What Works With Women Offenders

Rosemary Sheehan, Gill McIvor, Chris Trotter

• Publisher: Willan
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781843922407
• eBook ISBN: 9781134000708
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Criminology
• Index: Social Sciences

The number of women prisoners has been growing rapidly during recent years and in many places has more than doubled in the past decade, significantly outstripping increases in the number of male prisoners and with particular consequences for minority ethnic, black and aboriginal women, who constitute disproportionate levels of prison populations in many countries including Canada, the United States, the UK and Australia. What Works with Women Offenders provides a comprehensive analysis of the issues relating to work with women offenders. Chapters are written by academics and professionals with a high degree of expertise in their specific field, and its practical focus is designed to make it relevant to those working with women offenders. Imprisoning women offenders does not solve the problems that underlie the involvement of women in the criminal justice system, and a particular concern of this book is to identify and develop alternative responses that offer appropriate support and intervention to address womens underlying problems and reduce re-offending. The increase in womens imprisonment is very much an international phenomenon, and the book also aims to share knowledge and experiences from different jurisdictions to be shared more widely, and for the lessons learnt from good practice to be more widely disseminated.

Chapter 1

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The nature of female offending

Gill McIvor

Introduction

This chapter discusses the types of offences women are involved in and how their offending compares (in terms of its rate and seriousness) with offending by men, highlighting the relatively minor nature of the offences most commonly committed by women. However, there is evidence that how criminal justice systems respond to offending by women has changed in recent years. In particular, western jurisdictions have witnessed a dramatic increase in women's imprisonment (in terms of both the numbers of women imprisoned and the sentenced female prison population) that has far outstripped any such increases in the imprisonment of men. This chapter will argue that the observed increases in women's imprisonment cannot be attributed to increases in the severity of female offending but appear instead to reflect more punitive responses by the courts to offending by women. Recognising the harmful effects of imprisonment upon women and their families (and its ineffectiveness in reducing the risk of further offending), some jurisdictions have, with varying degrees of success, developed strategies aimed at encouraging greater use of community-based disposals. The Scottish experience will be drawn upon to illustrate how, despite policy commitments to improve the range and quality of resources available to female offenders in the community, the trend toward carceral expansion cannot easily be reversed.

Women's offending

The incidence of female offending

Perhaps the most striking feature of offending by women is its relative infrequency in comparison with offending by men. Across different jurisdictions, women represent a relatively small proportion of those convicted and sentenced by the courts. For example, in England and Wales, women represented only 19% of those cautioned by the police or convicted of an offence (referred to as ‘known offenders’) in 2002 (Home Office 2003) and 19% of defendants who were convicted of an offence in 2005 (Home Office 2006). In 2006 more men than women were convicted of all categories of indictable offences, with the exception of cruelty to or neglect of children (where 59% of those convicted were female).

With respect to summary offences, in 2005 women were more likely than men to have been convicted of Education Act offences (not sending children to school) and non-payment of a television licence (where 73% and 63% respectively of those convicted were women) (Home Office 2006). With the exception of ‘offences by a prostitute’ (where 99% of defendants were women) it is obvious that offending that is predominantly committed by women in England and Wales is connected very much to the domestic sphere. The fact that women's offending is also, in general, less serious than offending by men is illustrated by the finding that women represented only 15% of those convicted of indictable (that is, more serious) offences in 2005 but 20% of those convicted summarily (that is, of less serious offences) (Home Office 2006).

Similarly, in Scotland, men accounted for 84% of all convictions in 2004/5. More men than women had a charge proved against them in almost all crime and offence categories, the only exception being ‘other crimes of indecency’ where women accounted for 70% of offences, these being mainly related to prostitution. Unlike in England and Wales, however, similar proportions of those convicted of both crimes and offences¹ in Scotland in 2004/5 were women (Scottish Executive 2006a).

