Crime, Punishment, Rehabilitation and Reoffending

[Li Tan]

I was doing some reading about the various correctional institutes in New Zealand (a train of thought that ended up at Wikipedia), and there was a section about some kind of program that was supposed to reduce the rates of reoffending.
The program ended and was declared a failure.

Anyway, I just got to thinking about the whole situation.I think the whole system of justice and punishment that we use in most countries today is kind of broken. I'm not saying I have the solution, but it's obviously messed up when a teen goes to prison for a minor offence and comes out a hardened criminal.
I understand the whole "you made your bed and bow you gotta lie in it" argument, but that's also over simplified and ignores facts like kids whose dads went to prison and weren't around are more likely to go to prison and not be around, or surely uncoincidental coincidence of a huge proportion of female offenders having been sexually abused prior to their starting down a road of criminality. It's hardly justice when the deck was stacked against you from the start.

Right now, it's more like prison is a band aid that is supposed protect the general public from offenders, but that band aid is made of sandpaper and uses a toxic adhesive that will cause further injury in the future.

What do you guys think? Is the system now ideal? If not, where and how could we improve it? Have you seen, read or heard of any other approach to crime reduction?
Have you been inside the system? What feedback would you give if you thought it could make a difference?

 

[Soda Jack]

I think something that makes some people get worse after going to jail, or prison, is the violence they see while locked up. When you get locked up you have to be ready to fight at the drop of a hat. If you don't fight back, then you become known for being a person that can be easily taken advantage of. But win or lose, if you show you will fight, most predators will go for an easier target. And rest assured you will be "tried". A lot of inmates become predators just because they learn that they can get valuables by violence and intimidation, and those valuables can make their time a little more comfortable.

Also, I believe just the natural negative environment of being surrounded by people who have done negative things can effect a persons behavior. You would be surprised by how much people that have drug charges love to talk about drugs, thieves like to talk about all the things they've gotten away with stealing, sex offenders that are not ashamed of what they have done want to talk about sex, etc,etc.

Then there is the fact that counties, and states don't make jails, and prisons a priority for their tax dollars. When I went to jail, I went from 210pnds, to 160pnds after a few months of starvation. My eyesight, and hearing got bad because of malnutrition. I had to sleep on the concrete floor of a 14x7 cinder block room with 7 other prisoners for about a week before I got top bunk of one of the bunks in the room. We were packed in there like sardines.

 

[BraddersTheDog]

I think much of the debate comes down to the punishment vs rehabilitation question.

The best way to stop reoffending is to rehabilitate offenders. Allow them to get qualifications whilst in prison so as to increase their chances of gaining employment when released. In some cases this leads to offenders being able to go on day release to a job whilst still serving a sentence in prison.

The problem is that although preventing reoffending is the best result for society, individual victims want to see offenders get punished. You ask someone who's been burgled if they'd rather see the person responsible get increased qualifications and job opportunities or do time in prison. In most cases they'll say the latter. The first option sounds like the offender is being rewarded for burgling them (and in a sense they are).

There's also no doubt that restorative justice can offer some of the best results for both complainants and offenders alike (e.g. a meet-up where the two parties can discuss what happened, why it happened, why a crime might have affected the complainant so badly, why the offender committed the crime etc. or giving the offender the opportunity to put right what he or she did wrong). The problem is, most victims want to see offenders get punished and that is conducive to a high reoffending rate.

I'm sort of on the fence myself.

 

[Videodrome]

Prison should be more of a quarantine than a punishment zone. Figure out who can rejoin society safely and who is just a hopeless case that needs to be barred from society.

Also, maybe prioritize some of these crimes. Does someone using or dealing minor drugs like Marijuana need to be using up space in Prison? Or should Non-Violent Offenders be mixed in with a Violent prison population?

Do some prisons also use mentally damaging tools like excessive Solitary Confinement?

