Unit 2 DB1
Deterrence Theory Deterrence theory has many ideas as to what constitute deterrence. Some researchers think that it is the main purposes of our criminal justice system. They do agree that it is the main goal when it comes down to discouraging society from committing criminal deeds. Because, of fear of punishment for committing a crime. Some researcher would have you believe that the most powerful deterrent we have is our criminal justice system, because they are the ones that will make sure that violators will be punish swiftly if they break the law. Well, “this is unrealistic to believe that any criminal justice system could ever accomplish this goal, no matter how many law enforcement resources were dedicated to achieving it” (“Deterrence”, n.d.). Therefore, “deterrence theory of crime presumes that individuals are rational enough to consider the penalties for their actions and to be influenced by those consequences” (“How Much Do”, 2010, p. 782). Also if the punishment is not swift and certain, then the individual will assume that there are no consequences for their action, and might commit another crime, meaning that they will feel if I got away with it once can get away with it again, and might decide to increase their criminal activities. Thus “far, it seems like the deterrent effect of severe punishment is moderated by swiftness and certainty” (“Theories of Causation”, n.d., p.84).
Biological Theory Comparison Biological theory in comparison to
Deterrence theory is founded upon two types, general and specific. The idea behind deterrence is to make the sanction so abhorrent that it will deter the individual and society as a whole, although it should be stated that deterrence could be
375) and by using this hedonistic calculus people will refrain from committing crimes. This concept focuses on the punishment fitting the criminal and on preventing future crimes from occurring. The three most important factors in effectively deterring a criminal from further crimes are the severity of the punishment, the certainty of the punishment, and the swiftness of the punishment. If criminal doesn’t believe he will be punished or he feels the punishment is minor in comparison to the crime or if the punishment is not swift enough, then he/she will not be deterred from committing crimes. Studies on the effectiveness of deterrence have shown to be inconclusive. The deficient areas of deterrence are crimes committed in the heat of passions, crimes committed under the influence of drugs or alcohol, and the massive backlog of cases in the nation’s courts (Neubauer & Fradella, 2008).
While watching this crime documentary over the craigslist killer a few thoughts came into my mind about the deterrence theory. I believe certain things can be implemented to deter criminals like Philip Markoff from conducting heinous crimes in our society. The first idea is making it certain that if committing those crimes the criminal will be caught. In my opinion this is a way better deterrence than punishment because it makes individuals think twice about their actions. For instance, the criminal’s goal is never be caught and continue to commit crimes so making very clear that you will be caught changes their thought is my opinion.
Those who believe that deterrence justifies the execution of certain offenders bear the burden of proving that the death penalty is a deterrent. The overwhelming conclusion from years of deterrence studies is that the death penalty is, at best, no more of a deterrent than a sentence of life in prison. The Ehrlich studies – which took
The term deterrence underlines the discouragement of an individual from doing something for doubt or fear (Tonry 24). Casare Beccaria, the father of classical criminology, believed that certainty, severity, and swiftness could deter crime. He expressed that as certainty of penalization goes up, the less likely someone is to transgress the law. So if the criminals figure out that they would be penalized, they would be more discouraged to commit a crime. He strongly believes that the laws need to be very clear and must always be enforced. His second principle of deterrence expressed that the more swift the punishment is set in, the less likely crime will transpire. Beccaria believes that the less time between the crime and the penalization, the more vigorous impact it would
The certainty of punishment appears to possibly be the most effective deterrent to crime. Offenders may not be daunted much by the threat of severe punishment, as
A conspiracy theory is a theory that argues that the rich and those with power seek the make sure the criminal justice system fails because they benefit from that failure. Conspiracy theories are hard to be proven and for it to succeed, it has to be kept a secret. There’s no credibility in the sources due to the degree of secrecy. Conspiracy theories are invalid because it doesn’t correspond with how people behave most of the time. The Pyrrhic defeat theory isn’t a conspiracy theory because the theory bases itself on why the criminal justice system fails and that’s due to our own shortcoming of not trying hard enough to prevent it.
There are three principles that the deterrence theory follows. The first principle is severe punishment. Its basis is any criminal penalty must be severe enough to outweigh the benefits to be obtained by crime. Our perceptions about the severity of punishment is, the more people suffer, and the greater the severity of that punishment, than the criminal has ‘paid’ for their crime. For example, capital punishment. There are only two options you can receive as
However, no individual has ever been able to present any credible evidence that supports the theory of deterrence. Decades of research across the country has failed to produce signs of a higher murder rate in states that have abolished the death penalty. The theory of deterrence assumes that a murderer is examining the costs and benefits of the anticipated criminal act and taking a moment to think rationally. In the United States, the death penalty is only handed down for about one out of every one hundred homicides. A murderer has a greater chance of being killed by the planned victim or in a confrontation with the police, and therefor has no reason to fear the death penalty if there is only a one in a hundred chance they will actually receive it (Jackson, Jackson, and Shapiro 33). Moreover, most homicides are unplanned, impulsive acts and to imply that a murderer is thinking calm and cooly outweighing their options in such an emotionally charged environment is simply idiotic.
