The Colorado Sex Offender Risk Scale

Abstract

This study documents the development of an adult sex offender risk assessment tool. A sample of 494 sex offenders were followed for an average of 30 months. A risk scale was developed based upon criminal and therapeutic outcomes. The final risk scale included prior juvenile felony convictions, prior adult felony convictions, failure of the first or second grade, not being employed, victim being intoxicated, the perpetrator reporting not being sexually aroused during the crime, possession of a weapon during the crime, denial in therapy, sexual deviance in therapy, and motivation in therapy. The risk scale provided significant relative risk ratios against program failure at 12 and 30 months. Overall, those scoring high on the risk tool were 372% as likely to fail as those scoring low.

A Review of Weapon Choice in Violent and Sexual Crime

“…Ruback and Ivie (1998) examined information about the rapes of 2526 adult females from the records of a rape crisis centre, finding that attacks by strangers were more likely to involve a weapon and to occur outdoors than were attacks by nonstrangers and victims were less likely to physically resist strangers than non strangers. English, Retzlaff and Kleinsasser (2002) developed the Colorado Sex Offender Risk Scale. A sample of 494 sex offenders was followed for an average of 30 months.…”

Denial and Minimization Among Sexual Offenders

“…Unfortunately, among other concerns with the study, the outcome used in English et al (2002) confounded treatment attrition and sexual recidivism (see also Maletzky, 1993), making it impossible to determine the independent relationship of denial with either. However, the findings support a link between denial and failure to complete treatment, and also provide grounds for postulating that more comprehensive indices of denial (and minimization) would account for a unique portion of the variance in sexual recidivism in multivariate models.…”

“…Among a sample of 204 juvenile sex offenders referred to a community-based treatment program, Hunter and Figueredo (1999) found that self-reported level of defensiveness/denial was found to decrease the chances of remaining in and/or completing the program (see also Beyko & Wong, 2005). English et al (2002) reported additional evidence of the association between denial and negative outcomes among 494 adult sex offenders (54% of whom were in the community). Their denial variable was an 8-item scale (α = .93; e.g., denies actual facts of offense, blames others for the crime, says therapy is unnecessary).…”

“…It is, however, something of a controversy that despite two influential metaanalyses by Karl Hanson and his colleagues (Hanson & Bussière, 1998;Hanson & Morton-Bourgon, 2005), both of which clearly indicate that neither denial nor minimizations of sexual offending behavior predict sexual recidivism, considerable emphasis is nevertheless placed on the targeting of denial and minimization within treatment programs for both juvenile and adult sex offenders (e.g., Barbaree & Cortoni, 1993;Beech & Fisher, 2002;Maletzky, 1996;McGrath, Cumming, & Burchard, 2003;Salter, 1988). Indeed, the presence of denial or minimization has been construed as a risk factor for sexual recidivism, with variables encompassing types of denial and/or various minimizations included in a number of sex offender risk-assessment protocols (e.g., Boer, Hart, Kropp, & Webster, 1997;English, Retzlaff, & Kleinsasser, 2002;Prentky, Harris, Frizzell, & Righthand, 2000;Wong, Olver, Nicholaichuk, & Gordon, 2004; but see Worling & Curwen, 2001, for a notable exception). Sex offenders' denial has even been found to influence the decisions of risk assessors in applied settings (Amenta, 2006), resulting in adjustments to actuarial risk level (Gore, 2004).…”