Parole practises in Lithuania: Factors predicting court decisions

This article examines factors that predict parole decisions in Lithuanian courts. The study state has a two-stage discretionary parole system where applicants are first evaluated through a parole board hearing, and the board’s decision is then reviewed in court. The study sample included 360 court verdicts from various court institutions. Intergroup comparisons suggest that parole boards tend to grant parole more often than courts. The results of regression analysis suggest that courts weigh heavily on the decision made by the parole board as well as the number of misconduct reports, time left to serve and previous parole or probation violations.

Discretion in the U.S. Parole System

Parole in the United States serves as both a mechanism of early release from incarceration, as well as the period of supervision that may follow release, early or otherwise. Attached to the concept of parole, writ large, are multiple, seemingly irreconcilable perspectives regarding its purpose. Yet, evidence exists to suggest that all these perspectives are simultaneously reflected in the microlevel discretionary actions of parole practitioners and the macrolevel policies of the parole system. This is suggestive of a complex interplay between the individual discretion exercised by parole practitioners and the formalized legal reforms that, in some cases, attempt to limit such discretion. This article examines three stages of parole—release, supervision, and revocation—to explicate how practitioners use their discretion to resist or subvert reforms designed to curtail that discretion. Ultimately, these forms of resistance have both practical and theoretical implications for the future of parole and policies aimed at its reform.

Making Good: On Parole in Early Twentieth-Century Illinois

Parole laws, passed by most state legislatures at the turn of the century, provide for the release of prisoners before the expiration of their maximum sentence and for their supervision during their transition to free society. This article explores the early years of the parole system in Illinois. While the Illinois parole law indicated that parole agents would watch over ex-prisoners and aid in their rehabilitation, the state instead relied on private individuals, businesses, and voluntary organizations to supervise parolees. Agreements forged between prison officials and these supervisors illustrate the extent to which the private sector took on the functions of the state during the Progressive Era. As a result, employers and voluntary organizations developed a range of surveillance practices to maintain control over former prisoners, using informal systems of assessment and notions of success to evaluate the parolees in their charge. Though the parole system represented innovation on the part of the Illinois state government—a nod to emergent rehabilitative frameworks in penology—the reliance on voluntary organizations and businesses wove older class and gender ideals into this newer, purportedly more scientific and objective institution. This essay illuminates the everyday challenges of life on parole, tracing the experiences of ex-prisoners during the process of reentry and exposing the constant negotiations between employers, voluntary organizations, prisons, and parolees.

Pencapaian Perlaksanaan Program ODP di Malaysia (Achievement ODP Program Implementation in Malaysia)

Pelbagai pendekatan telah dilakukan oleh Jabatan Penjara Malaysia sebagai institusi bertanggungjawab secara khusus dalam pemulihan banduan untuk membantu dalam membina kembali diri mereka agar dapat berperanan semula dalam masyarakat sama ada sebagai isteri, ibu, anak perempuan, kakak, pekerja, dan lain lain. Antara pendekatan diperkenalkan oleh Jabatan Penjara iaitu Sistem Parol yang memainkan peranan penting dalam memastikan banduan yang dibebaskan secara Parol dapat kembali kepada masyarakat sebagai seseorang yang berguna kepada negara dan mematuhi undang-undang yang sedia ada. Oleh itu artikel akan membincangkan mengenai sejauh manakah pencapaian perlaksanaan program Orang Di parol (ODP) yang dilaksanakan oleh Jabatan Penjara Malaysia khususnya di Bahagian Parol dan Perkhidmatan Komuniti berdasarkan kepada kajian yang dilakukan terhadap Pegawai Penjara (40 orang sampel) di bahagian tersebut. Hasil kajian menunjukkan tahap keberkesanan perlaksanaan Program ODP amat memberi kesan yang positif kepada ODP. Namun walaupun berkesan terdapat juga kelemahan-kelemahan dan cabaran-cabaran dalam perlaksanaan program ODP menurut responden. Oleh itu, pihak penjara perlulah sentiasa membuat penambahbaikan Sistem Parol dari masa ke semasa agar terus relevan dengan perubahan zaman supaya menjadi lebih komprehensif dan efesien. Abstract Various approaches have been taken by the Malaysian Prisons Department as an institution specifically responsible for the rehabilitation of prisoners to assist in rebuilding themselves so that they can play a role again in society whether as wives, mothers, daughters, sisters, employees, and others. Among the approaches introduced by the Prisons Department is the Parole System which plays an important role in ensuring that prisoners released by Parole can return to society as someone who is useful to the country and complies with existing laws. Therefore, the article will discuss the extent to which the implementation of the implementation of the ODP program implemented by the Malaysian Prisons Department, especially in the Parole and Community Services Division based on the study conducted on Prison Officers (40 people sample) in that division. The results show that the level of effectiveness of the implementation of the ODP Program has a very positive impact on the ODP. However, although effective, there are also weaknesses and challenges in the implementation of the ODP program according to the respondents. Therefore, the prison must constantly make improvements to the Parole System from time to time in order to remain relevant to the changing times to be more comprehensive and efficient. Keywords: ODP program, parole system, achievement.

Marginal gains or diminishing returns? Penal bifurcation, policy change and the administration of prisoner release in England and Wales

Prisoner release has emerged as a key site of penal policy contestation in England and Wales. A series of crises have undermined public confidence in the parole system and reopened longstanding debates over the confused normative basis of prisoner release policy and practice. This article attempts to locate current concerns within an ideational interpretation of penal policy change. It will argue that prisoner release has been fundamentally re-shaped by a bifurcated penal strategy that emerged as one possible response to the unique challenges of late-modern crime-control. Over time this strategy has provided an enduring guide to collective action and a political template for successive penal reform programmes. However, there are signs that we may now be reaching the conceptual limits of this strategy. While the logic(s) of bifurcation will continue to yield marginal political gains in the short-term, this article concludes that the long-term prognosis is one of diminishing returns with significant implications for the legitimacy, effectiveness and administrative coherence of prisoner release in this jurisdiction.

A New System Takes Shape

The chapter examines the legislative planning process that gradually refined the early release framework eventually given legal effect by Part Two of the Criminal Justice Act 1991. The chapter begins with a review of the post-election planning process that gathered pace following the 1987 General Election. It examines the Home Office strategic awayday held at Leeds Castle in September 1987 and goes on to consider the Green Paper, Punishment, Custody and the Community and an unprecedented conference at Ditchley Park which brought together senior decision-makers from across the criminal justice system. The chapter then examines the passage of the Criminal Justice Bill 1990/91 and reflects upon the dramatic backlash against the new parole system in the mid-1990s. The chapter concludes with a critical appraisal of the underlying tensions that defined the development of criminal justice during this transitional period.

A Very British Compromise

The chapter explores the impact of Roy Jenkins’ appointment as Home Secretary and the detailed legislative planning that resulted in the complex system of parole given legal effect by the Criminal Justice Act 1967. It goes on to examine the administrative steps taken in 1968 to establish the new parole system and limit the damage of a small number of high profile crimes committed by the first cohort of parolees. The chapter concludes by reflecting on the idiosyncratic operation of parole in England and Wales at this time; a very British compromise that would exert a significant influence over the trajectory of early release policy and practice in the subsequent thirty years.