14 DAY TRIAL // According to a new scientific study published in the June issue of the American Sociological Review, a publication of the American Sociological Association (ASA), convicts who are released from jail on parole (parolees) are less likely to be incarcerated again shortly if they relocate their homes to other areas. Experts analyzed the behavior of detainees that were released during Hurricane Katrina, when they were simply forced to move away, even for a short while, on account of the natural disaster.
The research was conducted in the Louisiana Gulf Coast area, where numerous neighborhoods were altogether destroyed and had to be completely evacuated, and the inhabitants moved to other locations. In charge of the social experiment was David Kirk, who is a sociologist at The University of Texas in Austin. A press release on ASA's official website shows that the study was able to determine the fact that the number of parolees going back to jail from those areas was at least 15 percent smaller than the national average.
Additionally, the research shows, those who moved residence were also less likely to return to prison than two surveyed control groups that were released from detention before Katrina (1,538 and 1,731 parolees, respectively), and also than a group released after the hurricane struck, made up of 1,370 people. All of the detainees were originally apprehended and convicted in the New Orleans metropolitan area. “We may find that Hurricane Katrina led to positive outcomes for this particular slice of the population. The lesson may be that residential change can lead to a turning point in the lives of parolees,” Kirk said.
“Successful prisoner reintegration depends, in part, on providing opportunities for prisoners to separate from their criminal past. Prisoners typically return home to the same crime-producing environment, with the same criminal opportunities and peers that proved so detrimental prior to incarceration,” Kirk explained. All in all, it may prove beneficial to authorities in areas with high crime rates to provide the recently released parolees with the opportunity to move away from the area, so that they don't return to their lives as outlaws immediately after they leave prison.