Prescription of Psychotropic Medication after Prison Release Linked to Lower Rate of Violent Reoffending

JAMA: Among released prisoners in Sweden, rates of violent reoffending were lower during periods when individuals were dispensed antipsychotics, psychostimulants, and drugs for addictive disorders, compared with periods in which they were not dispensed these medications, according to a study appearing in the November 1 issue of JAMA.

Forced rehabilitation of drug users in Indonesia not a solution

TheConversation: Earlier this year, Indonesia executed 14 people, including Bali Nine duo Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, for drug offences. President Joko Widodo portrayed the executions as the ultimate weapon in an expansive “war on drugs” deployed to protect the country’s young generation from an  alleged “national drug emergency”. But his policy is harming the very people he claims he wishes to protect.

Juvenile incarceration yields less schooling, more crime

MIT: Teenagers who are incarcerated tend to have substantially worse outcomes later in life than those who avoid serving time for similar offenses, according to a distinctive new study co-authored by an MIT scholar. “We find that kids who go into juvenile detention are much less likely to graduate from high school and much more likely to end up in prison as adults,” says Joseph Doyle, an economist at the MIT Sloan School of Management and co-author of a new paper detailing the results of the study.

Study examines health factors influence on ex-prisoners’ chances of returning to jail

Melbourne: Ex-prisoners with a history of risky drug use, mental illness or poverty are more likely to end up back behind bars, a new University of Melbourne study has revealed. And those who are obese, are chronically ill or have attempted suicide are more likely to remain in the community, the research found. These are some of the findings from an exploratory study into health-related factors that could be used to predict whether a person released from prison will end up in custody again. It was led by Emma Thomas of the University of Melbourne and is published in Springer’s journal Health & Justice, an open access journal. University of Melbourne Associate Professor Stuart Kinnner is a co-author.

Sexual offending treatment programmes in prisons and hospitals are ineffective

BMJ. UK: Sexual offending treatment programmes do not rehabilitate criminals before they are released from prison, warns an expert in The BMJ. The UK has experienced a number of high profile sexual offending cases that has led to more disclosures and probably more prosecutions.