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Is There Evidence that Communities of Restoration Work?
Last modified 2007-11-03 00:47
Several promising studies suggest that the methodology works. One used records from the original APAC facility, Humaita Prison. Two others were of the first Community of Restoration in the United States, called the InnerChange Freedom Initiative (IFI) program.
The first study compared the re-arrest rates of Humaita prisoners over three years with those from another model prison. It found that only 5% a year were rearrested, half the rate of the other model. Those who did get in trouble had fewer arrests and were less likely to be locked up again than the other group1.
In 2003, two reports were released based on a six-year study of the IFI programme in Texas. Both found that prisoners who completed the program had significantly lower recidivism rates than did comparison groups.
The studies found that IFI volunteers were a key to success and that the prisoners’ attitudes changed to a more pro-social perspective2.
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1Byron Johnson, “Assessing the Impact of Religious Programs and Prison Industry on Recidivism: An Exploratory Study”. Texas Journal of Corrections, February 2002, 7-11.
2Tony Fabelo, Brittani Trust, and Michael Eisenberg, “Initial Process and Outcome Evaluationof the InnerChange Freedom Initiative: The Faith-Based Prison Program in TDCJ”, Criminal Justice Policy Council, February 2003. Byron Johnson and David B. Larson. The InnerChange Freedom Initiative: A Preliminary Evaluation of a Faith-Based Prison Program, Center for Research on Religion and Urban Civil Society, University of Pennsylvania,
Philadelphia (June 2003).