Source: ACSOL
A Superior Court judge in San Mateo county ruled this week that a registrant on parole is no longer required to participate in an additional treatment program. This ruling was made after a hearing in which a CA Department of Corrections (CDCR) representative testified that “a sex offender cannot successfully ‘complete’ a sex offender management treatment program” while on parole.
“This court’s ruling clarifies that many registrants on parole are required to complete only one treatment program,” stated ACSOL Executive Director Janice Bellucci. “No longer can CDCR require registrants on parole to complete multiple treatment programs just because CDCR has hired a new treatment program provider.”
In this case, the registrant on parole completed a three-year treatment program and was notified by his original treatment program provider that his treatment was finished. A few months later, however, the registrant on parole was notified by a new treatment program provider that he was required to restart a treatment program.
According to the court’s decision, there is undisputed evidence that the registrant on parole is “meeting the goals of successful reintegration into society.” In support of this statement, the court noted that the registrant on parole has stable housing and employment, has progressed in his trade (from apprentice to journeyman), has enrolled in community college and has a stable family.
The court noted in its decision that although the registrant on parole is no longer required to participate in a treatment program, he remains subject to special conditions of parole including GPS monitoring, restrictions on travel and limited computer usage.
The court’s decision is based upon CA Penal Code Section 3008(d)(2) which authorizes courts to disapprove further participation in a sex offender management program as a condition of parole. The same state law requires registrants on parole to complete at least one treatment program.
I totally get this. When I got out of prison, I was told that I had a complete a 2-year, 2 hours once a week program. After the first year they got a new provider, and the new provider had to evaluate us and we basically started all over again. Eventually I violated probation rules, that I couldn’t have an internet device, and got sent back to prison on what’s called an ATR, alternative to revocation, and did an in-depth course for 13 weeks. Once I got back out I continued with the program, and after covid hit the program went virtual, but I couldn’t use internet, so it was determined that I would have to go see the provider one on one, but I ended up going to a private provider of my own, which was actually my first facilitator when I first got out. So for three years I had four different providers. And I never graduated! Actually, by never graduating it was a violation of my court orders.
It always amazes me when they come up with these rules. I was never ordered to take a class. One was optional but I was transferred to another prison due to overcrowding so never took it. That was about 17 years ago……
There is a similar, though much worse, parallel system to this in the civil commitment programs in which those who have completed their terms in prison are put into prison-like environments involuntarily and under the same levels of armed security and held indefinitely, ostensibly to undergo “treatment.” What has happened in the case of California’s Coalinga State “Hospital” is that they have undertaken any number of “treatment programs” over the years which appear expressly designed to keep the “patients” incarcerated forever by making them start over again at the beginning of each new program or program administrator, erasing any levels of achievement they had attained with the previous program. The same thing happens when the “treatment” providers leave the programs, as they invariably do, and new ones are brought in: the men have to start over at the very beginning. This is a completely cynical approach to so-called “treatment,” which is said to be based on empirical, scientifically-based models but which, in reality, are agenda-driven pseudoscience that is the scandal of the psychology profession. People employed by these programs can earn exorbitant salaries paid for by the taxpayer having most often gotten their degrees from schools that specialize in “forensic psychology” that everyone knows just feeds the voracious appetite of government prisons, parole, government corrections and private contractors. These people will only ever get a salary from government, either directly or from contractors or from the “patients” forced to pay for their services and their first duty always is to the bureaucrats who are their bosses and paymasters. Few of these people could have been admitted to ivy league universities and would not excel if subjected to the standards of top-notch schools of psychology. Instead, they have gone to the “forensic science” equivalent of a DeVry truck mechanics school, not to disparage truck mechanics who actually perform a valuable service and do something worthy of respect. By the way, these same schools also pump out degrees such as “criminal justice” to feed the needs of police departments and parole agencies. These diploma mills are a way for marginal people and mediocre thinkers to earn truly amazing salaries and benefits that they would otherwise not have been able to, all paid for by us, the taxpayers.
Good. The “treatments” are more like Orwellian torture techniques. Lie detectors, PPGs you name it. What a nightmare.
Prior to my release from prison the head of the pyschological dept stated that I did not require any further treatment once released on Parole.
2nd week I was out I was told by my PO to report for s#x offender treatment evaluation. I met with a Dr (well that’s what they called him). I filled out 10 questions and was told right then and there I required further treatment.
Come to find out that Dr worked on staff with the treatment provider so of course he was going to tell me I had to have further treatment – can we say “conflict of interest”?
90 minutes every week for over 3 years at the cost of $40 each session (group session). I was told at the very first session that I would be in this group until the day I maxed out my sentence (Pennsylvania).
