Integrated Offender Management and the Policing of Prolific Offenders

This book analyses the impact of Integrated Offender Management (IOM) on contemporary policing and separates the rhetoric from the reality. Drawing on a qualitative study within an English police force over two years, this book examines the experiences of prolific offenders, subject to IOM, and sheds light on the culture and practice of the police and staff from other criminal justice agencies, working within the scheme. While IOM has been judged to have had initial successes in reducing the criminal activities of prolific offenders, this book tests the validity of such claims, and considers the apparent disjuncture between policy statements made about the workings of IOM and how IOM policing operations are realized on the ground. It makes a unique contribution to research on police culture and practice, and multi-agency working in the criminal justice system. An accessible and compelling read, this book will appeal to policymakers, as well as students and scholars of criminology, sociology policing, and politics. This book analyses the impact of Integrated Offender Management (IOM) on contemporary policing and separates the rhetoric from the reality. Drawing on a qualitative study within an English police force over two years, this book examines the experiences of prolific offenders, subject to IOM, and sheds light on the culture and practice of the police and staff from other criminal justice agencies, working within the scheme.While IOM has been judged to have had initial successes in reducing the criminal activities of prolific offenders, this book tests the validity of such claims and considers the apparent disjuncture between policy statements made about the workings of IOM and how IOM policing operations are realised on the ground. It makes a unique contribution to research on police culture and practice, and multi-agency working in the criminal justice system.An accessible and compelling read, this book will appeal to policymakers, as well as students and scholars of criminology, sociology policing and politics. Cover 1 Endorsement 2 Half Title 4 Series Information 5 Title Page 6 Copyright Page 7 Dedication 8 Table of Contents 10 Acknowledgements 11 Abbreviations 12 Chapter 1 Integrated Offender Management 14 Introduction 14 Crime, Risk and Security 15 A Brief History of Multi-Agency Offender Management in England and Wales 17 Research On Multi-Agency Offender Management in England and Wales 18 The ‘Common Sense’ Notion of Integrated Offender Management 19 IOM: the Basic Framework and Guiding Principles 20 Targeting and Selecting Potential IOM Participants 22 National Refresh 22 Research On IOM 24 IOM Service Delivery 24 Blurring of Professional Roles 25 Effectiveness of IOM 25 The Perspectives of IOM Participants 26 National Delivery of IOM: a Snapshot 27 Sunnyvale IOM Unit 28 Categories of Offenders Subject to Sunnyvale IOM 29 Operationalising Sunnyvale Policing 30 Questions, Theory and Method 32 The Aims and Structure of the Book 34 Notes 35 References 36 Chapter 2 Fairness and Legitimacy Within Integrated Offender Management 43 Introduction 43 Risk-allocation and Police Role in the Management of Sunnyvale Offenders 44 How IOM Police Legitimacy Might Be Won 45 Procedural Justice 46 Is It Possible to Determine Conclusively the Basis of Felt Obligations to Obey? 48 The Problem of ‘Dull Compulsion’ 49 The Bottoms–Tankebe Approach to Police Legitimacy 49 How Does IOM Fit Into the Bottoms–Tankebe Approach? 52 Empirical Support From the Corrections Setting 52 How IOM Police Legitimacy Might Be Lost 53 Conclusions 55 Note 55 References 55 Chapter 3 Police Decision-Making in a Criminal Justice Setting 59 Introduction 59 Structural Determinants of Police Decision-Making: Surround, Field and Frame 60 Surround 61 Field 62 Frames, Working Assumptions and Rules 63 Decision-framing and the Culture of Frontline Police Officers 65 Cop Culture 67 Challenges to Orthodox Accounts of Cop Culture: Does Talk Translate Into Action? 