Benson offers a departing report card on MSOP

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Cites progress in sex offender program, but miles to go

This week Dennis Benson will retire after four years as executive director of the Minnesota Sex Offender Program. His departure caps a career with the Department of Corrections that spanned more than three decades and included stints as warden at prisons in Stillwater and Oak Park Heights.

The Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP) has faced harsh criticism in recent years for its soaring population and costs. The population of civilly committed sex offenders has tripled over the last decade, with roughly 650 individuals detained at facilities in Moose Lake and St. Peter. During that span, not a single person was successfully rehabilitated and released from the program.

A report by the legislative auditor’s office released last year found numerous problems with the program. It determined that MSOP offers insufficient treatment, has been plagued by frequent staff turnover and treats individuals disparately depending on where they live.

The MSOP also faces a class action lawsuit in U.S. District Court arguing that the conditions of confinement are unconstitutional. In January a federal judge found sufficient merit to the claims to appoint pro bono representation for the plaintiffs.

But under Benson’s watch, there have been signs of change. The per-diem cost has been reduced by nearly $100 per person, and the overall cost of the program has actually dropped in recent years. More significantly, earlier this year Clarence Opheim — a convicted child molester who had been involuntarily enrolled in the MSOP for two decades — was granted the first provisional release in more than 10 years.
Capitol Report spoke with Benson on Wednesday. What follows is an edited transcript of that conversation.

Capitol Report: How would you characterize the status of the Minnesota Sex Offender Program as you get ready to leave?

Dennis Benson: I think operationally the program is in good shape. It’s very different from the other kinds of civil commitments that occur in DHS. We have developed our own policy and procedure, our own budget, our own finance division. We have brought the per diem down pretty close to $100 a day from where it was four years ago, and we’ve added 400 beds.

From a policy perspective, I believe there is still work left to be done. We have had one provisional discharge. But there are recommendations from the legislative auditor’s report that are still kind of sitting on the shelf. At some point, I think, the policymakers need to take a hard look at how people come into the program [and] how they go out. Right now it’s a court-driven process. I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad idea. But I do think that there are recommendations in the auditor’s report that make sense and that will offer more constitutional protection to the way that patients are committed and the way that they are provisionally discharged.

CR: There was an effort by Sen. Warren Limmer and Rep. Tony Cornish to really overhaul the state’s policies for sex offenders, including some of the recommendations that were in the legislative auditor’s report. They spent a lot of time working on it and it ultimately made no progress. What happened there?

Benson: I’ll take a shot at it, but that’s probably a better question for them. As we know, these are sensitive issues. It’s difficult to make changes around sex offender policy. I really commend the [effort] that Sen. Limmer, Sen. [David] Hann, Rep. Cornish and others made to try to implement some of those recommendations that were included in the auditor’s report.

I think the good news is that they did have hearings. The dialogue is continuing. As we all know, some of these tough items take more than a year or two to get implemented. While we will never de-politicize the program, we should de-politicize the process of people coming in and people going out.

The other thing we can’t ignore is that it’s an election year. We know that it was a short session. There were lots of other high-profile issues that were debated this year, primarily the stadium and a bonding bill. Sometimes it’s just not the right time to try and push issues like this.

CR: How concerned are you about constitutional challenges? There’s a class-action lawsuit that’s in the courts right now challenging some of the conditions of [confinement]. Is that something that whoever takes over in your position needs to be concerned about?

Benson: I think we take all litigation seriously. I don’t think it’s smart to simply disregard any lawsuit that the courts are paying some attention to. We do know that the federal courts are paying close attention to this particular lawsuit. I don’t think it’s going to be resolved anytime soon. There are issues around conditions of confinement. Many of those issues have been vetted by the courts, but there are issues regarding the statute itself. And the efficacy of treatment is another issue that is part of that potential litigation.

CR: You mention treatment. That was another criticism of the auditor’s report, that there wasn’t enough treatment available to individuals in the MSOP. Have you made progress in that area? And are you convinced that individuals enrolled in the program have access to sufficient treatment to potentially be rehabilitated?

Benson: I think we’ve made great progress in areas around treatment. I think we have an outstanding treatment team. We have a very competent clinical director who is implementing cutting-edge sex offender treatment technology, if there is such a thing. We do lots of training. We have increased hiring. While we still have vacancies because of the growing population, we’ve made great strides in hiring competent staff. You don’t become a seasoned sex offender therapist until you get, literally, years of experience. We’ve got a young staff that is in need of experience and training.

But the bottom line is we are able to offer certainly sufficient hours of treatment for those that are interested in addressing issues that brought them to MSOP.

CR: We had the provisional release of Clarence Opheim recently. What’s the significance of that for the Minnesota Sex Offender Program?

Benson: I think it’s indicative of the level of treatment that is occurring, that the courts were able to look at a case and say, yes, this case is ready for the next step — that being provisional discharge to a halfway house. We have to get one before we get two; we have to get two before we get three. It takes time to get people prepared. They’re all different.

CR: You spent three decades with the Department of Corrections. How has running the Minnesota Sex Offender Program been different from your work in the Department of Corrections?

Benson: Prison is there primarily for two things: accountability or punishment, and hopefully some rehabilitation as well. For the most part they have a fixed release date. This population has had their civil rights restored.

It’s a much different balance in terms of how [MSOP manages] them and how they spend their treatment day. First of all, we have to be prepared to treat 100 percent of them. They are there for treatment if they desire to be involved in it. They have rights that prisoners don’t have. On the other hand, they can still be potentially very dangerous, and the need for perimeter security and addressing those public safety issues is an additional part of staff responsibility. [It’s] a little more complicated than running a prison or a cellblock or even a treatment program inside of a prison.

CR: Are you going to have the capacity going forward for people committed to the program in terms of beds and physical space?

Benson: That’s really going to be driven by population increases. The good news is our population is increasing at a lower rate right now than we had anticipated. That can change at any time. We do have adequate beds to get us into 2013. Then the program is going to have to look at some options to create additional beds until such a time that [Minnesota State Hospital] vacates a building or two that can be remodeled into sex offender beds. The program is concerned about space needs looking out a couple of years.

CR: Minnesota has the highest per capital rate of civil commitments in the country. What role do you think politics has played in that reality?

Benson: We have a wide net with respect to our program. I honestly believe that the auditor’s report provides a solid road map out of the situation that we’re in if we can find political leadership to take a hold of it and move some of those recommendations forward. I think it’s unfortunate anytime politics enters into issues around confinement.