Introduction

This introductory chapter sets out the purpose of the book, which is to analyze why criminal recidivism rates remain persistently high and to reorient the search for solutions to recidivism by focusing on the importance of place of residence. This chapter situates the study by describing the facts about mass incarceration and prisoner reentry in the United States, including the fact that half of exiting prisoners are reincarcerated within three years of prison release. Many social critics have claimed that “nothing works” to rehabilitate prisoners. However, this book argues that residential change is an overlooked solution to chronic recidivism. This chapter introduces Hurricane Katrina as a natural experiment for examining the question of whether residential relocation away from an old neighborhood can lead to desistance from crime. Katrina provided an alternate reality for examining the relationship between where people live and their behavior.

Epilogue

The Epilogue takes the policy discussion a step further, describing an experimental demonstration project that uses housing subsidies to incentivize recently released prisoners to move to new cities. This demonstration project, which is called the Maryland Opportunities through Vouchers Experiment, or MOVE for short, was designed to determine if residential change, in this case induced through a real-world housing intervention, might yield the same reductions in recidivism that the moves from Hurricane Katrina produced. Thus, the book ends with a discussion of how the lessons of a unique but tragic natural experiment might be put to use to lower criminal recidivism. The Epilogue describes pilot results which suggest that residential relocation, along with stable housing, can yield significant reductions in the likelihood of criminal recidivism.

Residential Relocation as a Remedy to Recidivism

Relying upon Hurricane Katrina as a natural experiment, Chapter 4 provides quantitative evidence on the extent to which residential change lessens the likelihood of criminal recidivism during the first eight years following prison release. Analyses reveal that formerly incarcerated individuals who moved away from their old parish after release had substantially lower rates of reincarceration than those who returned to their previous parish of residence. An estimated 59 percent of parolees who returned to their home parish were reincarcerated within eight years of release. In contrast, an estimated 46 percent of parolees who moved to a new parish were reincarcerated. Findings presented in the chapter also reveal that short-distance moves are insufficient to separate someone from his or her criminal past. Moving from one metropolitan area to another can provide the type of separation from one’s past that can be crucial to desistance from crime. The chapter also considers evidence on the effects of residential change from government-funded housing mobility programs, including the Moving to Opportunity (MTO) demonstration. These programs offer important lessons about how residential mobility programs for the formerly incarcerated might be designed.

Mechanisms of Criminal Persistence

Chapter 3 introduces the case studies that compose the qualitative part of the mixed-methods data collection, and examines cases of individuals who persisted in criminal activity after their release from incarceration. Commonly, individuals who returned home to neighborhoods in close proximity to where they resided prior to incarceration tended to quickly fall back into old patterns of behavior, and ended up back in prison in short order. For instance, a contributor to relapse into active drug use is the fact that many released prisoners return home to the same environment, with the same criminal peers and opportunities for drug use, that proved so detrimental to their behavior in the past. This chapter shows that several of the most potent mechanisms of criminal persistence discussed in the literature appear to be particularly damaging in familiar social environments where someone resided in the past.

Considering Negative Cases

While the weight of the evidence presented thus far in the book suggests that residential change is an important contributor to desistance from crime, it is not always sufficient to bring about a change in behavior. Chapter 8 presents negative cases, including individuals who managed to move away from their old parishes following Hurricane Katrina, but who nevertheless still persisted in their criminal behavior, partly due to their addiction to drugs. If residential relocation has the potential to lower the likelihood of recidivism, it is important to understand under what conditions it can promote desistance from crime and under what conditions it does not appear to be sufficient. Conversely, this chapter also examines the case of an individual named Darnell who desisted from crime despite returning to the familiar setting of New Orleans, partly due to strong social bonds. Consideration of negative cases is critical for refining our understanding about the role of residential change in curtailing recidivism.

Policy Levers to Foster Residential Change and Reduce Recidivism

Chapter 9 seeks to inform public policy debates about how to reduce criminal recidivism, with a particular focus on parole and housing policies. In many states, prisoners released onto parole are legally required to return to their county of last residence, thus contributing to a return to old neighborhoods. Accordingly, this chapter argues that parole policies and practices need to be fundamentally altered. In addition, barriers to securing housing mean that many former prisoners will return to their home neighborhoods even when they do not want to because they simply have nowhere else to go. Such barriers curtail efforts at residential change and residential mobility. This chapter suggests that policies that expand stable housing opportunities for the formerly incarcerated, particularly opportunities outside of their old neighborhoods, may be a fruitful way to reduce recidivism. The chapter concludes by calling for a multipronged approach to reduce recidivism, including both mobility-based strategies and place-based interventions.

The Maintenance of Desistance

This is the first of two chapters presenting qualitative evidence for understanding why moving away from old neighborhoods can lead to desistance from crime. Chapter 6 examines the case of a former gang leader named Kenneth who was convicted of manslaughter. Whereas guilt and remorse may have been the initial reasons for Kenneth’s desistance from crime, his post-prison experiences touch upon several potential mechanisms explaining why a change of residence helps maintain his desistance. These mechanisms included marriage and parenthood, employment, separation from criminal peers, reduced opportunity for crime, and a new set of daily routines. More generally, his residential move severed some of his short-term situational inducements to crime and thereby provided a foundation for him to pursue long-term commitments to conformity. Additionally, this chapter explores the utility of residential change for separating individuals from the street codes and violent expectations of an old neighborhood.

The Wrath of Hurricane Katrina

The chapter describes the devastation to New Orleans and the Louisiana Gulf Coast inflicted by Hurricane Katrina. In Orleans Parish, 71.5 percent of housing units suffered some damage following Hurricane Katrina, with 42 percent severely damaged. The extent of housing destruction was similar in adjacent parishes of the wider New Orleans metropolitan area. Consequently, many prisoners released soon after Katrina could not go back to their old neighborhoods, as they normally would have done. Typically, 75 percent of individuals released from prison return to their former parish of residence. In the first six months after Katrina, just 50 percent returned to their home parish. Thus, this chapter shows that Hurricane Katrina fundamentally altered prevailing geographic patterns of prisoner reentry in Louisiana, affecting residential change and residential mobility for this population.

People, Places, and Things

Chapter 7 describes the life history of Vernon, a middle-aged Black man with a history of crack addiction and four prior imprisonments. He moved to Houston in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and has successfully desisted from crime. In self-help, peer-group programs such as Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous, it is commonly stressed that to manage addiction it is necessary to avoid the “people, places, and things” associated with previous substance use. Doing so is easier said than done, given that a lack of income and limited housing opportunities often push individuals back to the same environments where they used drugs in the past. Vernon’s case adds validity to the notion that residential change can provide the foundation for true behavioral change for people with substance abuse problems by separating them from the people and places of their past and by fostering an alternate set of daily routines and situations.

For Whom Does Moving Matter?

With evidence from Chapter 4 that residential relocation is associated with a lower likelihood of reincarceration, Chapter 5 examines whether the magnitude of the association is dependent upon an individual’s incarceration history, age, substance abuse problems, gender, or race. With very few exceptions, evidence reveals that most formerly incarcerated individuals reap some benefit from living in a new physical and social environment. However, some groups benefit far more than others from a fresh start in a new location. The effect of residential change on reincarceration is substantially larger for first-releases from imprisonment relative to repeat offenders. Similarly, formerly incarcerated women benefit more than men, as do Whites relative to Blacks. The only subgroup analysis that did not reveal much difference in the magnitude of the effect of residential relocation was related to substance abuse. Individuals with and without a history of substance abuse each benefitted similarly from a residential change.