from counseling to service brokerage.

c. In the latter part of the 1970s, thinking about probation changed to the

model that is current today. Rehabilitation and reintegration gave way to

risk management.

d. Today, people are placed on probation in one of four ways.

i. Judges impose a sentence of probation (60 percent).

ii. Judges impose a sentence of probation that is suspended

pending good behavior (22 percent).

iii. For those already on probation, an additional probation is

imposed but suspended (9 percent).

iv. The court requires that some period of incarceration be served

prior to probation. This “split–sentence” approach has waned most

recently.

e. Judges may also impose other sentencing arrangements.

i. Modification of sentence—modified sentence of incarceration to

probation

ii. Shock incarceration—released after brief period of incarceration

(the shock) and placed on probation

iii. Intermittent incarceration—spends weekends or nights in jail

Chapter 8: Probation

What If Scenario

What if you were a judge and were given the authority to impose sentences. Under what

conditions would you sentence a person to shock incarceration and why?

3. Today, 53 percent of people on probation have been convicted of a felony.

4. Probation practices reflect the social forces of the time.

a. Today there is a growing interest in “community justice.” This is a

philosophy that emphasizes reparation to the victim and the community. It

uses problem-solving strategies instead of adversarial procedures and

seeks to increase citizen involvement in crime prevention.

Media Tool

Visit http://www.appa-net.org/eweb/

o American Probation and Parole Association

o Have students browse the site. What types of information did they discover about

probation and parole? Discuss as a class..

Class Discussion/Activity

Allow the students to partner with a classmate. They will decide upon two states and discuss the

differences in probation within one state versus another. Allow them to discuss the differences in

class while ensuring that no two states are used twice.

See Assignment 1

II. The Organization of Probation Today

Learning Objective 2: Describe the two functions of probation.

A. Originally, probation was an arm of the court (Eastern United States primarily). As it

moved west, it was placed in the executive branch.

B. Probation has merged with parole in some places. This has produced three emerging

questions.

1. Should Probation Be Centralized or Decentralized?

2. Who Should Administer Probation?

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in part.

They also claim that moving probation to the executive branch would

result in:

i. Better allocation of services.

ii. Increased interaction.

iii. Administrative coordination with corrections and allied human

services.

iv. Increased access to the legislative budget process.

v. More appropriate service priorities.

c. Proponents for judicial control argue that:

i. Probation would be more responsive to the sentencing judges’

desires.

ii. Judicial employees would produce more scrutiny of people on

probation.

iii. Morale would be higher because they would work directly with

the judge.

3. Should Probation Be Combined with Parole?

a. Probation and Parole are analogous services, both supervising people

who are serving portions of their sentences in the community.

b. Supporters of combining argue that:

i. It promotes more efficient hiring and training practices.

ii. It promotes better professionalization of community officers.

c. Others argue that:

i. There are subtle and important differences between the two

populations, and these differences call for different handling.

ii. People on probation have less criminal lifestyles.

iii. People on parole always face a more difficult time re-entering

the community.

Media Tool

Visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuMshrlKi5Q

o Probation officer qualities

o Discuss what it takes to work in probation. What types of qualities would rule out this

career choice?

III. The Dual Functions of Probation Investigation and Supervision

Learning Objectives 3: Discuss the purpose and content of the presentence investigation report

2. The officer then seeks to verify, clarify, and amplify the information, including

anything that has been omitted.

3. The final PSI document:

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Chapter 8: Probation

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a. Summarizes the findings.

b. Evaluates the findings.

c. Recommends a sentence (often).

B. Supervision begins once the person is sentenced to probation.

2. The two establish supervision goals that comply with conditions established by

the court.

3. The officer decides how to terminate probation after examining client’s

response to probation.

C. Investigation and supervision are divergent functions.

1. In preparing the PSI, the officer primarily works with human service

professionals and develops a sense of partnership with the judge.

a. Supervision is fraught with uncertainty, intangible rewards, and little

sense of accomplishment.

i. Large departments specialize their staff in order to circumvent

this problem, but this can produce inefficiencies.

ii. Supervising officer must relearn the information in the PSI.

iii. If convicted of another offense, the supervising officer should

write the PSI.

D. The Investigative Function: Preparing a presentence investigation report

1. The purpose of the presentence investigation is to help the judge select an

3. Two different goals constrain the influence of the PSI in sentencing.

a. The rehabilitative goal requires assessment of the client’s treatment

needs. i. Does the client have special problems that led to the crime?

ii. Can these be overcome by community services and careful

supervision?

