Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, April 5, 1994 TAG: 9404050078
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: CHARLOTTESVILLE LENGTH: Medium
State Sen. Edgar Robb, R-Charlottesville, said last week that he might propose a government study of the drugs as a possible alternative to prison for some offenders.
"Chemical castration" involves the use of hormones or drugs to stop production of the male hormone testosterone. Doctors say the process is safe with relatively few side effects and has a high success rate.
Doctors at Johns Hopkins University have treated hundreds of men with the drugs Depo-Provera and Depo-Lupron, said Dr. Fred Berlin, who founded the university's sexual disorders clinic 14 years ago.
Men properly selected for such treatment have a more than 92 percent success rate and do not repeat the illegal sexual behavior, Berlin said. The drugs could cost as much as $600 a month, he said.
The cost to incarcerate a sex offender for one month is about $1,600, said Mike Etkin of the Virginia Department of Corrections.
Robb, one of three senators on the state Crime Commission, said the state should study the treatment as part of its study of alternatives to incarceration.
"Sex criminals, as such, have a very high rate of recidivism" and a very low, or nonexistent, rehabilitation rate without the use of the drugs, Robb said.
"It is completely reversible, which is an advantage over surgical castration," said Dr. Stuart S. Howards, a University of Virginia urology professor.
Howards said that although few people would commit sex crimes if their sex drive were shut off, he has some reservations about the state's using the treatment for sex offenders.
"I'm not opposed to it in the sense that I would refuse to do it, but I certainly wouldn't do it without a judge's order," Howards said.
Berlin said the term chemical castration is misleading because "the only thing it has in common with castration is it lowers the testosterone."
Judges in several states, including Michigan and Florida, have ordered those convicted of sex crimes to undergo the drug treatment.
Robb said he may write a letter soon asking the Crime Commission to study the issue.
"The matter is going to have to be studied diligently and debated from the civil liberties aspect, the constitutional aspect, the human aspect," he said. "We don't want to look like ghouls."
Memo: Shorter version ran in Metro edition.