Legal investigations; Behavior Response and Adjustment Guide; and Tablet PCs

Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles

The Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles has authority to grant paroles, reprieves, remissions, and pardons, and remove restrictions imposed by law. Parole officers supervise released offenders and facilitate their reintegration into the community under the direction of the Board, working closely with the Department of Corrections to manage prison bed space. To determine release decisions and manage effective community supervision, the Parole Board has introduced various innovative and effective procedures and programs.

Description

The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles has explored a range of new approaches in release decisionmaking and community supervision, in addition to its innovative Results Driven Supervision (see Program Example write-up). The Board has been recognized with several awards, and is one of the few parole boards accredited by the American Correctional Association, a distinction it has earned every year since 1994. Some of its approaches are described below.

To inform the Board’s release decisions, parole staff conduct investigations and provide detailed reports for inclusion in individual case files. A parole officer studies arrest and court records for each individual and may consult with arresting officers, court officials, victims, and witnesses to write a “Legal Investigation” on the details of his or her current offense and a summary of any prior offenses that he or she committed in the same county.

To assist supervision officers in determining responses to violations and rewards for positive behavior, the Board designed a Behavior Response and Adjustment Guide (BRAG). BRAG classifies positive and negative behavior as “low,” “medium,” or “high” and provides response options for each of these categories. Positive behavior includes finishing a school semester, completing an outpatient program or cognitive skills class, and performing volunteer work. Rewards for positive behavior include letters of recognition, certificates of completion, six-month compliance certificates, supervision level reduction, and reduced reporting requirements.

In order to facilitate convenient and thorough note-taking for parole officers in the field, the Board has acquired Tablet PCs, computers about the size of a piece of paper weighing less than three pounds, to record data on the 22,000 individuals under community supervision in the state. Handwriting-recognition software allows parole officers, who each supervise an average of 60 individuals, to record notes in the field as they would with pen and paper while digitally capturing information. Before Tablet PCs, the Board of Pardons and Paroles found that information from notes taken by hand was often not thorough or properly entered into the data system, and laptops were found to be bulky and difficult to use for data-entry in the field.