Custodial Sentencing And Recidivism Flashcards
Dealing with offending behaviour: a custodial sentence is a sentence where the court requires an offender to be held in prison or some other closed community.
Aims of custodial sentencing:
To protect the public (incapacitation): putting criminals in prison is necessary in the case of violent offenders or psychopaths who may not be able to control their behaviour and the public needs to be protected.
To punish an offender and prevent recidivism: this is essentially a behaviourist approach to dealing with offending behaviour. Punishment decreases the likelihood of a behaviour being repeated. Punishment may be one of the main reasons why people don’t commit crimes.
To deter others: the fact that people are given prison sentences should discourage the general population from committing crimes. This is a social learning approach that we learn indirectly from other people’s behaviour.
To atone from wrongdoing (retribution): the victim and their friends and family wish to feel a sense of justice being done. The offender should pay in some way for the crime they committed.
To rehabilitate offenders: prisoners can be educated more effectively as there are less distractions.
Psychological effects of custodial sentencing:
Deindividuation- individuals have a lowered level of self evaluation and decreased concerns about evaluation from others.
Depression self harm and suicide- depression can be caused by both hopelessness and helplessness. Depression may be expressed in terms of self harm. Suicide is also an outcome of depression.
Overcrowding and lack or privacy: overcrowding can lead to an increased risk of aggression as well as stress
Effects on family: children with a parent in prison are deeply affected both financially and psychologically. Parents in prison may also feel guilty and separation anxiety
Weakness of custodial sentencing is that the effectiveness of punishment is quite low. The high rates of recidivism show that for about 50% of the prison population punishment does not work. According to behaviourist principles punishment is most effective when it occurs immediately which isn’t the case with custodial sentencing. An offender may actually see the sentence as punishment for being caught rather than their behaviour so in the future they may be more careful to not get caught. Another assumption is that the severity of punishment would be a deterrent. However in the us where there is a death penalty the murder rates are not lower. This therefore suggests that custodial sentencing is not working to prevent recidivism.
An advantage of custodial sentencing is that there are benefits involved with it. For example one benefit is incapacitation. However this is only relevant to a small range of dangerous criminals and is not relevant to reducing recidivism. Therefore this benefit is limited. Retribution is another proposed benefit and this can be achieved without custodial sentencing. Offenders can go to their victim and try to make amends to face their conscience. Through this they may actually realise what they did wrong and see the true consequences of their actions. This offers the benefit of potential changes attitudes toward reoffending
However his benefit is also limited because the victim has to be willing to meet the offender which may be too emotionally difficult for them. The final potential benefit is rehabilitation. However some offenders may simply take part in these to reduce their sentence and not actually have any wish to change. This therefore suggest that the potential benefits that come with custodial sentencing may not actually be that beneficial.
Another weakness of custodial sentencing is that it has been argued that being in prisons can actually increase the chance of reoffending rather than decrease it. According to a researcher this would happen because offending behaviour is a consequence of increased associations with people who have pro criminal attitudes. This both affects na individuals attitude toward crime and provides opportunities for learning how to become more successful at committing crimes. Some research support is shown for this. Researchers found that placing low risk offenders with high risk offenders can make it more likely that the low risk offenders will reoffend. This means that in order to prevent reoffending prisoners could be kept in isolation and not be able to have frequent associations with other criminals however this may not be ethical to do.
There are also benefits to non custodial sentencing. The cost of prison care and the problems associated with it means alternatives may be preferred. Alternatives include probation, fines and community service. Evidence suggest that cautions are more effective deterrents than arrests and that offenders sentenced to community service were less likely to reoffend. However this could be because less serious offenders are given community service. A further advantage of custodial sentencing is that some of the problems that occur in prisons for example suicide can be avoided. Community services can be useful for new offenders and offenders who are non violent.
