Criminal Sentencing

Incapacitation, the removal of the offender from society to prevent them from harming society further, has been in use since ancient times. The incapacitation may be in the form of exile, penal colonies, prison, or placement in a mental institution. Regardless of the form, incapacitation places its focus on the future behavior of the offender and on the characteristics of the offender. It assumes that since that majority of crime is committed by a small number of criminals, removing them from society will reduce crime. What this theory does not take in to

While many conservatives oppose the rehabilitative measures restorative justice offers offenders and demand more prisons and penalties, advocates for restorative justice counter this demand with research. Restorative justice advocates call for restitution rather than retribution. According to promoters for restorative justice, imposing harsh penalties on offenders and lengthening prison sentences is futile. “Critical theorists argue that the ‘old methods’ of punishment are a failure and that upwards of two-thirds of all prison inmates recidivate soon after their release” (Siegel, 2008, p. 188). While conservatives want to build more prisons and lock away more offenders for longer terms, supporters of restorative justice believe that a more rehabilitative approach is beneficial for not only the offender, but also the community. “The offender is asked to recognize that he or she caused injury to personal and social relations along with a determination and acceptance of responsibility. Only then can the offender be restored as a productive member of society” (Siegel, 2008, p. 190). Placing an offender in prison for any amount of time is shown to be harmful to the offender, their victim, and society. “Rather than reduce recidivism, harsher punishments may increase the likelihood of reoffending” (Siegel, 2008, p. 86). A conservative asking for more prisons would likely be met with a barrage of evidence explaining why restorative justice will and

I agree that rehabilitation should be the primary goal in sentencing. Rehabilitation teaches a criminal how to interact with the community after being away for a set amount of time. Days in prison and jail can hinder the positive thoughts in one’s mind. Anger and depression can build up, and make the criminals want to act out again. The rehabilitation process can even mend burnt bridges with family and friends.

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

After legal challenges began on behalf of defendants disputing the constitutionality of the Sentencing Reform Act and the Guidelines, the Commission was given the task of monitoring the effects of federal sentencing practices and revising amendments to the Guidelines if problems arose for congressional approval. In 1990, Congress directed the Commission to respond to a series of questions raised in regards to the Guidelines, the effects of mandatory minimums and options and options for Congress to exercise its legislative power in statutory directive and organization (1991 U.S.S.C. Report). The 1991 report was a “preliminary assessment of short-tem effects” of the Guidelines on federal sentencing practice (1991 U.S.S.C. Report). The report conducted empirical research study requested by Congress to “assess the effect of mandatory minimum sentencing provisions on the eliminating unwarranted sentencing disparity as well as description of the interaction between mandatory minimum sentencing provisions and plea agreements” (1991 U.S.S.C. Report).

The goals of correction are retribution, deterrence, incapacitation, rehabilitation and restoration. The correction system restricts the freedom of those found guilty of a crime for the safety of society and prepares those imprisoned to re-enter back into society. The Rehabilitative Era and medical model offer the most appropriate means to accomplish correction.

As the 21st century continues, there will possibly be a developing public policy dilemma between firm determinate sentencing structures that have been recently developed in many states and the evolving social movement reemphasizing offender-based sentencing options. If the growth of alternative and restorative sentencing options continues on its existing path, the future will likely witness a growing separation between existing determinate sentencing systems and progressively individualized sentencing movements. Therefore, it will be the task of future generations to successfully balance the goals of justice and consistency within structured sentencing bases with the evolving emphasis on individualized rehabilitative methods to routine and

Punishments for an individual’s criminal actions, such as the possession of illicit drugs, have been in place for centuries. However, many people wonder why certain punishments are more severe than others and how a judge makes the final decision of what a sentence may be. In Federal Courts, a sentencing guideline is determined by the individual’s criminal history, severity of the crime, and mitigating factors.1

Rehabilitation is another utilitarian rationale for punishment. The goal of rehabilitation is to prevent future crime by providing offenders with the resources and abilities to succeed within the confines of the law. Rehabilitative requirements for criminal offenders usually include treatment for handicaps such as mental illness, chemical dependency, and chronic violent behavior. Rehabilitation also includes the use of public educational programs that offer the offenders the knowledge and skills needed to feel confident enough get out and compete in the job

Most stages of the criminal justice system revolve around the sentencing process, in that the primary focus is determining the guilt or innocence of the accused (Neubauer & Pradella, 2011). As a result, numerous laws, policies, and practices have been implemented throughout the system as a means to make sentencing procedures less complex. However, most of these sentencing laws have produced an adverse effect, and generated barriers during this stage of the justice process. Therefore, the purpose of this analysis is to provide further insight on challenges within the sentencing process in regard to sentencing laws. More specifically, three strikes laws are discussed in-detail as a means to present the positive and negative impacts they have

This type of structure is problematic because the accused rarely understand the sentencing process and the key court players’ show that they do not understand what is happening (Perren, 2010). Understanding that the accused do not understand how the sentencing process works and the judge, prosecutor, and counselor also act like they are not as knowledgeable in what is going on. The goal of this type of proposal gives the offender an equal opportunity to have an equal and flexible sentence, that is not only fair to the offender but also to the victim (Perren, 2010). This type of proposal can also incapacitate those that need to be imprisoned and it can reduce the cost of housing prisoners as well as increase safety in the public (Perren, 2010). This type of proposal can also bring back the reality of sentencing in the Criminal Justice system because currently the California sentencing structure presents the possibility that the federal government would mandate that some offenders would have to be released (Perren, 2010). The studies that have been looked at demonstrates that if individuals spend time in prison and then go on parole or into a treatment facility

Crime and punishment is a large part of society today as well as the most ignored. Robert Ferguson’s book, Inferno: An Anatomy of American Punishment describes the topic of crime and punishments in the American justice system. In his explanation, Ferguson also goes into detail on the topic of the “Punishment Regime.” The punishment regime can be described as a legal process to which a person in society is punished. The groups that part of the punishment regime include jurors, police officers, prosecutors, judges, and correctional officers. All the members of the punishment regime have a specific job in administrating a punishment to an individual. The main focus in this essay will be how the punishment regime has administered punishment in

Alternative sentencing has always been a consent debate due to the rise of corporation run prisons; many agencies argue that with our current prison system is void of human rights, promotes detrimental social impacts and the cost of imprisonment. Since the 1970's offering parole and probation options as an alternative helped reduce prison overcrowding. Lawmakers needed to develop new options for sentencing criminal offenders and enforce alternative correction programs, that would provide local courts, state departments of corrections, and state parole boards with a broad range of correctional options for offenders. When lawmakers discussed alternatives to incarceration they noted that there was a need to achieve the following goals rehabilitation,

Sentencing in America has come a long way from the past, and this present time isolation is an intricate part of sentencing and the criminal justice system relies on it. Moreover, America does not use the corporal punishment and cutting off of extremities anymore. However, sentencing become critical when the question is asked do current sentencing method works or accomplish what it set to accomplish? Nevertheless, are the key components of the goals of criminal sentencing being address all the time? Rest assured, the isolation incapacitation will definitely be covered, but do the victim really receive retribution or do the offender become reformed? Conversely, the just deserts portion can also be debated because the criminal justice system

Over many years there has been great debate about whether rehabilitation reduces the rate of recidivism in criminal offenders. There has been great controversy over whether anything works to reduce recidivism and great hope that rehabilitation would offer a reduction in those rates. In this paper I will introduce information and views on the reality of whether rehabilitation does indeed reduce recidivism. Proposed is a quasi-experiment, using a group of offenders that received rehabilitation services and an ex post facto group that did not? I intend to prove that rehabilitation services do