Rehabilitation And Corrections : The Most Significant Parts Of The Criminal Justice System Essay

The criminal justice system is composed of three parts – Police, Courts and Corrections – and all three work together to protect an individual’s rights and the rights of society to live without fear of being a victim of crime. According to merriam-webster.com, crime is defined as “an act that is forbidden or omission of a duty that is commanded by public law and that makes the offender liable to punishment by that law.” When all the three parts work together, it makes the criminal justice system function like a well tuned machine.

Our criminal justice system has over time implemented and changed the means of sentencing and punishment for crimes. In the United States plea deals are accountable for 90% of criminal cases. A plea deal is an agreement between prosecutor and defendant in whom the defendant accepts a guilty plea to a charge and in return receives some type of concession from the prosecution. As we have moved forward in the judicial system and now have the ability to look back on previous cases, plea deals have become more controversial. The majority of awareness in this area has been used to look deeper into false confessions, grazing right over the fact that false confessions are a large part plea deals. A controversy arose when many refused to believe that situational factors during interrogations and dispositional factors inherent to the suspects could result in false confessions. (Redlich, 2010)

The criminal justice system is composed of four categories: law enforcement, legal counsel, courts, and corrections. I am going to focus on one of these subjects and the problems or issues that are within the corrections part of criminal justice usually refers to the events that occur after being sentenced in a court of law. During the past few decades many problems have arisen in this area, solutions have been discussed and put into use over the years as well. However, there are still problems that are being dealt with in today’s corrections.

Restorative justice ways are a very controversial topic. Many people have different opinions about whether restorative justice is a good idea or not. Restorative prisons are a part of restorative justice and they can positively impact many people who were involved in some way of the crime or not. One way of restorative prisons are very effective and beneficial is because it gives the perpetrator more of an option on rebuilding their life after. It also helps the perpetrator see the good in themselves as well as others see the good in this perpetrator. Restorative prisons don’t just give the perpetrator freedom right away they have to go through a process to prove that they want to be a better person so they are not just receiving freedom

Is long-term incarceration working to resolve issues of criminal conduct? When considering the population of people incarcerated is rising at an alarming rate and crime statistics not dropping by much, it is hard to tell if incarceration is working in these modern times. The United States prison population is the largest in the world. In fact, the United States has 2.3 million persons in institutions which is more than the rest of the world combined (Wagner p. 2). Crime overall as decreased in the last 30 years with the introduction of rehabilitation programs but these programs are not universal. While serious crimes require serious punishment, most people that are incarcerated should be

There are more people incarcerated in the United States of America than any other country in the world willing to count their inmates (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2016). How can this be? Foremost, the criminal justice system in the United States of America (which is made up of the police, the courts, and the corrections) is not working toward reducing mass incarceration the way it should be. The criminal justice system is set up strategically to accomplish two goals: to bring in money and to gain power. The byproducts of achieving these two goals are mass incarceration, ethnic and racial profiling, and minimal justice. The system needs to change its goals to: reducing crime and doing justice. The police, the courts, and the correctional system all feed off of one another and affect each other. Therefore, if real change is going to be made, it needs to happen in all three branches of the criminal justice system. A system that seems to be working well is in Norway. Norway’s criminal justice system does not look like America’s system. The criminal justice system in Norway has different philosophies concerning crime, justice, and the corrections. "We don 't look at our inmates as criminals, but rather as regular people who have committed a crime." (Skulberg, 2010, p. 73) This is a quote from a Norwegian prison guard giving an example of the ideology in Norway. In order for the United States to reduce crime and to have true justice, first, the policing model needs to change

An ongoing and increasingly evident issue in the criminal justice system is how convicted individuals reenter society with little or no gradual process. These individuals often resort back to criminal activity in an act termed recidivism. According to the National institute of Justice(NIJ), recidivism “refers to a person’s relapse into criminal behavior, often after the person receives sanctions or undergoes intervention for a previous crime” (National Institute of Justice, 2012). This process often involves individuals committing more serious criminal offenses than in their prior offenses. Is there any way in which the criminal justice system can be altered so as to either

