The daily population for jails has been steady the last few
years. On the other hand, there has been a significant amount of people going
into jail each year. In 2015, there were 10.9 million new inmates (Todd D.
Minton and Zhen Zeng, 1). Even though
that number sounds high, it has steadily gone down since 2008. From 2006 to
2008 the daily jail population and admissions had both peaked. The daily
population reached just a little under 800,000 and the jail admissions hit 260
per every 100,000. However, most jails still have overcrowding issues.
There have been huge problems with
jails and prisons and them being overcrowded. The main reasons are that there
are harsher punishments to criminal activity, high return rates, and more
strict laws. For example, there was a law called the Three Strikes law, which
said once one person has committed more than two felonies they are
automatically incarcerated. Some states have done away with this law because it
was increasing the incarceration rate dramatically. This law definitely had
good intentions but with the significant number of repeat offenders, it was
doing more harm than good. The other issues are also causing other states to
still have an overcrowding issue.
One of the main issues is the fact
that people who go to prison or jail never end up staying out. Regardless of
the Three Strikes Law, criminals end up back in corrections anyway. I feel that
it is because they are not receiving any kind of rehabilitation or counseling.
If the government was to try and help these people understand that gravity of
their mistakes, and spend the money and rehabilitation programs and not in
incarceration, then it might be better for society. Obviously, not everyone is
going to take well to the programs, but I believe a good amount will. Most of
the people who continue to offend, do it because they do not know how to live
another life style.
Most criminals are from low income
homes and get involved into criminal behavior to help get by. I believe if the
government was more focused of rehabilitation rather than punishment, then
there will be less overcrowded institutions. Showing them that there are other
life styles out there and facilitating them in achieving another life style can
really make a change. However, I understand that there are going to be people who
are not going to benefit at all from programs. Some of the criminals who have
committed more serious crimes i.e. rape and murder, most likely will not
benefit from rehabilitation programs. Other criminal who have committed less
serious crimes can strongly gain from them.
However, our government has five punishment
purposes and rehabilitation is not the priority, but it did make the list. The five
purposes are deterrence, incapacitation, rehabilitation, retribution, and
restitution (Lisa Storm, 1). Deterrence basically puts fear in potential
criminals by severely punishing those who do commit crimes. Incapacitation,
literally removes the criminal from society by house arrest, incarceration, or
execution. Rehabilitation focuses on trying to change the criminal behavior
using special treatment. Retribution focuses on making society feel as though
the crime was dealt with adequately and no one should have to take justice into
their own hands. Restitution helps prevent crime by making the criminal pay for
any of the possible expenses to the victim or their family (Lisa Storm, 1).
All five purposes have logical ideologies
as far as crime prevention go. Not all of them have the most secure outcomes
including rehabilitation. Unfortunately, people are too different and each
purpose affects people differently. For some it works and for others it does
not that is probably why they have a few different methods. According to an
article I read, rehabilitation is the one purpose that helps the most with
lowering recidivism (Lisa Storm, 1). People need to realize that that is our
best option for minimizing the amount of people incarcerated.
Even with all these methods working
together, the issue is still the fact that jails are overcrowded. It is
apparent that the one that has showed the most results has been rehabilitation.
The one problem is that few people are willing to let their tax money to fund
treatment programs for criminals. What they are not thinking of is the
potential money that they will be saving.
Sources:
http://catalog.flatworldknowledge.com/bookhub/reader/4373?e=storm_1.0-ch01_s05
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