Looking to other jurisdictions, a similar pattern pertains. For instance, in the United States, local data collated centrally by the FBI indicated that female offenders represented 23% of all arrestees (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2004) while data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics showed that 17% of those convicted of felonies in 2002 were women (Durose and Langan 2005). In Canada 15% of adult court cases in 2002–3 involved a female accused (McCutcheon 2003) while in New Zealand, male offenders accounted for 82% of all cases that resulted in conviction in 2004 (for which the gender of the offender was known) with female offenders accounting for 18% of cases (Lash 2006). In Australia, defendants who were prosecuted in 2004-5 were overwhelmingly male, with this being particularly true of those convicted in the higher courts, where 88% were male (and 12% female). As in other jurisdictions, proportionally more women were prosecuted in the lower courts (22% of cases) (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2006a).

Even though the gap between male and female offending (in terms of the percentages who report having committed illegal acts) is smaller when self-reported offending is considered (e.g. Graham and Bowling 1995; Flood-Page et al. 2000) boys are still more likely than girls to report having committed all but the least common offences (Triplett and Myers 1995; Jamieson et al.1999). Young men also report engaging in different types of offences more frequently than young women and are much more like to report committing more serious offences (Jamieson et al. 1999).

Offences committed by women

The most recent data for England and Wales (Home Office 2006) indicate that women are disproportionately represented among those convicted of thefts from other people, employers and shops, for fraud, police assault, Education Act offences, social security offences, offences by prostitutes, non-payment of fares on public transport and non-payment of television licences.² Numerically, the most common offences for which women were convicted in 2005 were (in descending order): failure to pay for a television licence, driving while disqualified, shoplifting, non-payment of fares on public transport, common assault, offences under the Education Act and failing to surrender to bail (Home Office 2006).

A broadly similar picture is found in Scotland where, aside from prostitution, the categories in which women formed a higher than average proportion of those convicted in 2004–5 included fraud (37%), shoplifting (29%), non-payment of a television licence (69%) and ‘other non-sexual crimes of violence’ (42%) which includes neglect or maltreatment of children (Scottish Executive 2006a). In that year, the most common offences in respect of which women were convicted were failure to pay for a television licence, shoplifting, breach of the peace, assault (including resisting arrest), driving while disqualified and speeding.

Data for Canada indicate that in 20027#x2013;3 men were disproportionately over-represented among those who appeared in court for crimes against the person, criminal code traffic offences and crimes against property. While still representing the minority of those appearing in court, women accounted for a significant proportion of accused charged with prostitution (43% of cases), fraud (29%) and theft, including shoplifting (28%) (McCutcheon 2003). In New Zealand, women are disproportionately represented among those convicted of crimes against property, which includes shoplifting and fraud and under-represented among those convicted of offences involving violence (Lash 2006).

In Australia the most common offences in respect of which both men and women were convicted in 2004–5 were intention to cause injury and drug offences. Gender differences were evident with regard to sexual assaults and deception and related offences, the former being markedly more common among men (14% of those adjudicated compared with 2% of women) and the latter more common among women (18% of those adjudicated compared with 6% of men). The most common offences for both men and women sentenced in magistrates’ courts were road traffic and ‘motor vehicle regulatory offences’. Thereafter the most common offences among male defendants were public order offences (21%) and Acts intended to cause injury (15%). Among women, offences of theft and related offences (25%) and public order offences (15%) were next most common (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2006a).

Additional data for the state of Victoria indicate that the most common categories of offences for women sentenced in the higher (Supreme and County) courts in 2002–3 were robbery and cultivating/ manufacturing/trafficking drugs, especially among younger women in their twenties. Conviction rates for deception (fraud) were also relatively high for women, especially those between 30 and 39 years of age. Women accounted for 13% of all those sentenced (Victoria Department of Justice 2004).

Overall, therefore, this brief comparative analysis suggests that women's offending is less common and less serious than offending by men. These differences in patterns of male and female offending suggest that although there may be certain commonalities, it is likely that the pathways into offending by men and women are different and that different theoretical explanations for male and female involvement in crime are required.

Explanations for offending: pathways and needs

Women's offending challenges traditional theoretical explanations of crime which were developed essentially to explain offending by men. This has resulted in the development of theoretical explanations for women's offending that have focused upon a range of biological, psychological and sociological factors and which increasingly have incorporated feminist analyses to locate women's offending within patriarchal structures and wider socio-structural influences (Gelsthorpe 2004). Increasingly, attention is being paid to identifying the factors which appear to be related to women's pathways towards crime. For example, in the UK, Farrington and Painter (2004) found that socio-economic factors (such as low social class, low family income, poor housing and large family size) and child-rearing practices (such as low levels of praise by the parents, harsh or erratic discipline, poor parental supervision, parental conflict, and low paternal interest in children and in their education) were better predictors of offending among women than among men.

