Prospects for the Future of SVP Treatment Programs

Abstract

This chapter provides some guidance for those tasked with running sexually violent predator (SVP) treatment programs, informed by the author's experience of how different SVP programs operate in practice and enlightened by emerging models of good clinical practice. Seeking to make SVP programs fully "evidence-based" is both desirable and impossible. SVP laws are commonly designed in the context of public and political anxiety about the impending release of individuals who are notorious because of their history of sexual offending. While the specifics of the laws vary across different states, they commonly involve civil commitment of persons known to have engaged in acts of sexual violence who are assessed as having mental disorders that impair their emotional or volitional capacity in a way that makes them likely to engage in future acts of sexual violence. The chapter describes the developments in research that suggests a possible future in which a substantial proportion of those committed under SVP laws can be safely returned to the community. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved)