Deck 3: History of Parole and Mandatory Release

Question 1

Less than half of all U.S. parolees are able to successfully complete their parole term.

Answer 1

True

Question 2

Under discretionary release, offenders are released no matter how many disciplinary reports they have had or how they acted while incarcerated.

Answer 2

False

Question 3

The first parole system in the United States was in Elmira, New York.

Answer 3

True

Question 4

The community model of corrections made the assumption that all criminality was caused by psychiatric problems, and the undesirable behaviors could be modified only through professional counseling.

Question 5

In contrast to the rehabilitative model of corrections, the just deserts or justice model changes the focus of the system from the offender to the offense.

Question 6

Reduction of the nation's prison population was one of the four major justifications for the development of a formal parole system in the United States.

Question 7

Currently, ______________ state and federal prisoners are currently completing their prison sentence in the community.

A) 570,000
B) 670,000
C) 770,000
D) 870,000

Question 8

Convicted criminals were transported to early American colonies as a partial solution to the poverty and unemployment found in England.

Question 9

Georg Michael von Obermaier was the Warden at Norfolk Island in 1842, and implemented humane prison reforms and a rudimentary form of parole.

Question 10

There are three types of parole: discretionary release, mandatory release, and rehabilitative release.

Question 11

Alexander Maconochie is considered the "father of parole."

Question 12

Discretionary release is decided by the parole board.

Question 13

The English government designated Australia as a settlement for prisoners and paid for the transportation and maintenance of English prisoners to be shipped and housed there.

Question 14

Between the 1840s and 1940s, American prisons were supported by taxpayers.

Question 15

The Irish system of parole was developed by Sir Walter Crofton and involved the conditional release of offenders into the community where they would continue to be supervised.

Question 16

Parolees typically serve more than one year of time on supervision.

Question 17

Parole and probation may be used interchangeably.

Question 18

Medical parole occurs when medical doctors and experts in the community advise the prison officials that they must release a prisoner because his or her medical condition is such that the prisoner is going to cost more than the average offender per day to incarcerate.

Question 19

In the 1970s, there was a dramatic change from a focus on individualism, rehabilitation, and indeterminate sentences to determinate sentencing.

Question 20

Most correctional authorities agree that it is not feasible to control prison populations in the long term by the use of specific parole board actions.

Question 21

Which of the following is not one of the four concepts underlying the development of parole in the United States?

A) Reduction in length of incarceration as reward for good conduct
B) Supervision of parolee
C) Imposition of indeterminate sentence
D) Reduction of prison populations

Question 22

Three European prison administrators are credited for implementing the first modern-day parole practices in their home countries, one of which was _____, the first Spanish prison administrator to institute a system of parole in his home country of Spain.

A) Sir Walter Dali
B) Manuel Montesinos
C) Alexander Maconochie
D) Jorge Augustus

Question 23

A likely reason parole become more popular in United States after the 1930s is that the public valued _______.

A) good behavior in prison
B) post-release supervision
C) lower taxes
D) convict labor

Question 24

The first state legislature to pass a law recognizing "good time" as a reward for a good behavior was

A) New York.
B) Pennsylvania.
C) Massachusetts.
D) Vermont.

Question 25

Alexander Maconochie used a _____ system, whereby the duration of a sentence would be decided by the prisoner's good conduct.

A) determinate
B) demerit
C) checks-and-balances
D) marks

Question 26

The _____ is based on the concept of just deserts and even-handed punishment that calls for fairness in criminal sentencing, in that all persons convicted of a similar offense will receive a like sentence.

A) justice model
B) casework era
C) medical model
D) service broker model

Question 27

Parolees typically serve _____ under supervision in the community.

A) three months
B) six months
C) one to two years
D) more than three years

Question 28

About one-third of U.S. states have a(n)____________ structure that limits the discretion of parole boards for felonies.

A) truth-in-sentencing
B) indeterminate
C) determinate
D) rehabilitative

Question 29

_____ is the conditional release of a convicted offender from a correctional institution, under the continued custody of the state, to serve the remainder of his or her sentence under supervision in the community.

A) Probation
B) Parole
C) Work release
D) Furlough

Question 30

Which of the following reason(s) presented by the American Probation and Parole Association and the Association of Paroling Authorities have been used to justify the continued usage of parole in America?

A) Parole boards can impose prisoner participation in treatment programs.
B) Victims have a greater say in parole board hearings than the automatic releases.
C) Release decisions are made by a computer under automatic release.
D) All of these choices are correct.

Question 31

A parole board makes decisions about _____ release.

A) discretionary
B) expiration
C) mandatory
D) surety

Question 32

Under the system established at the Elmira Reformatory, volunteer citizens known as _____ supervised parolees.

A) trustees
B) sureties
C) guardians
D) bobbies

Question 33

Zebulon R. Brockway introduced the first parole system in which state in the United States?

A) Maine
B) Connecticut
C) Pennsylvania
D) New York

Question 34

The word parole is derived from the French parole d'honneur, which means

A) "word of honor."
B) "contract of consent."
C) "ticket-of-leave."
D) "discretionary release."

Question 35

Under ____________ release, offenders reentered society when correctional authorities and board members believed they were ready or they had improved their lives enough to earn the privilege to be released.

A) exclusionary
B) mandatory
C) discretionary
D) good-time

Question 36

Sir Walter Crofton, who had studied Maconochie's innovations on Norfolk Island, became the chief administrator of the __________ prison system in 1854.

A) British
B) American
C) Irish
D) Australian

Question 37

Under the medical model, the court set a minimum and maximum release date and the parole board determined when the appropriate time was to release the offender back into the community. This is a(n) _________ sentence.

A) indeterminate
B) determinate
C) mandatory
D) presumptive

Question 38

The _____ has the highest concentration of parolees in the United States.

A) Northeast
B) South
C) Southeast
D) Northwest

Question 39

In the 1970s, there was a move away from individualism, rehabilitation, and sentence indeterminacy toward giving the offender a more punitive sentence based on the offense. This type of sentencing practice is known as _________ sentencing.

A) indeterminate
B) determinate
C) split
D) rehabilitative

Question 40

Release from prison after 100% of a sentence has been served is known as _____ release.

A) expiration
B) mandatory
C) discretionary
D) surety

Question 41

First-time offenders on __________ release serve less time on average in prison than do first timers with discretionary release.

Question 42

The French phrase parole d'honneur, which means ___________ gives us the English word parole.

Question 43

Parole success rates are _____ probation success rates.

A) somewhat higher than
B) equal to
C) somewhat lower than
D) more than double

Question 44

The ___________ system of parole, created by Sir Walter Crofton, was renowned for its three classes of penal servitude: strict imprisonment, indeterminate sentences, and ticket-of-leave.

Question 45

____________________ was the governor of the prison at Valencia, Spain in the early 1830s, where he instituted and encouraged inmate involvement in education and vocational training. Through active participation, inmates could reduce their actual sentence by up to one-third.

Question 46

____________ parole is a way to control medical costs and allow low-risk offenders to live out their remaining days with their families in a structured release setting.

A) Conditional
B) Medical
C) Proscriptive
D) Rehabilitative

Question 47

The _____ system was used by Alexander Maconochie and granted credits to inmates for good behavior and hard work.

Question 48

The _____ model emphasizes the seriousness of the crime when determining release.

Question 49

_______________ refers to a form of release from prison where the offender has served 100% of his or her actual sentence and there is no mandated post-release supervision.

A) Mandatory release
B) Discretionary release
C) Pardon
D) Expiration

Question 50

Another name for medical parole is ________________ release.

A) compassionate
B) sympathetic
C) redemptive
D) restorative

Question 51

Which is true of the three types of release from prison?

A) Discretionary parole is the most common, then expiration, then mandatory/supervised release.
B) Mandatory release is by far the most common, then discretionary parole, then expiration.
C) Expiration is by far the most common, then discretionary parole, then mandatory/supervised release.
D) They each make up roughly one-third of all releases.

Question 52

Federal parole began in June 1910 due to legislation that established the nation's first three federal __________.

Question 53

The lowest parole rates in the United States tend to be in the __________ region of the country.

Question 54

The function of parole has changed from its traditional role. It is now tasked primarily with

A) protecting the public from released offenders.
B) rehabilitating the offender.
C) providing community help services for the offender.
D) meeting the multiple treatment needs of the offender.

Question 55

More parolees are removed from parole because of _____ than for the commission of new crimes.

Question 56

The conditional release of an inmate with a terminal illness is

A) a mercy pardon.
B) a conditional pardon.
C) medical parole.
D) mandatory release.

Question 57

Using parole for population control has had detrimental effects on post-release supervision because of escalating ________ sizes.

A) caseload
B) court docket
C) jail population
D) resource agency

Question 58

The rehabilitative model of parole, known also as the __________ model, dominated American corrections between the 1930s and the 1960s.

Question 59

________________ is the conditional release of an offender from confinement in a correctional institution by a parole board.

Question 60

Norfolk Island, the site of Alexander Maconochie's penal colony, is in the country we now call ________.

Question 61

You are advising a candidate for president on national law enforcement. The candidate wants you to write a brief about whether there should be a national standard of mandatory release or discretionary release. In your paper to the candidate, you need to inform her about the differences between the two and analyze any trends that currently persist in different regions of the United States.

Question 62

Medical parole is also known as _____.

Question 63

Compare and contrast Crofton's ticket-of-leave and Maconochie's marks system.

Question 64

Explain how parole works in light of mandatory release and discretionary release.

Question 65

Describe the origins of the justice model of corrections in the 1970s, and explain its development.

Question 66

The conditional release from prison to the community for prisoners with terminal illnesses who do not pose an undue risk to public safety is referred to as a ________ release.

Question 67

Explain the concept of medical parole and discuss the pros and cons of releasing offenders due to medical conditions.

Question 68

You are advising the governor of Utah how best to reform the parole system in his state. Any good parole system must balance the three functions of parole; it is up to you to advise him which is the most important in establishing an effective parole system. In your analysis to the governor, discuss which you think is most important, how you view the other two functions of parole, and how you feel each should be balanced with the other.

Question 69

How did Manuel Montesinos and Georg Michael von Obermaier contribute to discretionary release and the development of parole?

Question 70

You are teaching a class about the history of parole and have to present a lecture on which historical figure has the most relevance today: Manuel Montesiños, Alexander Maconochie, or Sir Walter Crofton and Zebulon R. Brockway. In your lecture, be sure to demonstrate how the theories of each do or do not apply to contemporary society and your classroom.

Question 71

You are a parole officer who is being pressured by an elderly judge to revive the medical model of parole, which was fashionable when he began his judgeship. Do you agree with him? Why or why not? Support your opinion with facts from the text.

Question 72

How did the medical model of parole develop? What were its aims, and why did it lose favor?

Question 73

Read about the case of Lynne Stewart at the beginning of the chapter. Imagine you are her sister. Write a letter to Judge Koetel on her behalf. Include in your letter a thoughtful analysis of the pros and cons of medical parole.