4. Two circumstances constrain the influence of the PSI on sentencing.

a. Judges often seek a balance between rehabilitation and risk

5. Contents of the PSI:

1. PSIs aren’t useful unless the information is valid and reliable.

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in part.

2. Victim impact statements reflect the impact of the crime on the victim.

a. Probation officer must interview victim and in their words report

3. Recommendations: Sentencing recommendations are a controversial

aspect of the PSI because a person without authority to sentence is

suggesting what the sentence should be.

4. Disclosure: In many states, the defense does not receive a copy of the

report: Williams v. New York.

a. Sixteen states require full disclosure of the PSI.

5. Private PSIs: Private investigative firms have recently begun to provide

judges with presentence investigation reports.

a. This is often called client-specific planning.

b. In one model, the firm serves as an advocate for the defendant. In

the second, the court hires a private investigator to provide a neutral

Chapter 8: Probation

Class Discussion/Activity

Create a fictional account of a person with a complete history, rap sheet, and school and work

records. Divide the class into groups of three. Assign each a role as a PO consulting firm (from

the perspective of the convicted person) and private PSI author. Have each develop a PSI for this

person. Compare in class not only the differences that appear as a result of the difference of

perspective but also the differences based upon the individual performing the PSI evaluation.

See Assignment 4

IV. The Supervision Function

Learning Objective 5: Describe the dynamics that occur among the probation officer, the

person on probation, and the probation bureaucracy and Learning Objective 6: Identify the

different kinds of probation conditions and explain why they are important.

A. The Officer: Probation officers face role conflict in virtually every aspect of the job.

2. The chief conflict between the two roles arises from their use of power and

authority.

a. Power is the ability to force a person to do something he or she doesn’t

want to do. (The lack of substantive power explains why probation

3. Probation Specialists have argued that their roles can best be modeled through

motivational interviewing.

B. The Client: The client’s response has a great influence on the overall effectiveness of

probation and depends on part on his/her perception of the officer’s power as the

relationship increases.

1. Officers must decide between two styles of supervision: supportive or

controlling.

C. The Bureaucracy: This imposes both formal and informal constraints on supervision.

1. Formal constraints are the “legal conditions” of probation that are set by the

court or written into the law. There are three kinds of conditions for probation.

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in part.

2. Formal organizational policy constraints frequently pale compared to informal

constraints imposed by bureaucratic pressures. Three such pressures are as

follows:

a. Case control

b. Case management structure

c. Competence

What If Scenario

What if you needed to attach conditions of release to the general population of probationers?

What would you stipulate?

See Assignment 3

VI. The Effectiveness of Supervision

Learning Objective 7: Define recidivism and describe its importance to probation and Learning

1. Supervision experience, classification of convicted individuals, officers’

competence, treatment types, and policies of probation agencies contribute to the

effectiveness of recidivism more than does the caseload.

Class Discussion/Activity

Ask students to think about factors that contribute to recidivism. List the factors on the board and

discuss ways probation may be more or less effective than incarceration at targeting those factors

in a positive way.

What If Scenario

What if you were asked to work with chronic recidivists and yet maintain a positive attitude

about your job? Would you request a higher or lower case load? Why or why not?

B. Case Management Systems: “Model system” developed for case management based

on: 1. Statistical risk assessment: The use of statistically developed risk assessment

2. Systematic needs assessments: Requires evaluation according to a list of

potential needs areas.

3. Contact supervision standards: Clients are classified into supervision “levels,

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4. Case planning:

5. Workload accounting: This is time studies that estimate the number of staff

needed to carry out supervision. It is a better measure than merely counting cases.

C. Evidence-Based Supervision

Learning Objective 8: Define evidence-based practice and discuss its importance.

1. Researchers have begun to systematically investigate the differences between

2. Community-based programs that follow these principles more effectively

reduce recidivism rates:

3. Overall, the evidence-based movement in community supervision has tended to

support the value of programs, when they are applied to high-risk people on

probation and use methods that are designed to reduce risk.

D. Specialized Supervision Programs

1. The needs of probationers vary dramatically.

3. Recent interest in the problem of substance abuse has increased the attention

given to people on probation with drug and alcohol problems by using new

4. Another specialized program pairs a probation officer more closely with street

police officers.

5. Specialized programs create conflict between “specialized” officers and those

who handle “regular” case officers. Regular cases become regarded as less

attractive.

E. Performance-Based Supervision: It questions about the effectiveness of community

supervision have spawned this reform.

