DALLAS, Feb. 25, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Securus
Technologies, a leading provider of civil and criminal justice
technology solutions for public safety, investigation, corrections
and monitoring, announces the appointment of a Director of
Recidivism and Reentry.
"Too often, too many offenders return to jail or prison. State
prisons and county jails are trying to tackle this ongoing problem
and improve the lives of inmates and friends and family
members. While significant steps are underway, Securus
continues to invest significant resources to assist our facility
customers with solutions," said Richard A. "Rick" Smith, CEO of
Securus Technologies. "The appointment of Dawn Freeman as the Director of Recidivism and
Reentry will be utilized to partner with the industry to find ways
we can help inmates returning to society in a meaningful,
productive way thus reducing recidivism rates."
So far, Securus has taken these industry-leading steps:
- Deployed an industry leading 150,000 smart devices, including
tablets to bring education, content and technology into the hands
of inmates. This represents an investment of over $20 million;
- Secured exclusive partnership with JobView to provide inmates
with job searches;
- JPay, a Securus company, launched Lantern (2015), a technology
driven education platform. Lantern is the gateway to a
positive, education-driven outcome. Over 180,000 inmates have
access to JPay's education programs with over 3.1 million downloads
and growing;
- Partnered with another leading technology provider that
provides customized educational content to offenders;
- Invested in Prison Entrepreneurship Program (PEP) in 2016 that
has a proven long term positive impact on recidivism.
"Securus recognizes the various needs of all Agencies so we've
been working on a portfolio of solutions that addresses the
flexibility our Agencies require," said Smith.
Correctional education has never been more important
– research shows that inmates who received education
while in prison were 43% less likely to become repeat
offenders.
"Securus' new Director of Recidivism and Reentry will
collaborate with federal, state and local agencies to combine our
technology capabilities with their specific recidivism goals to
bring real change - improving the lives of ex-offenders and
reducing the cost of incarceration through reduced recidivism rates
and new reentry solutions. It will be Ms. Freeman's work to insure
that Securus brings the full benefits of PEP, JPay, JobView, and
others to benefit inmates and all of society.
"Our long term support for the Prison Entrepreneurship Program
(PEP), as an example, is based on their results on recidivism
reduction – which are spectacular. That is why we are strong
advocates of PEP. Over the last three (3) years, PEP has reduced
recidivism down to 7% for its graduates, or an 86% reduction versus
national averages, and 100% of their graduates have jobs within 90
days after release from prison, with almost 300 businesses started
by its graduates! Those are results that speak for
themselves. We want to have all of our long-term facilities
get those same results.
"PEP is a great example of what we stand for and are promoting
at Securus," concluded Smith.
ABOUT SECURUS TECHNOLOGIES
Headquartered in Dallas, Texas,
and serving more than 3,450 public safety, law enforcement and
corrections agencies and over 1,200,000 inmates across North America, Securus Technologies is
committed to serve and connect by providing emergency response,
incident management, public information, investigation, biometric
analysis, communication, information management, inmate
self-service, and monitoring products and services in order to make
our world a safer place to live. Securus Technologies focuses on
connecting what matters®. To learn more about our full
suite of civil and criminal justice technology solutions, please
visit SecurusTechnologies.com.
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SOURCE Securus Technologies, Inc.