Toward Accountability: A Qualitative Assessment of Supervision Officers’ Responses to Noncompliance During the Covid Pandemic
Probation and parole officers have a great deal of discretion in deciding how to respond to noncompliance. Among the range of possible tools, research indicates that many supervision agencies rely on deterrence-based strategies that focus on incarceration as the primary response to supervision noncompliance (Hamilton et al., 2016; Hawken & Kleiman, 2009). The underlying goal of incarceration as a sanction, including short-term periods of confinement, is to disrupt and discourage clients from continued engagement in antisocial behaviors including drug and substance abuse (Kleiman et al., 2014). Use of incarceration in response to violations often requires a process of submitting paperwork, obtaining a warrant, and/or receiving judicial approval (Steen et al., 2013). In addition, there are many forms of noncompliance that range in seriousness, all of which may not warrant such an extreme response. For these reasons, agencies and their officers may turn to other graduated sanctions that emphasize increased control or surveillance (Taxman et al., 1999). These graduated sanctions range in terms of severity. For example, PPOs can prescribe incremental responses to escalating behaviors such as providing verbal warnings, increasing the frequency of drug testing, increasing the number of required office visits, or enhancing the level of surveillance via electronic monitoring devices (Taxman et al., 1999). Probation and parole officers may also use therapeutic responses to address violation behaviors (Taxman, 2008). These strategies may include referrals to substance use and/or mental health treatment programs, cognitive behavioral programs, residential treatment, or community service (Hamilton et al., 2016). However, very little research examines the frequency with which PPOs apply different types of responses to violation behaviors or the conditions under which different types of responses are applied.
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Prior to the pandemic, PPOs considered a range of factors when deciding how to respond to noncompliance, including the type of violation, severity, and individual’s pattern of behavior. However, during the pandemic PPOs had much less discretion. While theoretically, they could still choose to file a violation, a formal filing was seen as largely symbolic. As a result, PPOs began to file violations less frequently and instead used alternative methods to ensure a more certain and swift response to noncompliance. These methods included use of graduated sanctions, particularly increased communication, electronic monitoring, increasing contacts, and referrals to treatment. Many of these responses encapsulate practices grounded in the principles of effective intervention. For example, limiting intervention with lower risk clients and focusing on improved communication and rapport with clients represent key practices associated with improved supervision outcomes (Bonta & Andrews, 2017; Mowen et al., 2018). These shifts are in line with previous research suggesting that punitive, incarceration-based responses are ineffective for eliciting positive behavioral change and improved supervision outcomes (Boman et al., 2019; Pattavina et al., 2024).
