...When an adolescent commits a crime, should that make them an adult in the eyes of the law? Or should their age be considered and acknowledged as a shortcoming of a undeveloped mind, impacting their capacity for not fully comprehending their actions? These questions have plagued the juvenile justice system both in our current time and its history. The choice between harsh punishment or attentive rehabilitation as convictions for youth offenders I think the best choice is rehabilitation because it gives juveniles to another shot. Youth offenders are different from adult offenders biologically and this should pose a greater impact in the sentencing made on the adolescents in the juvenile justice system . Punitive punishment have...
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...Addiction Requires Treatment Not Punishment Gloria Tooles English 112 Professor James Introduction The United States has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world with a significant portion of those imprisoned are for drug-related crimes. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, between 1987 and 1997, the number of drug violations increased 48.2 percent. Drug addiction is an uncontrollable illness that causes its victim to commit all types of crimes to supply the ongoing urge for drugs. In short, this paper will be an attempt to examine this illness and, at the same time, determine which is better for the individual: punishment or treatment. Opposing arguments are that all drug abusers should be locked-up and the key should be thrown away. The initial law enforcements for drugs, even if no other crime has been committed, has been mandatory prison sentences to cover first time offenders, and harsher sentencing for second and third timers. There is no evidence that enacting tougher penalties will deter the drug problem or decrease the number of crimes being committed. For this matter, despite the fact that society considers drug abuse to be a crime; drug addiction is an illness and not a crime. Drug abusers should be punished for committing a crime in a way to help them with treatment to avoid them from relapse and committing the same old crimes over and over again. Definition of Drug Abuse Drug addiction is a compulsive craving for some type...
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...Child Criminals: Is Punishment or Rehabilitation The Answer? Lisa Perdew Prof. H. Mathers Ivy Tech Community College With the growing number of crimes being committed by juveniles the question of whether punishment as adults or rehabilitation in a youth facility is the better option has never been more relevant. Some say that if a child commits a heinous crime, such as murder, they should be punished just as an adult would be. Others say child criminals are children first and criminals second and that they should receive counseling and rehabilitation in order to give them a chance at a normal adult life. Most states in this country do not have set laws concerning the prosecution and punishment of juveniles involved in serious criminal acts and thus the punishment is determined by the judge of each case. This can, and has, led to some juveniles being punished too severely and others getting entirely too light a punishment. The debate has come to the point of whether there should be a blanket law where in all juveniles guilty of terrible crimes are treated as adults no matter their age or if because of their age, under 18, they should all be treated as children no matter the severity of their crime. Social workers have long been at the forefront of this debate and have very strong opinions concerning these children. Most of them think rehabilitation, or even early intervention, is the better option for these children. Many of today’s...
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...Should people less than eighteen years old (minors/juveniles/adolescents) ever be tried and sentenced as adults? The legislation of trying and sentencing youth criminals under adult justice system has been a hot topic of debate. Supporters of tough laws on insist the need to enforce harsh penalties to uphold justice. The practice of treating youth criminals as adults since the 1990s is a result of the steep rise in youth crimes. However, youth advocates argue that tough laws should not be applied to youth offenders anymore. The core issue of the controversy is whether, because adolescents are biologically and mentally different from adults, they should be treated differently. For minor offenses such as property crime in which nobody is killed, it is understandable that harsh punishments are not necessary. But there need to be tougher penalties for severe crimes that threaten and take others’ lives. Hence, juveniles under eighteen years old who commit violent crimes such as murder and rape should be tried and sentenced as adults in order to punish them for their mistakes, to lower the crime rates and to protect the society. Laurence Steinberg, a psychology professor from Temple University, describes the adolescent brain as “a car with powerful gas pedal and weak brakes” (cited in Hansen, 2010, p.123). This is a good illustration of the fact that humans’ psychosocial abilities do not develop fully before reaching adulthood as cognitive abilities do. A series of experiments studying...
