A Tribe Apart: A Journey into the Heart of American Adolescence

The corrections system has gone through the medical model, the community model, and the crime control model over the last century. In the late eighteen hundreds, the belief that incarceration itself did not reduce crime was emerging. Community based sanctions, like probation and parole, were thought to be great additions and that they would work well in conjunction with incarceration. (Wodahl, 8) Between

As the imprisoned population in the United States grows and American culture changes, rehabilitation is becoming popular among these alternatives to a standard prison system. Rehabilitation when referring to criminal justice are programs and methods used to assist prisoners in reforming themselves in order to avoid the habits that placed them in prison in the first place. These programs are becoming more popular due to the high cost of imprisonment and a change in American culture. Each prisoner costs forty thousand dollars each year to keep in prison(Weissmueller). This is money that is coming out of the taxes paid by United States citizens who aren’t even in the prison system. Alongside this, American culture is changing to be supporting of rehabilitation efforts as Americans see the effectiveness of criminal justice systems that include it. This was seen on a trip to Europe by U.S. prison officials; once they had seen the effectiveness of German and Dutch prison rehabilitation, they wanted to bring similar programs to their prisons (“People, not prisoners”). A rehabilitation based criminal justice system in the United States is gaining popularity, and as it does so it is earning the attention it needs and deserves.

The United States prison population has grown seven-fold over the past forty years, and many Americans today tend to believe that the high levels of incarceration in our country stem from factors such as racism, socioeconomic differences, and drugs. While these factors have contributed to the incarceration rate present in our country today, I argue that the most important reason our country has such a high incarceration rate is the policy changes that have occurred since the 1970s. During this time, the United States has enacted policy changes that have produced an astounding rise in the use of imprisonment for social control. These policy changes were enacted in order to achieve greater consistency, certainty, and severity and include sentencing laws such as determinate sentencing, truth-in-sentencing, mandatory minimum sentencing, and three strikes laws (National Research Council 2014). Furthermore, I argue that mandatory sentencing has had the most significant effect on the incarceration rate.

Corrections have existed throughout society for many years and continued to change and evolve in the United States reflecting society’s values and ideals throughout the centuries. In the criminal justice system, corrections exist in more than one form. Not only do corrections refer to jails and prison systems but they also pertain to community-based programs, such as probation, parole, halfway houses, and treatment facilities. Past, present, and future trends in regard to the development and operation of institutional and community-based corrections vary between states but corrections have grown immensely since the early 1800s and have continued to expand

Jamie Fader’s book Falling Back which was published in 2013, is based on ethnographic research over three years, from 2004 to 2007, of black and latino males on the edge of adulthood and that were incarcerated at the Mountain Ridge Academy reform school located in a rural area: “within a dense forest in western Pennsylvania, is Mountian Ridge Academy … ninety-acre campus contains eight dormitories, each of which houses thirty-two young men between ages 14 to 18” (p.1). The criminal thinking approach was intended to help young people identify the patterns that had led them to delinquency and replace it with corrective and prosocial thoughts. These young boys had been involved in drug offenses and violence within their suburban communities and were now in the process of behavioral change in order to help them reflect and be able to make better decisions which would lead them to a better life.

Although we would like to believe the world is not as racially charged in 2013 as it was in the 1960s, a look in our penal system would show that minorities are still arrested and incarcerated at a higher rate than whites. The United States has experienced a rise in its prison population over the last 40 years and our incarceration rate is nearly 5 times higher than any other country. Even though 13% of the US population are African American males, they make up 38% of the prison population. Contributing factors to these numbers are mandatory minimum sentences, high crime and poverty areas, and lack of rehabilitative resources within our system (p.77-78).

Every civilization in history has had rules, and citizens who break them. To this day governments struggle to figure out the best way to deal with their criminals in ways that help both society and those that commit the crimes. Imprisonment has historically been the popular solution. However, there are many instances in which people are sent to prison that would be better served for community service, rehab, or some other form of punishment. Prison affects more than just the prisoner; the families, friends, employers, and communities of the incarcerated also pay a price. Prison as a punishment has its pros and cons; although it may be necessary for some, it can be harmful for those who would be better suited for alternative means