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1. This approach emphasizes the importance of results in setting priorities and

2. Focus on public safety is expressed in two ways.

a. Chooses supervision strategies that reflect what is known about the

effectiveness of supervision

b. Sets goals for improved supervision outcomes with their clients

D. Is Probation Effective Regardless?

1. Most studies of supervision effectiveness compare different probation

2. One recent study, however, showed a few case factors predicted new criminal

behavior yet most people showed a large and abrupt reduction in offending after

being placed on probation.

Media Tool

Visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBAT07UEWug&feature=related

o GPS Supervision

o Discuss in class. What are the pros and cons of GPS monitoring?

See Assignments 2 and 5

VIII. Revocation and Termination of Probation

Learning Objective 10: Discuss the revocation of probation, including “technical” revocation.

A. Probation status is ended in one of two ways:

2. The person’s probationary status is revoked because of misbehavior.

B. The most common reason for revocation is another offense.

C. Rules violations that result in revocations are technical violations.

1. Revocation for technical violations is controversial because these are things

that are not illegal.

D. Somewhere between one-fifth and one-third of probationers do not abide by their

conditions.

E. A RAND study found much higher rates of offending:

1. More than one-third were arrested or charged with a technical violation.

2. Of these, 65 percent were arrested, while 51 percent were actually convicted.

F. It is possible probation works better in some places than others.

G. The approved practice is to handle the revocation in three stages because the client has

several due process rights. The approved practice is as follows:

1. Preliminary hearing (stage one)—determine if probable cause exists for the

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in part.

2. Hearing (stage two)—the facts of the allegation are heard and determined.

Person on probation has right to counsel

3. Sentencing (stage three)—whether to impose confinement or amend the

probation conditions.

H. Probation in the Coming Decade

1. Two increasingly divergent types of probation:

2. Probation administrators are changing the way they want to be evaluated. The

traditional measure has been arrest rates. Some want to measure “performance

3. Probation finds itself at a crossroads.

Class Discussion/Activity

Have students discuss what factors they would consider when revoking probation of an

incarcerated individual. Would they have more leniencies for males or females? Why or why

not?

What If Scenario

What if, as a probation officer, you ignore minor violations from your probationer who has

otherwise come so far? What might the long-term consequences be?

LECTURE NOTES

The focus of this chapter is probation. Begin by reviewing what probation actually is. The

chapter explores the roots of probation in America in traces its development over time. The story

of probation offers an opportunity to explore how practices come to make their way into the

correctional system. Be sure to emphasize the relationship between social forces and correctional

practice.

Instructor’s Manual

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people are placed on probation. The chapter describes the current structure of probation. The

authors ask who should administer probation and just how it ought to be utilized. Have students

discuss the issues.

This chapter divides the functions of probation into two categories: investigation and

supervision. Review each purpose and their many dimensions as highlighted in the reading. Be

sure and delve into the creation, rationale, and role of the presentence investigation. The chapter

emphasizes that sentencing recommendations in PSIs are controversial. Discuss the controversies

One of the most important parts of this chapter focuses on the complicated matter of

effectiveness of supervision. Ask them how they would define or measure effectiveness and

review the authors’ offerings.

The chapter culminates with a discussion of probation’s future. The reality of caseloads and

resources must be addressed. The chapter notes that there is a growing movement for “evidence–

based” practice in dealing with those under community supervision—probation or parole.

KEY TERMS

Judicial reprieve

A practice under English common law whereby a judge could suspend the imposition or

execution of a sentence on condition of good behavior.

Recognizance

A formally recorded obligation to perform some act (such as keep the peace, pay a debt, or

appear in court when called) entered by a judge to permit a person who has been charged with or

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convicted of a crime to live in the community, often on posting a sum of money as surety, which

is forfeited by nonperformance.

Presentence Investigation (PSI)

An investigation and summary report of a convicted person’s background that helps the judge

decide on an appropriate sentence. Also known as a presentence report.

Victim impact statement

A descriptions in a PSI of the costs of the crime for the victim, including emotional and financial

losses.

Client-specific planning

Process by which private investigative firms contract with the person to conduct comprehensive

background checks and suggest to judges creative sentencing options as alternatives to

incarceration.

Power

The ability to force a person to do something he or she does not want to do.

Punitive conditions

Constraints imposed on some probation clients to increase the restrictiveness or painfulness of

probation, including fines, community service, and restitution.

Treatment conditions

Constraints imposed on some probation clients to force them to deal with a significant problem

or need, such as substance abuse.

Instructor’s Manual

Recidivism

The return of a former correctional client to criminal behavior, as measured by new arrests or