There was no way for me to graduate. I was basically held captive – either pay $40 a week and sit thru that stupid sessions or be violated and go back to prison.
The group leaders did not even have any type of certification either. They just made you say things that were not true. If they thought you did something prior to be arrested then you had to admit to it or they would report you to your PO. The PO would sit in on some sessions and gave us a very hard time during.
Since they made up admit to things we never did I was one up on them. Homework assignments were never in my own handwriting – always typed out. No proof to who wrote it. I did not know where they would end up so I figured this was one way to protect myself from false accusations.
@William
After leaving intake at Dodge, I got sent to Jackson where my social worker was honest enough to say that “sex offenders” didn’t qualify for ERP. I decided right away that it wasn’t worth my risk & time to take the program on the inside since there weren’t incentives for early release. They knew they couldn’t force me to take it; all they could do was put me on “refusal” status. Once released, I never had a ban on computer access, because the court never ordered it. I was always allowed to use a computer with DOC approved monitoring software. I got assigned a treatment provider on the Milwaukee east side where the clients, lead doctor, and facilitators (except 1 white chick) were all black. My PO & I thought I would get a 13 week program, but they gave me 102 weeks instead, most likely because I told them on my compass report that I thought my 3 year prison sentence was a travesty of justice, the Milwaukee DA was corrupt & racist, and his department wasted valuable resources on me instead of pursuing violent criminals. The report gave me a negative mark on “attitude” and a status of being subject to anger and “anti-govt activities.” Even my PO didn’t understand that one. I got off to a rocky start in treatment, because I always introduced myself as being convicted under Wisconsin’s mandatory minimum cp possession law. The lead doctor accused me of “intellectualizing” and said if treatment were to work, I had to get past feeling my punishment should have “fitted my crime.” Then COVID hit, so there was no class for 3 months. When summer came, I got assigned a cool white gal who did my therapy over the phone from her suburban home. When fall came, I went to group zoom format with the same therapist leading, but then the white chick from my first group came aboard as an observer. After I presented a report that the group loved, she started bringing up sh*t I said in her group a year earlier! I got into an argument with this b*tch. After the zoom meeting, my therapist texted me and asked if I wanted to move to her night group. I said sure! Anything to avoid that other woman. Anyways, I eventually finished SOT a year later, then they gave me 22 hours of aftercare! Which is really just a review of the same SOT program. So I had 122 hours of treatment, and 5 months later I was released from parole last October. I’m glad that ordeal is over with except the registry part where Wisconsin expects me to update them half way around the world. What a horrible state.
I need to go get some lottery tickets, because I’m a very lucky man! Not only did I get to avoid prison, 5 years of probation for me, I breezed through the mandatory “Treatment” BS.
My first provider was a… nightmare however. He spent most of our sessions explaining to us why we should all barricade ourselves in our homes and never come out or even open the door. The moment anybody sees us, they will immediately try to either kill us or frame us for a new SO. He also told wonderful stories about his former career as a Police Officer working on the Sex Crimes team, heavily implying that he worked with DA’s to help frame PFRs for SO’s he knew to be false. Also suggesting that this was a common practice for all LEOs and DAs. He never actually said these things, just implied it… frequently. His theory, I suppose, is if we just imprison ourselves, the world can be safe from the people he assumed would all “continue to assault children at every opportunity”. He assumed that even for the people who had adult victims.
However, once I escaped all this, I found a truly wonderful human being that actually believed that one fact does not define a whole life, and that with encouragement, people can change for the better. Not sure how she ever got approved as a “Treatment provider”, with whacky theories like that! Required electric quija board interrogation…basically, “Since you’ve been on probation, have you committed any new offence?”….basically just that. Worded differently, but that was the idea.
Many of us, self included, have signed paperwork from our “treatment programs” that it is a two-year program. I have been forced to continue to go for over six years now. Parole officers tell us that California stipulates we must continue for as long as on parole. But if the original program was two years, then a continuation beyond is an “additional program” is it not?
I fully expect states to move away from treatment model in most cases. Instead and increasingly they will rely on tech and domestic surveillance initiatives. Some of it is tax expense, and some of it the controversy surrounding conversion and aversion (behavior mod) therapies. But for the most part it is the people’s perception about the incurable nature of sexual deviance. “Why treat them; if it doesn’t work on “them?”
I would like the case name to show my po or is this just going to take effect automatically
I went to CALIFORNIA YOUTH AUTHORITY (CYA) and completed 2 sex offender programs of 18 months each in order to parole out…should that count for the present…and I was 9 years ago when my offense took place