I believe that most research does indicate that most of the participants in these programs don't re-assault . . . BUT only about 50% of convicted offenders participate in the programs -- at least in our jurisdiction about 50% absconds, fails, drops out, etc. And those 50% represent 12% of those with a police report, which represent 25% of all perpetrators . . . so that's about 1% of perpetrators do not re-assault because they were in a program or are they in the program because they aren't going to reassault.
. . Actually, I believe that a higher percentage doesn't reassault, but they do it without going through batterers intervention programs (BIP); they do it because someone in the community says this isn't okay (like their prior girlfriend who said get lost, or her friends/brothers who threatened to beat him up, or any of a number of other people). So, there are two parts here -- 1. what contribution does the BIP have in their failure to re-assault (maybe 10%?) and 2. how much attention do we give to a strategy that works with less than 5% of batterers (when such programs exist) compared to how much attention do we give to the social change, higher level of law enforcement/sanctions, etc. Chiquita Juergen Dankwort wrote: >For the record, I believe that participants who are in these programs >adhering to recommended guidelines (existing in most states and >provinces throughout North America now) do not for the most part >re-assault. ***End-violence is sponsored by UNIFEM and receives generous support from ICAP*** To post a message, send it to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe end-violence OR type: unsubscribe end-violence Archives of previous End-violence messages can be found at: http://www.edc.org/GLG/end-violence/hypermail/
