Descriptive Profile of Older Women Offenders

• NCJ Number: 238466
• Author(s): Leigh Greiner; Kim Allenby
• Date Published: November 2010
• Length: 23 pages
• Sponsoring Agency: Correctional Service Canada
• Sale Source: Correctional Service Canada
• Publication Format: Document
• Publication Type: Report (Study/Research)
• Language: English
• Country: Canada

Annotation

This study provides a comprehensive profile of older women offenders; compares the assessed levels of risk and needs of older and younger women offenders; assesses the relevance/use of a typology to classify older women offenders.

Abstract

Results show that older women offenders fell into one of four categories based upon their offense history: Older first-time offenders (n = 61), who had committed their first offense after 50 years of age; Long term first-time offenders (n = 48) who had committed their first offense prior to 50 years of age and were serving a long term sentence; Middle age first-time offenders (n = 20) who had committed their first offense in middle age (yet prior to 50 years of age) and received a sentence of less than 10 years; and Recidivists (n = 32) who had sentenced to more than 1 Federal sentence. Results suggest that, older women were rated as having lower overall needs, lower overall risk, and a higher reintegration potential when compared to women offenders under the age of 50. Compared to younger women, older women were found to have lower needs in the domains of employment, associates, substance abuse, and attitude. In terms of institutional misconduct, results suggest that older women are less likely to be victims or perpetrators of minor or major institutional incidents than their younger counterparts. With regard to programming, it was found that older women were significantly less likely to enroll in, or complete educational programs. They were also less likely than younger women to enroll in substance abuse programs, or psychology programs. However, they were significantly more likely to enroll in and complete 'other' programs (e.g., chaplaincy, personal development) than their younger counterparts. Data were collected on women offenders who were 50 years or older. Both groups were composed of 160 women, of which 54 were in custody and 106 were under community supervision. 16 tables, 41 references, and 7 appendixes