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...believe that whatever horrible crime that someone has done should have that crime done onto them. One example is when a grown man rapes a little child; I would make sure he gets castrated. I would want him to remember what happened to the little child and how wrong he was. Lethal Injection Lethal injection is an easy way out but Mr. Cuomo states “True life imprisonment is a more effective deterrent than capital punishment.” (Cuomo, 2011) I do not agree with this; life in prison means they get to eat three hot meals, get exercise, watch cable television, sleep in a bed, have internet access and take showers all on the tax payer’s dime. It is so much scarier to me that I would get the death penalty and cease to be on this earth than to have life in prison. They have more than an elderly person in a nursing facility. Even in the bible it says to give these people the death punishment. “In Genesis 9:6, God told Noah that the penalty for intentional murder should be death: “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image.” [ (Mohler, 2014) ]. This is something that I feel very strongly about and is something I believe to be true. “In the simplest form, the Bible condemns murder and calls for the death of the murderer. The one who intentionally takes life by murder forfeits the right to his own life.” [ (Mohler, 2014) ] Then he pulls the race card “capital punishment appears to threaten white drug dealers, white rapists and...
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...and it’s role throughout history. It will be discussed from the time of King Henry in 1166 to 1995 speaking of the Just Dessert. It will also be discussed the comparison and similarities of the security levels in jails, state prisons and federal prisons, what makes them different or alike. Lastly, it will be discussed about the political policies in place to why there is growth in our criminal justice system. The first jail was created by King Henry the II in 1166 that was created by King Henry specifically for holding offenders for trial, however it became where it was being used hold individuals that were either poor or mentally Ill. John Howard found the jails to be a disgrace and found that the living conditions were inhumane to the criminals because of its filth. This is when John Howard and the English House of Commons created the Act of 1779 which was four requirements needed to be met and they are, (1) secure and sanitary structures, (2) systematic inspections, (3) abolition of fees charged to inmates, and (4) a reformatory regime in which inmates were confined in solitary cells but worked in common rooms during the day.” (Corrections an introduction) The U.S. soon began to follow the Act of 1779 known as the English model. In 1790 the first prison was established and it was called the Walnut Street Jail located in Philadelphia. This is where the concept of confinement and rehabilitation was created (Corrections an introduction) The Quakers who were the ones that changed...
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...the world. The only way to rid ourselves of crime is to have a big enough deterrent that will stop people from committing those crimes. “Criminal Punishments are measures, usually designed to be unpleasant, which are imposed by governmental authorities on persons who have been convicted of violating provisions of applicable criminal laws.” (Criminal Punishments) Each crime has a different level of response that is needed for instance you are not going to give someone the death penalty for running a stop sign and you are not going to give an Ax murder a warning and send them on their way. Ensuring that the proper deterrent is applied for each crime is an important factor to insuring that a person will not commit the crime again. The theory of deterrence comes from the idea that the punishment must be as severe as the crime committed. Additionally, the punishment has to be given to the criminal so that the punishment is viewed as a result of the crime. When the act of punishment stops one from committing crimes, this is called "general deterrence." There is another form of deterrence, which is "specific deterrence," referring to the inability of criminals to commit additional crimes after punishment has been served. It is completely obvious and clear that capital punishment is classified as a specific deterrent, because the criminal will be dead; therefore, crimes will no longer be committed. Nonetheless, capital punishment is a controversial topic discussed by all people, who cannot...
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...often claimed that the death penalty is a deterrent to murderers, but many studies have shown that the death penalty is no greater deterrent than prison to murderers[1]. States that do not allow or only very rarely use the death penalty have lower murder rates than the states that use the death penalty most often[1, 2, 3]. It is also much more expensive to sentence criminals to the death penalty rather than life in prison in all states that reported such information[4, 5]. While the death penalty could have benefits for society, those benefits are absent in the current system. And if society is not benefiting, and the criminals are not benefiting from capital punishment, maybe the system should be changed. What does neuroscience have to say about this? In the past several years, neuroscience has played a larger role in the court system, especially in capital punishment cases[6, 7]. Most lawyers and defendants presenting neuroscience evidence in court are looking for mitigating factors in the brain that may reduce sentencing from death, to life in prison, or possibly even lighter sentencing. But unless the brain abnormality is treatable, should we revoke the tougher sentence for the criminals that are not treatable, and have very little likelyhood of being rehabilitated. Are those with brain abnormalities visible on current neuro-technology any less responsible for their actions than those do not have detectable brain abnormalities? References 1. The Myth of Deterrence: Death...
