NCJ Number
163043
Journal
Penal Issues Issue: 7 Dated: (March 1996) Pages: 3-5
Date Published
1996
Length
3 pages
Annotation
This report presents data on the criminal records of French prisoners released in 1982 after serving at least 3 years in prison; the observation period was 4 years after release.
Abstract
Any type of offense, whether minor or major, was considered. The findings show that 49.7 percent of the subjects committed at least one other offense within the 4-year period; thus, just over 50 percent were not convicted of any new offense of any type. The average time lapse between release and a new offense was 1 year and 1 month. Of the new cases, 90 percent were moderately serious, 7 percent were minor offenses, and 3 percent were major offenses. New moderately serious offenses were mostly simple thefts, motoring offenses, and check fraud. In 5 percent of the cases, the new offense resulted in a sanction at least as serious as the original sentence. Differential analysis was applied to the new case rate using nine variables: gender, nationality, marital status, age when released, previous convictions, nature of the original offense, length of imprisonment originally pronounced, type of release, and proportion of the sentence spent in custody. The most discriminating variable was the nature of the original offense. Seventy-two percent of those who committed a new offense had originally committed simple theft. Those with one or more previous convictions who were released on parole committed 95.6 percent of the new offenses. 4 tables