Idaho officials question adult crime ranking
By REBECCA BOONE
Associated Press
Wednesday, April 1, 2009 10:14 AM PDT
BOISE — Idaho criminal justice officials say a national report ranking the state as second in the nation when it comes to the number of adults under correctional control is misleading.
The report, by the Pew Center on the States, found that one in 18 Idaho adults was under correctional control in 2007 — placing the state’s per capita rate second only to Georgia.
But Gregory Sali, research analyst supervisor for the Idaho Department of Correction, said the report skews Idaho’s numbers by counting the state’s population of unsupervised probationers. Officials with the Idaho Supreme Court and the Idaho Association of Counties have joined in criticism of the report.
Not all states have that low-level classification for offenders who commit minor crimes and are considered at low risk to re-offend. In Idaho, unsupervised probationers are not required to check in with probation officers, but the Idaho Department of Correction still monitors all the state’s parolees, Sali said.
But Pew officials stand by their numbers, noting that they gathered them from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics and that the bureau has several methods of verifying the data.
‘‘For all the numbers in the report, in terms of population, we use the Bureau of Justice Statistics and they send out a survey that has real strict definitions,’’ said Adam Gelb, director of the Pew Center on the States.
‘‘Across the board, for Idaho and for all the states, we stuck with the official BJS counts and estimates, which are based on the state’s submission of its parole and probation data,” he said.
According to the report, Idaho has more than 48,000 people on probation and more than 3,000 on parole — in other words, one in every 21 residents is on probation or parole, ranking Idaho second in the nation. Just over 11,000 people are in prison or jail in Idaho, according to the report. That’s 1 in 100 residents, and puts the state at a national rank of 21.
The Pew report combined those two numbers to come up with the 1 in 18 figure.
‘‘Everyone is concerned that that number is an error,’’ said Idaho Courts Administrator Patti Tobias. ‘‘Idaho is doing a fabulous job in strengthening misdemeanor probation across the state. The Department of Correction, the 44 counties, the court and the Criminal Justice Commission — everyone is working together toward that goal.’’
Roughly 33,000 of the more than 48,000 probationers are on unsupervised probation, said William Sabol, chief of the Corrections Statistics Program at the Bureau of Justice Statistics. The remaining probationers are on supervised misdemeanor and felony probation.
Unsupervised probation is typically reserved for those convicted of minor crimes and misdemeanors, and who judges feel are a low risk for reoffending. As long as the probationer meets the requirements set by the judge — like paying fines on time — and doesn’t get in trouble during the probationary period, he or she is released without any further consequences. It’s also a relatively cheap way to deal with crime — Ben Harmer with the Ada County prosecutor’s office says placing someone on unsupervised probation doesn’t cost anything because no one has to be paid to supervise the offender.
The Pew report recommended that although violent criminals need to be locked up, the nation could save money by overseeing nonviolent offenders in their communities.
But because the bulk of Idaho’s offenders under correctional control are probationers who are already being handled in their own community — most without any supervision at all — it’s difficult to say what the report actually means for Idaho, Gelb said.
‘‘Without a lot of additional exploration, it’s really difficult to know what Idaho’s ranking means,’’ he said. ‘‘As a general matter, what we say in the report is that in these very tough times corrections is one area where states can get more public safety with fewer dollars if they strengthen community corrections as a credible alternative to prison for low-risk offenders.’’
Gelb said more intensive research is required to understand why Idaho’s numbers of unsupervised probationers are high and what that means for the state.
Sali contends that Pew’s decision to include those unsupervised probationers artificially inflated Idaho’s ranking.
‘‘My sense is that we’re actually about 1 in 30, and that fits with our incarceration rate, which is just slightly higher than the national average. It’s their publication, so they get to say whatever they want, but it’s just poor research,’’ Sali said.
Still, he said, he agrees with Pew’s premise — that there’s little to be gained and a lot to be spent by locking up nonviolent offenders.
‘‘In Idaho, we do incarcerate more nonviolent offenders than other states and we incarcerate them longer, and as a taxpayer I’m in agreement that you should incarcerate fewer and release them sooner, diverting them to other programs,’’ Sali said. ‘‘I just disagree with how Pew gets there.’’
