triggered:
• at initial assessment
• during offending behaviour program screening and assessment
• during Case Management Review Committee meetings
• by a urine sample positive for AOD use.
A prisoner may also self-refer to AOD treatment.
329. Justice Health169 contracts an independent
provider, Caraniche170 to deliver AOD
programs in all Victorian public prisons. In private prisons these programs are delivered in-house at Fulham Correctional Centre and are sub-contracted to Uniting Care ReGen at Port Phillip Prison.
Remand prisoners
330. Prisoners on remand have access to a range of short-term AOD health programs, which focus on harm reduction and relapse prevention.
169 Justice Health is a business unit of the Department of Justice and Regulation and is responsible for delivering health services to people in Victoria’s prisons.
170 Caraniche is a company of psychologists, social workers and other health professionals.
331. Similar to offending behaviour programs, there have been limitations on the AOD programs that remandees can participate in. However, in response to my draft report, the department advised that ‘Justice Health has increased AOD delivery for remandees and has made 24-hour health [AOD] programs available to remandees’.
Sentenced prisoners
332. Sentenced prisoners have access to a broader range of AOD programs. These programs, delivered by Caraniche, are divided into two streams:
• health stream programs: aim to help prisoners understand the risk and harms of substance abuse, promote healthier lifestyles and prepare prisoners for returning to the community
• criminogenic programs: longer group- based programs that target the relationship between substance use and offending171.
333. Programs vary in intensity and duration. The longer, more intensive programs target prisoners with a higher risk of reoffending and more significant drug and alcohol issues.
334. In its submission to my investigation, Caraniche highlighted that:
Unlike sex offender and violent offender treatment programs in which the offending behaviour is the direct treatment target, criminogenic AOD treatment addresses a broad range of offending behaviours and the specific relationship between them and substance use172.
171 Caraniche, Submission to Ombudsman Discussion Paper, December 2014.
335. Program evaluation data from Caraniche shows that participants make significant gains from AOD treatment programs in mental health and wellbeing, addressing criminal thinking patterns and decision- making skills.
336. A range of programs are available in different locations including:
• a 130 hour intensive residential drug treatment program at Marngoneet Correctional Centre and Dame Phyllis Frost Centre
• individual counselling sessions • AOD programs targeted at prisoners
with both substance abuse and mental health problems, including depression, stress, anxiety and grief and loss
• AOD programs addressing substance abuse issues and women’s histories of trauma, violence, grief, relationships and children
• transitional programs to help prisoners prepare for release who have substance abuse issues.
Changing trends in drug use
337. Witnesses told my officers that AODprograms need to be regularly adapted to address changing trends in drug use. 338. Several submissions to my investigation
highlighted the challenges posed to the prison system by the increased use of methamphetamine, commonly known as ‘ice’, and the need for specific programs targeting the use of this drug.
339. Caraniche data shows that drug use patterns of prisoners participating in their programs are changing. In the last four years:
• heroin use has almost halved (32.7 per cent to 17.9 per cent)
• ice use has doubled (20 per cent to 40 per cent)
• violent offences committed by drug users have doubled (18.7 per cent to 36.7 per cent).
340. The data shows that in 2013-14:
• the most significant drug for male prisoners prior to their imprisonment was ice (49 per cent), followed by alcohol (23 per cent) and heroin (18 per cent)
• the most significant drug for women prisoners was heroin (45 per cent), followed by ice (33 per cent) and alcohol (12 per cent)173.
341. In August 2015 the Victorian Government announced174 a new pilot program aimed
at prisoners identified as having a high risk of reoffending and a history of ice use. The program, to be trialled at the Marngoneet and Hopkins prisons, involves 44 hours of intensive treatment, including cognitive behaviour therapy, specifically designed to reduce reoffending among ice users. The announcement also referred to two other pilots that have recently been introduced:
• 24-hour program aimed at increasing prisoners’ understanding of their ice use and the effect on their mental health • six-hour harm-minimisation education
program to help prisoners understand the effects of withdrawal and long-term use, as well as where to find support.
Marngoneet Correctional Centre
342. Marngoneet Correctional Centre was originally designed as the sole therapeutic and treatment focussed prison in Victoria, comprising three separate living areas (known as ‘neighbourhoods’), housing male prisoners convicted of sexual offences, violent offences, and those with significant substance abuse issues175. However, this
model has changed as a result of pressures across the system.
173 While heroin remains the most significant drug for women, Caraniche advised that ice use and violence are increasing. 174 The Hon Daniel Andrews MP, Premier, Media release – Ice-addict
prison treatment aims to break link with crime, 24 August 2015.
175 Deakin University, Evaluation of the Marngoneet Correctional
343. A number of witnesses raised concerns about the current operation of the residential drug program at Marngoneet. The Managing Director of Caraniche advised:
Whilst we run the residential program at Marngoneet and it’s an intensive program, it doesn’t follow the principles of ideal practice that we know are what’s required to get best treatment outcomes. So it’s a very compromised treatment approach that we have significant concerns about. It’s not operating any way near in optimal conditions.
344. During my investigation it became clear that overcrowding has influenced the current operation of the residential drug program. The Forensic Services Manager at Caraniche advised:
When they developed Marngoneet, it was about building a state of the art programs prison based on a Therapeutic Community philosophy and operating model, a 300 bed prison with three neighbourhoods, violence, sex and drug and alcohol. But the issue was that the system had grown substantially and the moment that SMU’s [Sentence Management Unit’s] decisions about placement became security focused and stopped considering all of the other responsivity factors that are required to make an assessment about whether someone should go there (into a treatment prison), then the beginning of the culture starts to get eroded and then over time, other decisions have been made and Marngoneet is not operating like a TC [therapeutic community] at all, it’s operating just like another prison really. 345. The Director of Justice Health also
commented on changes at Marngoneet, telling my officers that due to
overcrowding, prisoners had been placed in the residential drug treatment unit who were not undertaking the intensive drug treatment program, resulting in a change to the profile of the unit.
346. Similar concerns were noted in a 2013 evaluation report of Marngoneet,
commissioned by Corrections Victoria. The report noted:
It is … evident that the Marngoneet model has experienced considerable change since it was first implemented, with concerns expressed by some stakeholders (but by no means all) that this has
undermined both the quality and integrity of the rehabilitation services that are offered. For some, the prison is evolving into a mainstream medium security prison in which programs are delivered, but in which the social therapy model has limited relevance176.
347. Corrections Victoria has acknowledged Marngoneet’s changing role in the Victorian prison system, noting that the original clinical service model was implemented prior to the department’s decision to regionalise clinical services, which has meant access to treatment and programs has been expanded to a number of prisons177.