Effectiveness of Treatment for Drug Abusers under Criminal Justice Supervision.Presentation at the Conference on Criminal Justice Research and Evaluation, 'What to Do about Crime'. Held in Washington, DC. on July 11, 1995

摘要

The proportion of people in the criminal justice system who are substance abusersis very high and has grown larger in recent years. Rehabilitation and treatment offered to prison inmates has had a checkered history in this country, however. This paper interweaves a number of themes related to these facts: the relationship of drugs to crime, the current overcrowded situation in correctional facilities, and state-of-the-art treatment approaches used with substance-abusing offenders who are in custody. The paper presents the findings of studies that have demonstrated that in-custody treatment, particularly the therapeutic community (TC) model, can be effective in preventing rearrest and in other outcomes. Moreover, with this approach, successful outcomes are positively related to the amount of time spent in treatment. Several successful projects--notably Stay'n Out, Cornerstone, Amity Prison TC, Key-Crest, KEEP, and TASC are highlighted. The CDATE project, a 25-year update of the author's study of the effectiveness of correctional treatment, is also described.