NCJ Number
144104
Date Published
1993
Length
16 pages
Annotation
This paper reports on an assessment of the Focused Offender Disposition Program (FOD), a federally funded demonstration program designed to develop an initial classification system that can provide courts with reasonable criteria for deciding on the broad type of treatment needed by any given drug offender.
Abstract
The classification system developed was called the Offender Profile Index (OPI). The evaluation of FOD in the three target sites found that the OPI was viewed positively by judges, probation officers, the majority of the TASC people interviewed, and criminal justice managers. The OPI is continuing to receive acceptance by agencies that are attempting to use an initial assessment instrument to classify types of service needs. By contrast, empirical data collected during the course of the project found that there were few significant differences between the study groups on such basic variables as length of stay in treatment, drugs found in urine, and reasons for termination. As such, the data did not provide statistical evidence for the ability of the OPI to improve treatment needs assessment over what the local systems were already doing. Moreover, the data could not be used to argue the relative effectiveness of "urine monitoring only" versus conventional treatment; however, the authors' observations and process evaluation interviews suggested some explanations for the lack of differences between the study groups, particularly in the areas of "system conditions" and "study group distinctions." 3 notes and 25 references