Revisiting Future Dangerousness Revisited: Response to DeLisi and Munoz

Abstract

In a recently published article in this journal titled “Future Dangerousness Revisited,” DeLisi and Munoz (2003) offered a number of findings regarding the major disciplinary and violent misconduct of inmates in the Arizona Department of Corrections (ADOC). Most prominently, they opined that their findings demonstrated that death row inmates are more dangerous than other inmate groups. The methodology and analysis of DeLisi and Munoz, however, suffered from such fundamental flaws and errors that their conclusions were without support. Our own comparison of rates of assault between death row and general prison population inmates in ADOC failed to reveal significant differences. Our analysis of the disciplinary records and current risk classifications of all inmates on the Arizona death row in 2003 revealed that although averaging 10 years at risk on death row, 82% had no serious violent misconduct and 87% were rated by ADOC at the lowest risk of institutional violence.

Keywords

future dangerousness death row prison violence

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References

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