Punish Offenders

If offenders commit crimes it is right that they should be punished. The Courts decide on the sentence, depending on the nature of the crime. Working alongside the Prison Service, it is the job of Probation to administer sentences.

Prison is the right place for offenders who are a serious risk to the public. But for many offenders, Community Sentences are a more effective form of punishment.

Community Sentences have been proven to be more effective in reducing offending.

Community Sentences are not a soft option. Some offenders even say that the hard work and hassle of a long community sentence can be a bigger deterrent than a short stay in prison.

If offenders go into prison, they can lose their jobs, income, homes and personal friends. So when they come out of prison, these offending related factors can make them more likely to re-offend. The benefit of Community Sentences is that they punish offenders whilst keeping the framework in place that can ultimately lead to offenders becoming law-abiding citizens.

Wiltshire Probation manages three types of punishment for offenders:

Unpaid Work
Curfews - monitored via electronic tagging
Licences - which restrict what offenders can do and where they can go

In 2007/08 Wiltshire Probation:

Managed an average of 2,000 cases during the year
Delivered over 650 awards in basic skills, numeracy and literacy tuition
Managed over 700 offenders through Unpaid Work programmes

The services provided by Probation and its criminal justice partners is making an impact:

5.8% reduction in adult re-offending from 2000 to 2004
4.6% reduction in re-offending rates for offenders discharged from prison
6.7% reduction in re-offending rates for offenders starting community sentences
Only 0.43% of sexual and violent offenders go on to commit a Serious Further Offence

Source: Home Office – March 08

National Offender Management statistics show that the frequency rate of re-offending for offenders given a court order under probation supervision has fallen significantly over the last six years by 23.4%.
Offenders commencing court orders, i.e. community sentences, have lower frequency rates than offenders discharged from prison.
The highest rate of re-offending is by those discharged from short prison sentences, i.e. not under probation supervision. The frequency rate declines as the prison sentence increases, which suggests that those under the longest probation supervision are the least likely to commit a further offence.
Figures, released by the National Offender Management Service in September, show that adult re-offences fell 13% between 2005 and 2006.
The frequency of adult re-offending fell 22.9% between 2000 and 2006.

Unpaid Work

Offenders pay a price for their crimes whilst putting something back into the community.

Wiltshire Probation supervises offenders who are carrying out Unpaid Work as part of a Community Order. The value of this work is equivalent to £3/4 million every year - contributed free to local community projects. Through the Community Payback scheme, local people help decide which community projects benefit from this investment. The scheme is helpful because it enables offenders to make reparation to the local community for their crimes.

All projects that offenders work on are subject to standards laid down by the Home Office. These projects are carefully assessed and are both rigorous and demanding whilst also providing the opportunity for offenders to develop a better understanding of the impact their behaviour may have had on the local community and the wider public.

Through Community Payback Projects we aim to reduce the fear of crime felt by members of the public and reduce re-offending. We do this by helping offenders to acquire new work and life related skills, increase their empathy with victims and thus grow their sense of community responsibility.

By engaging with the local people we aim to ensure that offenders are making direct reparation to the communities against which they have offended.

Recent projects have included painting and decorating, outdoor practical work and caring projects.

To nominate a Community Payback Project, click here

Curfews and tagging

An offender may be ordered to stay at a particular location for certain hours of the day, normally indoors. Curfews help to structure an offender’s life and break the cycle of offending. They will normally have to wear an electronic tag during their sentence.
Curfews were introduced as a mechanism to better protect the public. They introduce regularity into what are often chaotic lifestyles and enhance supervision, disrupting the pattern of offending behaviour.

Offenders are given strict instructions to comply with the time of their curfew. They must adhere to the curfew every day which means significant loss of liberty and puts essential demands, quite rightly, on the offender.

Licences

All offenders sentenced to more than 12 months in prison are released with restrictions on what they can and cannot do in the community. These restrictions are known as licence conditions and compliance with the conditions is supervised by Probation Service staff.

What is a 'licence'?
Some offenders are released from prison before the custodial part of their sentence is due to end. This means that although the offender is released from prison, they are still serving their sentence with conditions on their liberty.

The 'on licence' process helps offenders re-build their lives, return to their families and gain work approved by the person responsible for supervising them.

Conditions of a licence
There are a standard set of conditions as well as additional particular conditions that can be included to manage the risk the offender presents, for example:

restricting them from contacting named individuals such as previous associates or the victim of their crime
preventing them from living in a certain area
requiring them to undergo regular treatment such as drug testing or counselling

Public protection is an over-riding concern and licence conditions are designed to intensively reduce any risks to the public.