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...Some realists would argue that the punishment of offenders is designed to carry out a number of purposes. First, giving the victim, or the victim’s family a sense of justice from the criminal justice system, and to maintain social solidarity, showing that crime is not tolerated and via this, most forms of deviance. Realists believe that crime is a real thing and that official statistics should be taken at face value, as such they call for tougher sentences to be given for more severe crimes, for example, taking a life receives a higher sentence than using a drug. Right Realists would argue that the system works as a form of deterrent and that with target hardening, the deterrence of prisons and other punishments will take precedence in the mind of a person considering their options, in accordance with the Rational Choice theory. A person will weigh up cost versus gain, and if they believe that the gain outweighs the cost, they will commit an act of deviance. They also believe biological differences are responsible for crime and deviance through studies which show criminals to have a lower intelligence and to just be acting on instinct. However; they’re criticised for contradicting themselves in that in one circumstance they believe people are biologically predisposed to commit crime, and then saying that they have free will and are rationally deciding what to do. They’re also criticised in that in studies of criminal IQs, there’s only ever been, at best, a 4% drop in IQ against...
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...Some realists would argue that the punishment of offenders is designed to carry out a number of purposes. First, giving the victim, or the victims family (indirect victims) a sense of justice from the criminal justice system, and to maintain social solidarity, showing that crime is not tolerated and via this, most forms of deviance. Realists believe that crime is a real thing and that official statistics should be taken at face value, as such they call for tougher sentences to be given for more severe crimes, for example, taking a life receives a higher sentence than using a class C drug. Right Realists would argue that the system works as a form of deterrent and that with target hardening, the deterrence of prisons and other punishments will take precedence in the mind of a person considering their options, in accordance with the Rational Choice theory. A person will weigh up cost versus gain, and if they believe that the gain outweighs the cost, they will commit an act of deviance. They also believe biological differences are responsible for crime and deviance through studies which show criminals to have a lower intelligence and to just be acting on instinct. However; They’re criticised for contradicting themselves in that in one circumstance they believe people are biologically predisposed to commit crime, and then saying that they have free will and are rationally deciding what to do. They’re also criticised in that in studies of criminal IQs, there’s only ever been, at best...
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...class so I can finally complete my degree and hope that it will help me get to the next level in my career field. I learned that without higher education life can a lot more difficult but with it one life can improve at least financial fivefold. The comparison of a person with a college degree and those without over the course of their life monetary wise is close to 1.2 million. I also have a family and how can I ask my kids to attend college if I myself didn’t complete it even when I have the chance. What is your opinion on the Criminal Justice system? Our criminal justice system for one is not the greatest but it is a system. There are a ton of thing that are wrong with it and to fix them seems everyday harder and harder to achieve. For one we need to retool the punishment and for crimes that are not that life threading and be harder on those that are life altering. According to New Renaissance magazine. “America now locks up prisoners at a rate five times greater than most industrialized nations, a rate of incarceration second only to Russia. The number of inmates in state and federal prisons has more than quadrupled, from fewer than 200,000 in 1970 to 948,000 in 1993” (p1 Lozoff). We are placing people in to jails for reason that are senseless, and let those that deserve to be out or off. Example the judge that sentence a teacher to jail for 30 days for raping a student cause she looked older then she was and in his eye she was enjoying are consented to it. Really a 14 older...
