5 Necessity of comprehensive measures according to the characteristics and needs of elderly offenders

  As described earlier, the number of elderly offenders is increasing at a significantly higher rate than the growth of the total elderly population. In addition to mental and physical problems specific to elderly and problems that are difficult to provide living guidance on, such as abilities to lead social lives and their personalities/characteristic behavior, elderly offenders have problems different from those with the offenders at young or prime ages, with the ratio of elderly offenders living alone being high, having no stable residence, or having no income, and with no one around to protect/supervise them, and being financially unstable with low self-sufficiency. For such elderly offenders, institutional as well as community treatment and the coordination of social circumstances need to be elaborated. In order to develop treatment responding to the problems of elderly offenders, it is important to properly identify their needs by taking into consideration their actual living conditions and systematically implement support according to those needs. As described in Chapter 4 Section 2, it is desirable to actively implement measures for effective coordination of social circumstances by identifying the mental/physical conditions of elderly offenders and the family/social environments, etc. of their planned place of live after release, etc.
  Chapter 4 Section 1 showed that some elderly inmates have mental/physical diseases, etc., requiring immediate welfare support (admission to social welfare institutions, etc.) or hospitalization, that many of them are worried about not having living expenses or jobs after their release, and that many reimprisoned inmates have the problem of not having any one to rely on after their release. It is conceivable that if those having such problems are released from penal institutions and return to community lives without proper welfare support, etc., then they will face financial difficulty and repeat offenses. Therefore, it is necessary to promptly and assuredly provide them with welfare support immediately after being released from penal institutions so that their self-sufficiency be facilitated in community and thus reduce the risk of them committing repeat offenses. Penal institutions, probation offices, and halfway houses have been making efforts to provide released inmates with required welfare support, etc. through coordination with welfare related institutions, etc. This issue, however, will become more and more important as aging progresses further, with an increase in number of elderly offenders being anticipated. Hence, in order to facilitate smooth reintegration into society and prevent repeat offense of elderly offenders, it is important that probation offices take the lead in, but with the cooperation of penal institutions, facilitating cooperation with regional welfare, etc. related institutions and providing support in arranging living environment before their release so that they can receive welfare support,etc. and live self-sufficiently after being released.
  In addition, arranging welfare support, etc. may take a certain period of time after being released from penal institutions, and in some cases they may need to wait for some time for admission to social welfare institutions, etc. . Therefore, it is essential to arrange before their release for welfare support after release and to facilitate their admission to halfway houses until welfare support, etc. become available, while providing guidance and training for adaptation to social lives. For this reason, considering that halfway houses are actually operated with the intention to accept those expected to get employment, it is desirable to develop the necessary system to place welfare staff at institutions so that these new roles and functions can be appropriately facilitated.
  In addition, for those relatively healthy and expected to be employed, employment support will be considered. With regard to employment support, as shown in Section 4 and Section 5 in Part 2, the Ministry of Justice is promoting employment support measures in cooperation with the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, and penal institutions and probation offices provide support for inmates and probationers/parolees respectively. Although the situation of elderly employment is very severe, this measure may be applied actively to elderly offenders who are relatively healthy and have the motivation to work.