Quite obviously, persistent offenders begin offending and increase their offending activities to a point where they're increasing at a peak, and that's the cause of the incarceration. There's less offending afterwards, hence the effect of some incarceration. I think a lot more studies need to be done. There's really a lack of studies on the effect of incarceration and future offending, but we have seen in a couple of instances that there is an effect. There may be re-offending afterwards, but it's at a lower rate. I think in that case, it was half the rate that it was for youth offenders prior to incarceration.
On May 13th, 2010. See this statement in context.