Deterrence, is another one of the goals. Deterrence relies more on trying to prevent crime from occurring. An example of such, would be to punish someone who committed a crime with a harsh sentence. With that is the hopes that others who are thinking of doing the same crime, see the possibilities of what could happen and prevents those interested in doing the crime from committing the crime. Another example of deterrence could be crime prevention such as having more cameras in locations, with the higher chances of getting caught or being able to be recognized helps to prevent some crimes from occurring.
This paper defines and analyzes Beccaria's concept of deterrence and the three key elements of punishment. The concept of deterrence is a classical school and rational choice model that emphasis punishment in order to deter crime. The three key elements of punishment used in order to deter crime include: the swiftness of punishment, the certainty of punishment, and the severity of punishment. It discusses which of these elements Beccaria thought was the most and least important, as well as my personal opinions. Also included in this paper are real-life examples of deterrence and the elements of punishment that they use.
In the United States there are four main goals when it comes to punishment which are retribution, deterrence, incapacitation, and rehabilitation (DeJong, 2016, p. 288). The main goals for these punishments are to maintain order over society and to prevent recidivism (DeJong, 2016, p. 288). This ties into the Ecology perspective. By maintaining order over society and preventing recidivism, it ties into all of the issues regarding the Ecology perspective which requires for each issue to address the individual, family, community and society. Maintaining order over society and preventing recidivism strives toward making a safer environment for the individual, family, community and society. There is no universal agreement for making the severity of punishment just or fair (DeJong, 2016, p. 288). When it comes to retribution the person who is getting punished deserves the punishment (DeJong, 2016, p. 289). Retribution refers to when an individual commits a certain crime then that person must receive a punishment proportionate to that crime or suffering that they may have caused towards the victim (DeJong, 2016, p. 289). Regarding deterrence there are two types, general deterrence and specific deterrence (DeJong, 2016, p. 289). General deterrence focuses on the society in general and wants to scare everyone away from committing crimes (DeJong, 2016, p. 289). Specific deterrence focuses on criminals that have already been convicted and wants to prevent them from
All things have their problems. Contemporary Theorist believes that, yes deterrence may stop some people but for other is causes a backlash effect. The authors of Criminology: Explaining Crime and Its Context explained backlash effect like this, “…stiffer penalties will generate more rather than less deviance among some segments of the targeted population” (Brown et al., P148, par. 3). A study by Gary Lafee and some of his colleagues showed how the backlash effect works. They results of their study showed that deterrence did occur but the backlash effect was much more. This study shows that punishment might stop some criminals, but not all of them are afraid of punishment (Brown et al., 2010, p 148-150).
In classical theory, the main objective of study is the offence and the nature of the offender is a rational, free-willed, calculating and normal individual (Aker, 2012). However, it became apparent that some were more motivated to commit crime than others, regardless of deterrence. Therefore, the classical doctrine cannot account for re-offending. Based on empirical research done on convicted offenders, the notion of deterrence was rarely given thought of (Burke, 2013). Initially, most offenders give a lot of thought to the notion of punishment; however, in the process of committing the offence, offenders give little consideration to deterrence and consequences. As a result, this defies whether the purpose of deterrence is, in fact, achieving what it is meant to (Burke, 2013). The model is idealistic, that individuals could be controlled by the threat of punishment- by the likelihood of arrest, prosecution and
Deterrence is a further purpose that needs to be highlighted. The aim of punishment is also to warn people from crime committing under the fear of being punished and it might be reached through the well-developed criminal justice system, one of the main aim of which is to ensure that every wrongdoer will be punished for the criminal acts. There are two kinds of deterrence. They are general and specific deterrence. Ferris defines specific deterrence as deterrence which attempts to persuade the individual before the court not to commit further offences, while general deterrence is defined as the process of persuading others who might be inclined to offend not to do so. Deterrence has its own pros and cons as well. One of the main deterrence benefits is that it may reduce crime rate significantly and sharply. For instance, there is a three strikes policy in most states of USA, which means that if an individual has already been in jail two times and if this person commits a third crime, she would be automatically sentenced for 25 years regardless of crime seriousness. On the other hand, the main drawback is that criminals usually think that they will not be caught, so they continue committing crimes.