Today we see five prevalent goals of corrections including retribution, incapacitation, deterrence, rehabilitation and restorative justice. Goals employed in corrections change over time depending on several factors including the trends of thought in society and issues within the prison system. Politics as well as prison overcrowding also factor into determining which goal dominates. Retribution has a long-standing history as the most culturally accepted goal because people fended for themselves prior to organized law enforcement (Bartollas, 2002, p. 71). Incapacitation, the dominant goal currently, eliminates the threat by placing the criminal outside society, typically through incarceration, and preventing the criminal from having the ability to commit additional crimes. Deterrence, like retribution, has continued as a goal throughout history. In an effort to reduce the risk of crime, law enforcement attempt to deter criminals from committing crimes. Rehabilitation gained enormous strength with an attempt at moral redemption of the offender. Reformists believed corrections needed a makeover as they worked towards rehabilitation. Rehabilitation places more focus on the individual rather than the act in an attempt to rehabilitate the person. America did not begin to look at the corrections system more substantially until the 1970s as the idea of rehabilitation fell (Bartollas, 2002, p. 75). Restorative justice promises to restore the victim as the offender

Mass Incarceration in the United States has been a large topic of choice because rapid growth in the prison and jail populations, the long sentences the inmates face, and the inability for some inmates to incorporate themselves back into society. Since the 1970’s the U.S. prison population quadrupled from 158 to 635 people per 100,000, causing the U.S. to gain the title of country with the highest incarceration rate. (Massoglia, Firebaugh, & Warner, 2013, p. 142; Muller, 2012) As the growth of the U.S prison and jail population rapidly increased, so did the growth of the three major contributors to that population – African Americans, Hispanics, and whites – with African American and

Getting on with life after getting out of prison shouldn’t be as difficult as society and the government make it. By labeling someone a criminal the stigma that follows them will continue for the rest of their lives. There is discrimination with employment, housing and under federal law, people convicted of drug felonies are deemed ineligible for food stamps. The penal system appears to be a system of social control rather than a system of crime prevention. “Many of Wisconsin 's Black Male Offenders Go Back to Prison, Struggle to Stay Out” is an article about the black men in prison and how Larry Jackson’s first run in with the law placed him in a juvenile center when he was only nine years old. For 20 years he has been in and out of prison, this paper will attempt to apply theories on why it is so difficult for young men to stay out of prison.

Surviving and functioning within the criminal prison system is a culture in and of itself. When we see media portrayals of life in prison, the general stereotype is of hardcore violence and ongoing criminal behaviors. The media images and sensationalism may not be too far off in their narrative of how life in the big house really is. This paper will explore the world of prison culture, specifically life for men within the U.S. prison system. Additionally, the implications of therapy use to address both substance abuse and mental health in the prison culture will be examined.

Corrections and Criminal Justice are major fields in the area of psychological research. The attention driven to these two fields reflect greatly on the public’s interest and opinion on the control of crime in the United States. Risk, need, and other characteristics of offenders’ influence on the management of programs to reduce criminal recidivism (Andrews,1989).

With the exception of probation, imprisonment has been the main form of punishment for serious offenders in the United States for over 200 years. Americans can be said to have invented modern incarceration as a means of criminal punishment. Although Europe provided precedents, theoretical justifications, and even architectural plans for imprisoning offenders, Americans developed the blueprints for the typical prisons of today and devised the disciplinary routines, types of sentences, and programs that prison systems of other countries subsequently adopted or modified (Rafter & Stanley 1999).

Teenagers are more than capable of achieving great tasks in the future as well as causing great destruction with every skill stapled in their mind as they grow. Good and evil will determine the effects of which path a young mind its taught so that’s why parents must educated well with good intensions for a better future. The age of a teenager shows history how it transformed the world including the United States by family values, the high school, and dangerous adolescences etc. What teenagers did was start a fashion changing the world and its rules, becoming rebellious toward their parents values for

Criminology itself is the systematic study of the nature, extent, etiology and control of lawbreaking behavior. The core components revealed in this course are definitions of crime in nature as harm causing behavior, the descriptions and classifications of criminals, the analysis of crime, profiles of everyday victims and offenses, and the origin of crime. The field of probation relies heavily on these components in order to understand and properly categorize offenders, stay aware of offender’s mental and emotional status, and attempt to predict the future of criminal offenders. The various theories presented in Criminology 262 help shape the Dallas County Adult Probation Department and serve as model types used to minimize the risks associated with sentencing alternatives. The agency assesses the same theoretical categories provided by Criminology 262 such as sociological, biological, and psychological explanations of crime in an attempt to better deal with offenders. The internship experience has supported the previous notion installed through Criminology 262 that one single theory cannot explain crime. The combination of each theory and perspective enabled an opinion of individuality to form. In opposition to the core components embedded in the course, the personally constructed opinion that criminal offenders cannot be categorized and must exist on individual levels was formed from the internship experience. The Dallas County Adult Probation