The United States And The Criminal Justice System Essay

Before proposing a reform to the American criminal justice system, we must first examine the problems that plague the process of justice on all levels. American society plays an important role in shaping the criminal justice system. Their beliefs and values determine the type of deviants and the consequences of the crimes. Often their beliefs contradict each other.

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.

In any given year now, incarceration rates has tripled with approximately 13 million people introduced to American jails in any given year. This increase in the prison population far outpaced the crime rate and the US population growth. Today, America has around 5% of the world’s population but a quarter of the world’s prison population.

Over the past few decades, the United States has witnessed a huge surge in the number of individuals in jail and in prison. Evidence suggests the mass imprisonment policy from the last 40 years was a horrible catastrophe. Putting more people in prison not only ruined lives, it disrupted families, prevented ex-prisoners to find housing, to get an education, or even a good job. Regrettably, the United States has a higher percent of its population incarcerated than any other country. America is responsible for a quarter of the world’s inmates, and its incarceration rate is increasing exponentially. The expense produced by these overcrowded prisons cost the country a substantial amount of money every year. Although people are incarcerated for a number of reasons, the country’s prisons are focused on punishment rather than reform, and the result is a misguided system that fails to rehabilitate criminals or discourage crime. By researching mass incarceration, I hope to get society to understand that incarcerating an individual not only effects the family, but we will look at the long term consequences on society and how the United States can remain safe and, at the same time, undo much of the damage that results from large-scale imprisonment.

In order to keep a safe society, it is important to establish a nation with

The criminal justice system focuses more on criminalization and incarceration than it does on rehabilitation. The United States of America wins the award for the highest incarceration rate in the world with over 2.3 million people in correctional facilities. America itself contains only about five percent of the world population, but accounts for twenty-five percent of the world’s prisoners (American Civil Liberties Union). With a longstanding history of mass incarceration and

No matter how you look at it, the prison system within the US holds too many people without valid reason. The last decade has seen a lot of states cut down on crime while also cutting down on their prison populations. In the years between 1999 and 2012, for example, both New York and New Jersey cut their prison populations by 30%, and crime rates fell “faster than they did nationally.”

In the past four decades, there has been a staggering increase in the United States prison population at the local and state level. Currently there are 2.2 million people in the nation’s prisons and jails that has added up to a 500% increase over 40 years (The sentencing project). The cause of this prison growth is a variety of laws and punitive sentencing policies that were initiated starting in the early 1970’s. Policies such as harsh drug penalties for non-violent crimes, Mandatory Minimum Maximum sentences and the Three Strikes law have all contributed to America’s current problem of mass incarceration.

As Americans, we live one of the greatest countries in the world. Things are not perfect, but they can range from good to great. However, there is one area that seems to continuously fall behind our great national standard. This area is the level of people that to fill up our prison system. The United States has only five percent of the world 's population, but it has houses 25 percent of its prisoners, which is around 2.2 million people (Collier, 2014). One of the main reasons the United States has become the prison capital of the world is due to the hard stance on all drugs. This stance led to the use of mandatory minimum sentencing laws to keep drug offenders locked up for longer than they should be.

The United States has a larger percent of its population incarcerated than any other country. America is responsible for a quarter of the world’s inmates, and its incarceration rate is growing exponentially. The expense generated by these overcrowded prisons cost the country a substantial amount of money every year. While people are incarcerated for a number of reasons, the country’s prisons are focused on punishment rather than reform, and the result is a misguided system that fails to rehabilitate criminals or discourage crime. The ineffectiveness of the United States’ criminal justice system is caused by mass incarceration of non-violent offenders, racial profiling, and a high rate of recidivism.

Imprisonment is a rising social issue in America. To put in a numerical perspective, America at only 4% of the world’s population of 7.1 billion is surprisingly the world’s largest jailer at an overwhelming 22 % of the global prison population (Lee 2015). Currently the prison system costs American’s nearly 70 billion dollars (Borowski 2015). With this amount of federal funds going towards housing and feeding inmates, questions begin forming about the effectiveness of the correctional system. Do the punishments fit the crimes, and if so, is it economically beneficial? This paper discusses the benefits and problems of the correctional system in the United States, and

In the United States, Imprisonment is one of the main forms of punishment for offenders who commit a felony offense. The United States has the highest number of offenders incarcerated in prion than any other country in the world. Both the federal and state prisons both have the same mission and that is to protect society by confining offenders in a controlled environment that are safe human, secure, cost efficient, and provide rehabilitation to offenders in self-improvement and educational opportunities and helping them become better law-abiding citizens. Prisons are operated at the Federal and State level and are operated at various different levels of security based on the offender’s crimes which can range from minimum security prisons to supermax facilities (De Maille, 2015)

When it comes to the criminal justice system, there is often a gray area between what is considered fair and what is just, with these concepts many times having a connection. Furthermore, justice and fairness are subjective and many times individuals’ concept of what is fair or just differ. Throughout a recent court case involving a Stanford University swimmer being charged with rape, that issue became well evident. This case involved a Stanford student, Brock Turner, being charged with sexually assaulting an unconscious woman on the school’s campus behind a dumpster. The victim who has chosen to remain unidentified read an empowering letter at Brock Turner’s sentencing hearing, addressing him and the affect his actions have made. Another letter was made public during this case, which was written by the attacker’s father and directed towards the judge during this hearing; Which made an attempt to justify Brock’s actions. These letters, media coverage of Brock, and decisions made by the judge throughout this court process exemplified the dilemma associated with deciphering between what is just and what one believes to be fair when it comes to a crime, and how what may appear to be fair to one person may not be fair to another.

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The Criminal Justice System in the United States of America was established with noble intentions. The basis of the system can be traced back from the first book of the Bible Genesis, and the story of Cain and Able. The criminal justice system was established to be morally suitable for a growing diverse society. Moral dilemmas within the system arise from concerns related to principles of officials’ right and wrong behavior. These principles are often embedded into a culture of the human character, in other words, viewed as essential to the criminal justice system. This biblical story mentioned above has defined the way justice has been administered for thousands of years. The quote "Eye for an eye" continues to be the standard