Facilitating Successful Reentry Among Justice-involved Veterans: The Role of Veteran and Offender Identity

Abstract

Reentry courts facilitate successful offender reintegration into the community following release from incarceration, and many justice-involved veterans may benefit from such services given their elevated risk for deleterious outcomes postrelease. However, effectively engaging court participants is a crucial foundation to achieve the goals of recidivism reduction and global psychosocial improvement. This conceptual article presents an overview of factors that may interfere with a veteran’s engagement in reentry court through the lens of both veteran and offender identity. Recommendations for reentry court personnel based on justice-involved veterans’ experiences, identity, and unique needs are presented. Careful consideration of these factors and associated practice adaptations may facilitate rapport between reentry court personnel and veteran participants, foster engagement, and ultimately improve outcomes among this unique, at-risk population.

Associations between justice involvement and PTSD and depressive symptoms, suicidal ideation, and suicide attempt among post-9/11 veterans.

“…Irrespective of the setting, our results suggest it is important for mental health providers to assess for psychiatric symptoms and suicide risk among justice-involved veterans. While justice-involved veterans may experience stigma and distrust of providers (Desai et al, 2021), in offering mental health and suicide risk assessment, health care providers can serve as critical intercepts for connecting these veterans to health (e.g., pharmaco- or psychotherapy) and social (e.g., vocational rehabilitation, transitional housing) services to facilitate rehabilitation (Blue-Howells et al, 2013).…”

“…These experiences may partially explain why justice-involved veterans within our sample had more severe PTSD symptoms than veterans without a history of justice involvement. These prior traumatic experiences may lead justice-involved veterans to be hesitant to disclose exacerbations in psychiatric symptoms or suicide risk to those working with them in rehabilitative settings (Desai et al, 2021). For these reasons, it remains important for those working within such settings (e.g., correctional facilities, services specific to justice-involved veterans, outpatient mental health) to utilize a trauma-informed lens (Desai et al, 2021; Miller & Najavits, 2012).…”

“…These prior traumatic experiences may lead justice-involved veterans to be hesitant to disclose exacerbations in psychiatric symptoms or suicide risk to those working with them in rehabilitative settings (Desai et al, 2021). For these reasons, it remains important for those working within such settings (e.g., correctional facilities, services specific to justice-involved veterans, outpatient mental health) to utilize a trauma-informed lens (Desai et al, 2021; Miller & Najavits, 2012). In particular, it is crucial to utilize a nonjudgmental empathetic lens to understand justice-involved veterans’ lived experiences, rather than judging prior behaviors.…”

“…Indeed, in fixed-effect models, number of times incarcerated, as well as length of incarceration, was associated with more severe mental health symptoms (Porter & DeMarco, 2019). Furthermore, contextual factors specific to criminal justice involvement may be similarly important to study—for example, how the experience and perception of criminal justice involvement, as well as perceptions of those within justice-involved veterans’ social networks and communities (e.g., stigma, social isolation, perceived burdensomeness; Desai et al, 2021; Holliday et al, 2020), may impact mental health outcomes and risk for suicide.…”

The Role of Social Determinants of Health in Moral Injury: Implications and Future Directions

“…In addition to moral injury stemming from offending, involvement in the justice system itself (e.g., incarceration) may create vulnerability for exposure to new types of PMIEs (e.g., engaging in behavior to maintain safety in prison) [ 42 ]. Discrimination and stigma related to justice involvement [ 43 , 44 ] could also result in heightened exposure to PMIEs and potential moral injury development due to repeatedly experiencing betrayal by others.…”