A Thousand Years Young Summary

This paper discusses three critical issues in the criminal justice system. It touches on the general issues of punishment philosophies, sentence decision making, and prison overcrowding and focused more specifically on the negative effects of each. Highlighted in this informational paper is the interrelated nature of the issues; each issue affects and is affected by the others. Data and information has been gathered from the FBI Uniform Crime Report, the Bureau of Justice Statistics, Amnesty International, the NAACP Legal Defense

In, “The Caging of America”, by Adam Gopnik explains the problems in the in the American criminal justice system focusing more on the prison system. Some of the struggles that Gopnik states in his article are mass incarceration, crime rate, and judges giving long inappropriate sentencings to those with minor crimes. He demonstrates that inmates are getting treated poorly than helping them learn from their actions. Using facts and statistics, Gopnik makes his audience realize that there is an urgent need of change in the American prison system. The main idea of Gopnik’s article is that the prison system needs to improve its sentencing laws because prisons are getting over crowed. Gopnik’s argument is valid because there is a problem in the sentencing laws that has caused a malfunction in the prison system as a whole.

When we think about prisons, jails, and courthouses, our minds are meant to draw a connection to cold, hard, justice and fair punishments for guilty and deserving parties. Yet, in our judicial and prison systems around the world, this idea is nowhere close to reality. From inhumane punishments, to mass incarceration, and “trapping” people in the system based on race or financial status, justice is far from being served.

The criminal justice system in America is a system designed to work in three distinct steps. The first being to fairly identify those breaking the law, second, create a process through which to both punish and rehabilitate criminals, and lastly integrate them back into society. The current system typically goes unquestioned, as those in the system seem to be deserving of what ever happens while they are in it, even once they have served their prison sentence. It is only upon deeper inspection that we begin to realize the discrimination and unfair tactics used to introduce certain groups of society into the criminal justice system and proceed to trap them there. This is the issue addressed in Alexander’s The New Jim Crow, and it is through arrests, sentencing and further upon release from jail that this oppressive system is created and maintained.

Mass incarceration has been an issue in the United States since the start of the War on Drugs, because of the political agenda attached to the “tough on crime” regimen thousands of people have suffered as a consequence. The solution to this is one that can only be possibly solved by approaching through several angles. The ten steps presented by Michael Tonry, are an innovative and have merit to some extent. However, mass incarceration results from more than unjust sentencing laws, which is his main focus. If ever we are to resolve the issue, society and the criminal justice system must come together to completely reevaluate what we consider to be “tough on crime” and redefine the purpose of prisons, strictly punishment or rehabilitation. The focus has to shift from harsh sentencing, stigma, racial discrimination to a basic form of rehabilitation and reduction of the prison system in general. The criminal justice system has to do what they are actually meant to do and focus on rehabilitation measures, and when possible completely stop interaction with the prison system all together.

The number of prisoners in United States prisons has increased and are still growing day-by-day. The Sentencing Project, an organization that fights for a fair and effective U.S. justice system by promoting reforms in sentencing policy, addresses unjust racial disparities and practices in its article “Trends in U.S. Corrections.” They write, “The United States is the world's leader in incarceration with 2.2 million people currently in the nation's prisons and jails — a 500% increase over the last forty years ”(The Sentencing Project 1). According to The Sentencing Project statistics, the number of prisoners has dramatically increased in the past four decades,

In chapter 13 of Adam Benforado Unfair; Throwing Away the Key, the prisoner, the focus of the text is taking an in-depth look into Americans justice system and the love it has for mass incarnation. According to the reading, America only accounts for 5% of the world’s population, but nearly a quarter of all of the worlds prisoners. (P.g 209). There are 5 times more prisoners in state and federal prisoners than there where in 1978, a scary upward trend. There are several reasons into why Benforado believes the United States has yet to make any progress in deterring and impeded crime. One reason, Benforado suggest is that Americans favorite tools of mass incarceration and solitary confinement do not do what they are intended to do, in fact they do they opposite. Society tends to believe, that to decrease crime, we need to increase the magnitude of the punishment. With a growth in the severity of the punishment, criminals will not see the pay out in

Is incarceration the best way to deal with criminals? In the article written by Michael K. Williams, “America’s Mass Incarceration Habit Needs a Serious Fix,” this issue, among others, are tackled. He shares a personal experience and startling statistics to outline the reality that is prison. Through the use of rhetorical appeal, we delve into the mind of the writer and learn why incarceration is not an invaluable tool for non-violent criminals. We also explore racial disparities and begin to see why prison should be discarded as a form of punishment for nonviolent offenses. I agree with the author, America’s addiction to throwing people in jail needs treatment.

