NCJ Number
78898
Journal
Monatsschrift fuer Kriminologie und Strafrechtsreform Volume: 63 Issue: 4 Dated: (August 1980) Pages: 231-241
Date Published
1980
Length
11 pages
Annotation
Statistics on furloughs of prisoners from Hamburg prisons are analyzed.
Abstract
Statistics indicate that the rearrest or disappearance rate for inmates on furlough rose only slightly from 18 percent in 1976 to 20.4 percent in 1979. Prisoners on furlough did not have to be rearrested in over 95 percent of the cases. Statistics for the present study derive from records of 113, 140, and 33 prisoners from three very different Hamburg prisons. Results indicate that furlough violations are highest (around 39 percent of the prisoners given furloughs) in the facility for prisoners with long sentences. Over half of the furlough violations occur upon the first three furloughs. Furlough violators generally act in protest, because they have unsolved personal problems, or because they succumb to an individual weakness, for example, for alcohol. The assumption that visits to wives or fiancees have a stabilizing influence has proved false: half of such visits cause massive difficulties. In closed prisons, furlough violators tend to have more previous convictions and to be older than nonviolators. Drug or alcohol abuse history and previous regular working habits seem to have little effect on violations. None of these factors appear to be relevant in open prisons. The difference is attributed to the excessive expectations of inmates in closed prisons, who are frequently disappointed when they actually taste freedom. In considering furloughs as a part of rehabilitation treatment, one must weigh short-term against long-term risks. The measure seems justified, for while some new offenses are committed by furlough violators, the recidivism rate of prisoners who have had furloughs is lower than the rate of those who have not. Rather than abandoning the furlough system because of short-term risks, efforts should be made to provide prefurlough and postfurlough counseling, to improve the system of establishing qualifications of individuals for furloughs, and to expand understanding of the course and consequences of furloughs. Tables, notes, and a bibliography are supplied.