An understanding of how women become involved in crime can be gained from the accounts of women themselves or from the analysis of the experiences and characteristics of women drawn into the criminal justice system. These analyses suggest that women's offending is often rooted in poverty and deprivation (for example, stealing to provide for children) or problems relating to substance misuse. Female offenders frequently have experiences of abuse, psychological problems (including depression and low self-esteem) and past or present involvement in abusive personal relationships (Chesney-Lind 1997; Loucks 2004; Rumgay 2000). What is less clear, however, is whether and in what ways these experiences contribute to women's offending. Whilst the links between poverty and drug use and crime may be understood at a simplistic level in essentially utilitarian terms, the relationships between women's histories of abuse and their involvement in criminal activity are less clearly discerned (e.g. Dowden and Andrews 1999).

It is now recognised that women are likely to have different ‘criminogenic needs’ from men (Hedderman 2004a) because their routes into offending and reasons for offending are often different (Jamieson et al. 1999). Experiences of physical and sexual abuse appear to be more specific (though not unique) to women (Hollin and Palmer 2006). Others — such as criminal history, unemployment and substance misuse — appear to pertain to both men and women. However, even if certain factors appear to be associated both with women's offending and with offending by men, it not necessarily the case that the way in which these factors intersect with offending is similar for men and women. For example, analysis of data from the Drug Use Careers of Offenders (DUCO) study in Australia (Makkai and Payne 2003; Johnson 2004) suggests that drug use may play a different role in the development of male and female offending, with men more likely than women to report having engaged in offending prior to their first use of drugs (Australian Institute of Criminology 2005). This is consistent with Jamieson et al.'s (1999) finding that the offending of young women in their late teens and early twenties in Scotland was usually drug related. Many young women in that study reported having been initiated into drug-use by their male partners and having begun committing offences to finance their (and often their partner's) use of illicit drugs. This being so, they considered desistance from offending to be unlikely unless their drug problems were addressed.

Gender and desistance from crime

Traditionally, criminological interest has focused upon when and why young people start offending, with a view to both understanding the aetiology of crime and identifying methods of preventing young people from becoming involved in committing offences. Offending is, essentially, an age-related phenomenon and most young people — male and female — eventually ‘grow out of crime’. In recent years, however, increasing attention has been paid to the processes associated with desistance from offending: how and why people eventually stop committing crimes (e.g. Burnett 1992; Leibrich 1993; Graham and Bowling 1995; Rex 1999; Maruna 2001; Farrell 2002). An enhanced understanding of the processes that accompany or promote the cessation of offending may, it is argued, inform the development of more effective interventions with young people who have already begun to offend (McNeill 2003, 2006).

Although research on desistance has concentrated primarily upon men, a few studies have included both sexes (e.g. Graham and Bowling; 1995; Leibrich 1992; Maruna 2001; Uggen and Kruttschnitt 1998) or have focused solely upon women (e.g. Sommers et al. 1994; Katz 2000). There is evidence that young women, who are of course less likely to offend in the first place, desist sooner than young men (Graham and Bowling 1995; Jamies...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Full Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface and acknowledgements
• List of figures and tables
• Notes on contributors
• Introduction
• 1 The nature of female offending
• 2 The transitional pathways of young female offenders: towards a non-offending lifestyle
• 3 Sentencing and gender
• 4 Risks and needs: factors that predict women's incarceration and inform service planning
• 5 Responding to drug and alcohol problems: innovations and effectiveness in treatment programmes for women
• 6 Offending behaviour programmes for women offenders
• 7 Parole and probation
• 8 Responding to mental health needs of women offenders
• 9 Responding to the health needs of female offenders
• 10 Women prisoners and their children
• 11 Barriers to employment, training and education in prison and beyond: a peer-led solution
• 12 Employment: offending and reintegration
• 13 Housing and support after prison
• 14 What does work for women offenders?
• Index