Desmond LeSure Professor Bolton ENGL 1020 19 April 2012 “Is the Three-Strikes Law fair and ethical?” There are individuals who were known as habitual criminals who constantly repeated the cycle of committing a crime, getting arrested, and eventually getting released. In 1993, Americans noticed that this was very costly to the public because the process of arresting and trying these criminals was expensive. American tax payers were beginning to become concerned with this issue and wanted something to be done about habitual offenders. Society is pushing the issue that it was more logical to keep repeat criminals in jail and not release them to commit more crimes. Politicians listened to society and executed a law that would put an end to
The prisons in America seem to cause more problems than assistance in today's society. The country's penal system is overcrowded, expensive, and some argue that is ineffective as well as inefficient. The costs to staff and support these facilities increase dramatically every year. Prisons, which are supposed to be correctional facilities, are currently filled with violence and hostility. These institutions are created to control crime by deterrence, incapacitating criminals, which protects society from potentially dangerous criminals, but it is hard to tell if this is being
The demographic group most affected by the war on drugs and the incarceration boom are the juveniles. Youth who turn to drugs and alcohol abuse are faced with harsh reality at YSI Facilities, another branch of the private prison industry. Rather than being charged with fines appropriate to their offenses and being sent to rehabilitation or other forms of drug treatment, non-violent offenders are locked away with long, harsh sentences. This profit-driven war on drugs and other substance abuse ruins the lives of the inmates, turning them into harder criminals by exposing them to such environments. According to a project run by The Huffington Post, 40% of juvenile offenders sent to private prisons on account of drug related crimes are arrested and convicted of harsher crimes in less than a year from their release (Kirkham).
That is where private prisons come in. These prisons bring in a lot of money. Big business is a main component in putting minorities in prison and in keeping them there. The number of minorities in prison is not justified by the crimes that
Overcrowding has become a major issue in the United States mainly because nonviolent drug addicted offenders are repeating behaviors and ending up in jail. As a result, criminals are receiving early releases, violence in the institutions is on the rise, and non-violent prisoners are not receiving the rehabilitation that they need. The elimination of federal parole and
These eye-popping numbers came about for many reasons: mandatory minimum sentences, three-strikes legislation, illegal drugs, gangs, immorality in all its modern forms, the war on drugs, the decline of marriage and families, high rates of recidivism, incarceration of the mentally ill, the decline of capital punishment, problems with the criminal justice system and all the forces pushing tough crime policies. Difficult economic times focus attention on the increasing costs of keeping all these people - 93% of them men - behind bars. Each prisoner costs about $32,000 per year, and the average prisoner does little to offset the cost of confinement. The social costs may be even higher. Breadwinners are lost, families destroyed, more kids grow up without fathers or mothers, welfare costs increase, the entire sex ratio is thrown out of balance and prisoners face grim prospects when released.
Treatment Versus Incarceration Anthony Williams Ivy Tech Community College Treatment Versus Incarceration One of the most controversial points in America is the debate about Treatment versus Incarceration. We have sectors that seem to believe that you cannot treat and rehabilitate an offender. This sector, which is the Justice System of this country, simply states ‘build more prisons’. We have come to a time where there are so many prisons in some states that it is considered a vital source of income for that state. As we will soon learn, if we do not put some type of behavioral modification program in place we will continue to have the problems of prison overcrowding.
Prisons are consistently overflowing with repeat offenders and minor criminals. In addition to repeat offenders and perpetrators of minor crimes clogging up the system, the cost of keeping a prisoner is astronomical compared to the author’s suggested form of punishment. However, I do see the need for prisons, or someplace comparable, to keep the most violent criminals out of society. I believe Moskos should have stated hard facts regarding the ineffectiveness of prisons and given pertinent details about the productive use of corporal punishment. I’m not sure there are any “appropriate” forms of punishment.
Reasons for growth in the State Prison system part of the over population in prison has been merited to the changes in sentencing practices. The sentencing practices are part of the harsh constraints on judges and parole individuals, there are required to examine each individual case and their own special circumstances. 1980 was the large increase in incarceration; some say is based on the war on drugs and trafficking of illegal drugs to the United States. Poverty Poverty has many ways of dealing with the prison growth, there are more crime related issues than there are work, people try to get money easy and get themselves into a bigger hole. The profiling of people who have been incarcerated is one of the main reasons why most employers won’t hire an individual, therefore this people do not feel welcome in society and end up going back to prison, because they feel safer with food and
The drug war also deeply undercuts the role of incarceration in dealing with people convicted of such serious crimes as child molesting, rape, kidnaping and homicide. There is no room in our prisons: 40 states are under court orders for overcrowding. Funds are not available to build prisons fast enough to provide the needed space. Violent criminals are being paroled early or are having their sentences chopped to make space for drug users and dealers. “ The drug war (excluding treatment and preventive education expenditures) costs about $9 billion at the federal level and about twice that on the state and local levels.