A hard line stance by law enforcement to treat addiction with a criminal justice approach rather than with a public health approach has resulted in over-crowded prisons and offenders in need of treatment. The rise of the prison population began with enactment of the federal Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988 (Olson & Lurigio, 2014). Highlighting the escalating prison population, Olson and Lurigio (2014) noted from 1990-2000 the state prison population had almost doubled. Additionally, Taxman, Perdoni, and Caudy (2013) indicated of the approximate 7 million adults being supervised by the United States correctional system, almost 70% have been diagnosed with a substance use

Ever since the 1970’s the “War on Drugs” has been an uphill battle. Even back then President Nixon knew that harmful effects some specific drugs can have on not only individuals but the society as a whole. In 1971, President publicly announced that drug-related crimes and drug abuse were “public enemy number one.” Though one could argue that the claims of President Nixon are both outdated and potentially overgeneralized, studies throughout the next forty years have only strength Nixon’s worries. Research has proven that “the vast majority of offenders in the criminal justice system are drug users. In the drug use forecasting (DUF) studies conducted in 20 major cities in 1988, the percentage of male arrestees testing positive for any drug ranged

Currently there are 2.4 million inmates in state and federal prisons across the United States. (Cullen, 2011) Each year, more than 700,000 individuals are released from state and federal prisons. Statistics indicate that more than two-thirds of state prisoners are rearrested within three years of their release and half are reincarcerated. High rates of recidivism mean more crime, more victims and more pressure on an already overburdened criminal justice system. A topic of much discussion is what happens when the inmates are released back into society? Are they prepared for the “outside” world? Has the institution done enough to prevent recidivism? It can be said that prison based education is a means of rehabilitating and re-direction. If someone is released with only the same knowledge, skills, and abilities they entered prison with, then they are likely to become involved in the same activities as prior to being incarcerated. This action is known in the criminal justice community as recidivism. Recidivism is a tendency to relapse into a previous condition or mode of behavior. (Merriam-Webster, 2014) Recidivism is the largest concern for prison system professionals. The goal of most prisons is to rehabilitate the offender, not to punish per say. If the inmate is to return to free society, prison officials need to attempt to reduce or eliminate the possibility of committing criminal offenses upon release. Currently prisons provide various forms of education to

The drug treatments programs that prisons offer is beneficial in several different aspects. Although, inmates are viewed in a bad appearance in the community. However, the victim is the direct costumer and the

Restorative justice is a system of criminal justice that focuses on the rehabilitation of offenders through reconciliation with victims and the community at large. I think this is a good system to help people through tough times. Another system is the death penalty. The death penalty is when you did a really bad crime like kill someone, they have a choice to kill you. They kill you by injecting drugs into your veins. The church is against this because it is wrong to take someone's life from them. I am both for and not for the death penalty. I am for it because if someone did first degree murder they should get killed for it. I say this because when they murdered the person they have hurt everyone that knew the person. That is why I think

With more than “2 million people” (B, "Rehabilitate or Punish") incarcerated in the United States, it’s a wonder how rehabilitation can possibly be a factor anymore in United States Prison. However, at one point rehabilitation or reform was the main goal up “until the mid-1970” (B, "Rehabilitate or Punish"). So why is rehabilitation no longer an objective? Is it the overabundance of prisoners in the system? Or that the public’s approach on crime has changed from understanding to tough and preventive. In this case Jonathan Wayne Nobles fate was decided based on society’s lapsed views on incarceration, lack of knowledge of mental disorders, as well as the non-apparent recognition of positive change in

David Cole wrote, "our criminal justice system affirmatively depends on inequality" (5). Cole has substantial grounds for making this statement. Race and class have long been issues in the criminal justice system, but does the system "affirmatively depend on inequality?" Does the criminal justice system depend on the disparities of the people that it serves?

never implemented as intended. Although the contours of the correctional system changed—the juvenile court, indeterminate sentencing, probation, parole, and discretion became integral features of this system—the resources and knowledge needed to provide effective treatment to offenders were in short supply. Cullen and Gendreau (2000).