On September 19, 2016, AEON publishes an article by Judith Lichtenberg, “How US prisons violate three principles of criminal justice”. Lichtenberg claims the United States prison system is a failure for society and brings to the table that for most of the time, it is against African Americans. The argument is prominent across America, Lichtenberg writes, but no one is standing up for the better of society. Therefore, she makes known that retribution is a major issue, leading to the type of quandaries we have with the Prison System. Three fundamental principles should control the utilization of incarceration as penalization. Lichtenberg argues everyone should have a fair chance in getting the right punishment, any malefactors, no matter the circumstances, that does the same crime should get the same verdict, and prisons should rehabilitate than eradicate, whether

In conclusion, prisoners have more civil rights in American prisons than in many other countries, and prison conditions are much more humane in America than in many other countries. The challenge for the twenty-first century is maintaining a proper balance between the well-being of inmates and ensuring that incarceration is unpleasant enough to act as a deterrent to crime. The courts have developed a body of law that attempts to balance prisoners’ rights with the legitimate goals and concerns of

Law enforcement over the past few decades has been incarcerating more inmates and creating a media storm on their harsh methods. It seems as though the agenda has changed from “to protect and serve” to arresting individuals as much as possible. In the same context, the death penalty has been increasing over the years as well. We live in a country where Americans want to feel safe, but at the same time, many citizens are supporting these harsh punishments on offenders of the law. Therefore, the following literature review will discuss mass incarceration, long-term imprisonment and the death penalty theories.

On September 19, 2016, AEON publishes an article by Judith Lichtenberg, “How US prisons violate three principles of criminal justice”. Lichtenberg suggests the Criminal Justice System is a failure for society. Americans agree that there is a problem with incarceration achieving very little, Lichtenberg says, but disagrees about the expressing their concerns about the discriminatory judicial system. She insists that retribution is a major issue for why people are being sent to prison. Three basic principles should control the use of incarceration as punishment. Lichtenberg argues punishments should correspond to the severity of the crime, discrimination in sentencings have negative effects for African Americans, and prisons should rehabilitate

In America, the justice system is flawed and biased in most cases. Many cases are overlooked and have exaggerated sentences that sets a person’s fate in stone. In the documentary, Time: The Kalief Browder Story, Kalief Browder was wrongfully put in Riker’s Island Jail for three years. He endured beatings, starvation and torture without ever being convicted of a crime. He spent most of his time in solitary confinement and it drove him to the brink of insanity. His whole life changed the night he got arrested for supposedly stealing a man’s backpack. Without having the funds for bail, Kalief stayed in one of the most violent prisons in the country and it affected him immensely. He was paranoid and did not trust anyone around him because he thought they were the police. No matter what he did to try and work through the suffering, he still ended up in a psychiatric hospital on a couple occasions after his release. And because of the effects, he committed suicide at his mom’s home only a few years after he was released from prison. The justice system is fatally flawed and needs to be revised for the fact that Kalief’s story is not so unusual. Although the justice system was made to protect the innocent and reform the guilty, it failed to provide justice.

In many cases we are forced to believe that the prison system is fair and equal to all, although that may not be the case. The prison system at first glance seems fair and equal but after looking closer you will find many times it’s not fair at all. For example, “an African American male could spend more time in jail for possession of crack than a white man with the same amount of powder cocaine” (Harmon 372). This is just one example of how society has been taken advantage of in the prison system. Some people are subject to years in prison although they should not be while others enjoy life even though they should be in prison. The injustice in the sentencing of prisoners is an ongoing problem in society, as some criminals get of easy for horrible crimes others criminals suffer unfairly all because of color of their skin.

“Americans have always had ambivalent feelings about crime and punishment” (71). Many say our American System of Justice is broken, for they believe the system is looking to just punish those who have done wrong and is not looking to rehabilitate them, especially for juveniles. Then there are some who say, the American System of Justice does not need to change for it already punishes criminals with due process, and rehabilitates them. The American System of Justice should change the way they punish criminals, because those who are incarcerated for nonviolent crimes are taking up space in our prison system, juveniles are being put in solitary confinement and coming out more damaged than they were, and lastly some offenders are serving to long for the crime they committed.