ABSTRACT
What does the social reality of sex and violent offenders look like post-incarceration? This study is based on the qualitative analysis of interviews with male sex and violent offenders conducted approximately 1.5 years after their prison release. We examined the challenges participants faced when returning to the community, explored how participants after release coped with these challenges, and looked into stabilizing and destabilizing factors in the reentry process for sex and violent offenders. The findings reveal the multifaceted nature of the reentry process and that there are no simple causal pathways between resources or risk factors, on the one hand, and desistance or reoffending, on the other hand. In order to understand the trajectories after prison release, it is essential to comprehend the interplay between individuals and structural factors affecting the reentry process.