67 Cop Culture and Its Use as an Analytic Concept 69 The Tenacity of Cop Culture 69 Interactions Between Surround, Field and Frames 70 Conclusion 71 Notes 72 References 73 Chapter 4 Mission Orientation: Partnership Working Within Sunnyvale IOM 77 Introduction 77 [Re]defining the Organisational Field: Traditional Relationships, Multi-Agency Partnerships and Integrated Offender Management 77 Past Positions, Values and Historical Challenges 79 Mission Orientation: Partner Agencies as Intelligence Gatherers 82 Convergence and Divergence: Occupational Attitudes and Relationships 87 Cultural Change 90 Police Offender Managers: the Dominance of the Intelligence Gathering Frame 92 Probation Worker Attitudes: Going the Way of the Police 95 New Operational Understandings 99 Attitudes of Prison Officers Working Within the Sunnyvale Structure 101 Drug Worker Attitudes 103 Recalling Offenders to Prison: a Disparity Between Police Officer and Probation Worker Thinking 105 Conclusions 109 Notes 111 References 112 Chapter 5 ‘Still’ Police Officers: The Culture of Policing Within Sunnyvale IOM 116 Introduction 116 The Culture of Police Decision-Making 117 Making Sense of the Talk and Action of Sunnyvale Police 119 Sunnyvale DET Officers: a Desire for Action and an Exaggerated Sense of Mission 119 Police Offender Managers: Redefining Concepts of Action, Excitement and Mission 121 Police Offender Managers: Resisting Change 123 Women Police Within Sunnyvale IOM 129 Sunnyvale DET Officers: Misogynistic Talk, But Not Reflected in Action 130 Police Offender Managers: the Persistence of Old Misogynistic Assumptions 130 Sunnyvale DET Officers and Offender Managers: a General Absence of Racism 131 Sunnyvale DET Officers: Suspicious, Cynical and Pessimistic 134 Police Offender Managers: the Endurance of a Suspicious, Cynical and Pessimistic Outlook 137 Sunnyvale DET Officers: a Sense of Isolation and Mutual Solidarity 138 Sunnyvale Police Offender Managers: an Isolated But Not Mutually Cohesive Group 140 Sunnyvale DET Officers: Authoritarian Attitudes and Conservative Ideologies 144 Conservatism Among Police Offender Managers 145 Conclusions: the Endurance of Cop Culture and the Link Between Sunnyvale Police Talk and Action 147 Notes 149 References 150 Chapter 6 Offender Perceptions of Sunnyvale Policing 154 Introduction 154 Surveillance and the Management of Risk: Some Preliminary Matters 155 Surveillance Technologies 157 Knowledge Sharing and Distribution 158 The Police National Intelligence Model: Structuring IOM Information Sharing 159 Having a Word: Putting Knowledge to Work in Sunnyvale IOM 160 Experiences of People Subject to Sunnyvale Policing 164 The Usual Suspects: Regularity of Contact With Sunnyvale Police 165 Perceived Nature and Quality of Participant Encounters With Sunnyvale Police 172 Negotiating Power-Relations: Cost-Benefit and Prudential Calculations 173 Sunnyvale Police Talk and Action and Its Effect On Normative Cooperation 175 The Nature and Quality of Police–offender Relations and Its Implications for Offender Relations With Other Sunnyvale Workers 176 Sunnyvale Participant Views On Fairness of Sunnyvale Police Action 178 Trust, Legitimacy and Participant Perceptions of Sunnyvale Policing 181 Conclusions 182 Notes 185 References 186 Chapter 7 Old Habits Die Hard 190 Introduction 190 The Rhetoric of IOM and the Realities of Operational Practice 191 Good Cop–bad Cop: Business as Usual in Sunnyvale IOM 192 The Tenacious Link Between Talk and Action: Implications for Police Culture 194 How Did Sunnyvale Offenders Perceive Sunnyvale Police Action? 196 Did a Degree of Perceived Legitimacy Lead to Offender Compliance/cooperation? 199 Challenges for the Rehabilitation of Offenders and Trajectory of IOM 200 Futures of IOM Research 201 Notes 203 References 203 Chapter 8 Reflexive Ethnography: Watching Sunnyvale Police 207 The Significant Contribution of Ethnography to Police Research 207 Negotiating Access to the Sunnyvale Police Organisational Field 210 Becoming Accepted 211 Perceptions of Me: Understanding Sunnyvale Officer Reactions to My Presence in the Field 212 Conceptions of You: How Sunnyvale Police Officers Viewed Their Role, Within the Police Organisation, Mattered to the Trust and Acceptance Process 214 Positioning the Work of Police Offender Managers 215 The Practicalities of Observing ‘Deviant’ Police Officers 217 Exclusionary Practices 218 A Different Role Conception, Resulted in a Different Reaction to the Research 219 Observations of Sunnyvale, Uniformed DET Police 221 Alternative Explanations for Varying Levels of Trust and Acceptance 223 Recording and Interpreting the Field 224 Notes 226 References 226 Index 231 Procedural,justice;,Law,and,Justice;,Police,Decision-Making;,Police,Organization;,Prolific,offenders;,Rehabilitation;,Police,legitimacy;,Police,Culture;,Multi-agency,criminal,justice,working;,Police,Partnerships Procedural justice,Law and Justice,Police Decision-Making,Police Organization,Prolific offenders,Rehabilitation,Police legitimacy,Police Culture,Multi-agency criminal justice working,Police Partnerships