 

[TDbank24]

I think rehabilitation over punishment might be the way to go. I've been checking up on Anders Behring Breivik, the guy who killed over 70 people in Norway. Now the guy deserves to rot for what he did but he's just an example. I didn't really know what Norway's justice system was like until this case. In Norway the max sentence you can get is 21 years. They'll never let him out but that's just the max sentence they give criminals. They rehabilitate them in jail. They give them a nice comfortable cell and let them play video games. Might sound ridiculous and to a degree it is, given what he did. But you can't argue that Norway has less of a crime rate than the United States. So they must be doing something right. I get the idea that the stricter the punishment here in the US and other countries is, the more likely the person is to re-offend. Like they want revenge against society.

 

[Z A C K]

I think rehabilitation over punishment might be the way to go. I've been checking up on Anders Behring Breivik, the guy who killed over 70 people in Norway. Now the guy deserves to rot for what he did but he's just an example. I didn't really know what Norway's justice system was like until this case. In Norway the max sentence you can get is 21 years. They'll never let him out but that's just the max sentence they give criminals. They rehabilitate them in jail. They give them a nice comfortable cell and let them play video games. Might sound ridiculous and to a degree it is, given what he did. But you can't argue that Norway has less of a crime rate than the United States. So they must be doing something right. I get the idea that the stricter the punishment here in the US and other countries is, the more likely the person is to re-offend. Like they want revenge against society.

So in Norway if you commit a serious crime you're allowed to spend 21 years sitting around playing video games all day?

 

[Soda Jack]

Prison should be more of a quarantine than a punishment zone. Figure out who can rejoin society safely and who is just a hopeless case that needs to be barred from society.

Also, maybe prioritize some of these crimes. Does someone using or dealing minor drugs like Marijuana need to be using up space in Prison? Or should Non-Violent Offenders be mixed in with a Violent prison population?

Do some prisons also use mentally damaging tools like excessive Solitary Confinement?

Oh yes. Getting solitary is a punishment for bad behavior for the majority of inmates. But solitary is also the way some inmates have to do their time. If an inmate is consistently a threat to other inmates, or their own safety is at risk, then they can be made to do their time in solitary. Ive never been to prison, but I spent a total of 7 months in jail, but because of the seriousness of my case, I had to spend 3 months in solitary. There were other guys in my cell block, that were stuck in solitary until their trial, which can sometimes take a year or two to happen. And what I mean by solitary, is its a single person cell, and an inmate must spend 23 hours a day in their cell.

 

[Li Tan]

If you're in solitary, are you allowed any of the personal effects that a normal cell allows? Like books or something?

 

[Soda Jack]

If you're in solitary, are you allowed any of the personal effects that a normal cell allows? Like books or something?

We had a selection of about 10 books we could check out and read. It doesn't take very long to read a 300 page book when you are locked up 23 hours out of the day. We could have pictures that had been mailed to us, as long as the officers that reviewed our mail didn't find them inappropriate. We could have hygiene items, and anything we ordered from the canteen in our cell. No tv, no contact with visitors except by video screen, we did have a phone in our cell block we could use if we had family that could afford the inflated cost of the collect call service they offered. Our 1 hour out of our cell we could spend in the hallway in front of our cells, we got to all go outside for 1 hour a month. Saw a couple guys that had robbed, and assaulted an elderly woman, get their ass kicked on one of those days. Our shower was right beside the windowed wall with the door that led out of our cell block. Almost everyone in the whole justice center(including women COs) would see you naked when you took a shower. I finally started wearing my boxers when I showered.

Ideally, you wish you could sleep your time away, but you can only sleep so much until it become impossible. Plus, we had a bright light in every cell on the center of the ceiling that stayed on 24 hours a day. The light would drive me crazy when I would try to lay on my bunk. I wrapped all kinds of s*** around my head so I wouldn't have to look at that light. At least they would dim it to about half brightness at night. Sometimes you could talk the CO in the control room to dim the light during the day. Honestly though, the hardest thing about being locked up is being away from your loved ones. Your loved ones also become victims of your actions, you don't realize that when you mess up. Or at least I didn't.