Custodial Sentencing Flashcards
What is custodial sentencing?
Involves spending time in a prison or other institution
What are the four main aims of custodial sentencing?
Deterrence
Incapacitation
Retribution
Rehabilitation
What is deterrence?
The unpleasant experience is designed to put individuals off committing crime again. General deterrence aims to send a broad message to members of a given society that crime will not be tolerated. Individual deterrence is to prevent an individual repeating the same crime - based on behaviourist principle of punishment
What is incapacitation?
The offender is taken out of society as a means of protecting the public. The need for this is dependent on the severity of the offence and the individual (society require protection from murderers but not an old person committing a driving offence)
What is retribution?
Society is enacting revenge and the level of suffering should be proportionate to the crime. Based on the idea of an eye for an eye. Many see prison as the best option as other options are too soft
What is rehabilitation?
Many see prison as not just a punishment but an opportunity to reform offenders. Upon leaving prisoners should be better adjusted to deal with society and develop skills through training programmes for drug addiction for example
What is recidivism?
The rate of reoffending
What did the statistics produced by the MJ 2013 suggest?
That 57% of UK offenders reoffend within their first year of release
In 2007 - 14 prisons in England and Wales recorded reoffending rates of 70% (UK along with US had some of the highest in the world)
Where are reoffending rates much better and what do they do (+why is this criticised)?
Norway’s are half the rates of the UK’s
They have a bigger emphasis on rehabilitation and skills development - however people criticise the system for being too soft
What evidence supports the psychological effects?
Bartol suggested that imprisonment can be ‘brutal, demeaning and generally devastating’ - in the last 20years suicide rates are 15% higher than those in the normal population
Prison reform trust found that 25% of women and 15% of men in prison reported symptoms indicative of psychosis - prison regimes may trigger psychological disorders suggesting it isn’t successful in rehabilitating - especially the psychologically vulnerable
What is the issue with individual differences?
Not all offenders will react in the same way in prison as people and institutions are different
The length of the sentence, reason for sentence, previous experience may all be mitigating factors
Many prisoners may have pre-existing psychological and emotional difficulties at the time they were convicted and therefore it is difficult to draw conclusions that apply to every prisoner in every prison
What are the opportunities for treatment and training?
Rehabilitation works on the theory that incarcerated people become better and this means that they can live crime-free lives on release. Many prisoners access qualifications so they are more able to gain employment when they leave
They may also take part in anger management and social skills training - giving them an insight into their own behaviour, suggesting prison is worthwhile for some
What is a problem with the opportunities for treatment and training?
Prisons may lack the resources to provide these programmes and the benefits of such schemes are not conclusive
What is the issue with ‘universities of crime’
Incarceration with older, more experienced prisoners may give younger inmates the opportunity to learn how to commit crime and learn the tricks of the trade. This may undermine attempts to rehabilitate prisoners making reoffending more likely
What are the alternatives to custodial sentencing?
Davies and Raymond - in a review found that the government tends to exaggerate the benefits of prison in a bid to appear tough on crime, in reality they do little to deter or rehabilitate offenders. Alternatives such as community service and restorative justice have been proposed in order that inmates may be able to remain in contact with family or employers