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...America Today in the Prison’s Melanie Fife American InterContinental University March 17, 2013 Chad Faries ABSTRACT I’m writing a paper that has 5 different sources, that have books, newspaper articles, and Government papers, that has something to deal with America’s prisons today in society. America has a huge problem with our prison system being overcrowded. The crime rate has increased so much and we are just making me people go to jail or prison. The topic I chose was the prison system being over-crowded. I know many people that have been on both sides of the prison's walls, which allows me to see both sides of the prison system. Prison's in American are very over-crowded due to crimes being committed more often than what they were ten years ago due to not being staffed properly, not having enough room for all the inmates, and the system just trying to have you do your time and not trying to get you back to society. Prison Overcrowding has so many issues understaffing can lead to security and control difficulties. It can also cause heath and the well-being of the inmate’s problems. They will have more violence and conflicts because they are understaffed and cannot be watched properly. Not enough security can make it harder to manage the prison. They can increase opportunities for exercise, sports, and church. Active inmates are less likely to feel stressed or hostile. We can also classify offenders due to the level of their risk and their crime. Improve organization...
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...Analysis of “Why Prisons Don’t Work” An article written by Wibert Rideau titled “Why Prisons Don’t Work”, published in Time Magazine on March 21, 1994, was written by a man who was sentenced to die in prison. He was accused of murdering a white person in Lousiana in 1962, long before the civil rights movement really took hold. He was in prison for 44 years by the time he walked a free man. The same system of justice used in 1964 is still the same system we use today, and the only difference is that there are far many more people in prison today than ever. We should all wonder how many Wibert Rideaus are sitting in cells, in prisons, throughout America today. Let his article be a wake up call that many people are wrongfully convicted every day in the United States. The ethos of Mr. Rideau is of a very high caliber for more than one reason. The first reason is that he was in prison 44 years and strives to educate the public on why prisons don’t work. He could be home, angry and licking his wounds and yet he tells his story in an effort to use his experience for positive change. The second reason for ethos is that he is a persuasive writer whose intelligence and use of language is excellent. Third, he is committed to using the remainder of his life to do what can be done to change prison systems and punishment in America by giving us an inside view. Fourth, he has come such a long way in building a memorable career for himself after being a convicted felon and...
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...society. They experience stigma and discrimination behind bars and are often regarded as "unworthy" in the general community. This paper will identify the ethical issues and problems prisoners face in the areas of harsher punishment and abuse, and how utilitarianism and relativism plays a vital role in resolving some of the ethical issues in prisons. Imprisonment as punishment for crimes was first used during the sixteenth century in Europe. Prior to that, criminal correction usually consisted of enslavement or swift physical punishment such as whipping or execution. According to Michael Hardy (1998) prison was conceived as a more humane response to criminal behavior. Europeans established colonies in America in the seventeenth century and they continued the practice of imprisoning those convicted of crimes (Hardy, 1998). During the colonial era, the number of Americans in prison made up a small, barely noticeable segment of the population. Today, this has changed dramatically. According to statistics from the Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice, if incarceration rates continue unchanged, 1 out of every 20 Americans alive today will be imprisoned at some time in their lives. This is due in part to new crime laws such as “three strikes and you’re out” and tougher sentencing for drug-related offenses (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2009). The question that needs to be addresses is, has the government ensured a universal, consistent, ethical protection for prisoners and are they...
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... 2) They keep us from hurting or depriving each other 3) For Example: the "golden rule" a) "Do onto others as you would have them do onto you" b) Fear of social disapproval regulates our behavior 1) In society, those who break the law, even if they are not apprehended, are looked down upon c) Example: why do we wear clothes to class? 1) Is it because we will be arrested for indecent exposure if we do not? 2) Alternatively, is it because everyone will laugh at us if we do not? d) Norms, Morals, and values are Situationally defined 1) Each social group can define what it considers right and wrong a) If this was a class at a "clothing optional" campus, it wouldn't be a big deal if you didn't wear clothes to class 2. The Criminal Justice System and its Administration is our System of Formal Social Controls a) We have given the State the power to: 1) Codify laws to regulate behavior 2) To the police to apprehend those who break laws 3) To censure those who break laws 4) To punish those who have been censured by the court b) The perspectives on the Criminal Justice System we will look at today are...
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