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<p>Requiring certain sexual offenders on licensed supervision to take polygraph tests
has shown itself to be an effective means of protecting the public from harm, as part
of a wider set of licence conditions, controls and interventions. As a result of the
5,228 tests carried out on 2,249 sexual offenders between 2015 and 2019, 1,449 significant
disclosures were made, providing important information to probation officers which
might not have been obtained from other sources. Probation officers have then used
that disclosed information to question offenders or make other enquiries, to establish
whether they have breached their licence conditions – and where they have, probation
officers have taken robust enforcement action, including recalling offenders to custody.</p><p>
</p><p>Once statutory powers are available, working with the National Probation Service
(NPS), the Cambridge Centre for Evidence Based Policing will conduct a three-year
pilot of mandatory polygraph examinations for domestic abuse perpetrators released
on licence and assessed as presenting a high risk of causing serious harm. The pilot
will involve a randomised control trial, with high risk domestic abuse perpetrators
in four of the 12 NPS Regions split into intervention and control groups. Those in
the treatment group will be required to take a polygraph test three months after release
from custody and every six months thereafter (unless they fail a test, in which case
the tests will become more regular). Those in the control group will not be tested,
so that we can assess the effectiveness of polygraph testing on outcomes such as compliance
with licence conditions, recall rates and reoffending. At the end of the period, the
Government will lay a copy of the evaluation report before each House of Parliament
and, based on its findings, will make final decisions regarding wider roll out.</p><p>
</p><p>Polygraph testing will be one of a set of standard and additional licence conditions
to which those in the trial will be subject. The other licence conditions may include
exclusion zones preventing offenders going to certain places (usually near where victims
live or work), non-contact conditions preventing them contacting victims and their
families, curfews, electronic monitoring and completing behaviour treatment programmes.</p>
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