Last October a person that was awaiting a civil commitment hearing escaped from our Arizona Community Protection and Treatment Center ACPTC, which provides for the civil commitment of people who have a mental disorder that predisposes them to commit sexual acts that pose a danger to the health and safety of others. Fortunately the person that escaped was apprehended by an alert law enforcement officer.
That event triggered a thorough investigation by ourselves with help from our partners at the Arizona Department of Corrections. We concluded that the escape happened because of a combination of physical security weaknesses along with some operational problems. We were able to fix the operational problems right away- but it took until this week to finish the physical security enhancements. We completed major security enhancements this week including miles of new razor wire, new security cameras, night-time lighting improvements, motion detectors on the fences, and new visual security technology. We were able to keep the labor costs way down by using qualified inmates from the Arizona Department of Corrections for much of the labor.
This transition time has been difficult for our team at the ACPTC because daily patterns needed to be changed so that we could complete the security enhancements safely. Thank you all out at the ACPTC for your hard work day-in and day-out during the transition.
I am disturbed to hear that in ‘inmate’ or one committed as you state escaped; I will assume that this was due to an error in security measure.
However, it is good to know that the person has been apprehended again making our streets safe again.
Dan.
The report found that it was a combination of staff errors and physical infrastructure short-comings. Everything has been corrected.
My name is Chad Mesojedec. I am the Rehabilitation Therapies Director at the Minnesota Sex Offender Program- Moose Lake, MN. I would appreciate information regarding the rehabilitative services your program provides (e.g. Vocational, Education, Therapeutic Recreation). Soft skills/Life Skills programming/testing is of particular interest to me. Thank you.
Hi Chad, Thank you for asking about our rehabilitation services. The ACPTC Rehabilitation Department provides art therapy, music therapy, recreation therapy, therapeutic work, and fitness and leisure programming in groups and individual sessions. The programming is designed to address treatment goals that support protective factors that can reduce sex offender recidivism, while also addressing dynamic risk factors. Treatment areas addressed include developing independent living skills, increasing affect identification and regulation, prosocial behaviors, accountability, frustration tolerance, communication skills, problem solving, coping skills, healthy expression through creativity, leisure education, and assistance with job skills. The professionals in the Rehabilitation Department must be credentialed in their discipline. The department consists of two art therapists, two music therapists, two recreation therapists, and a fitness specialist.