Crim. Ch.14 Deterrence/ Incapacitation/ Retribution/ and Rehabilitation

Cesare Beccaria + Jeremy Benthan

argue that the punishment of criminal acts can deter potential offenders by making the negative consequences of crime greater than its rewards

The deterrence model

assumes that people engage in beh. only after carefully and rationally considering the risks or costs and its rewards or benefits

Promptness of Punishment

the promptness w/ which penalties are imposed can also effect criminal beh. if an offender is punished soon after committing a crime, both the specific and general deterrence of the public could be greater than if the offender were not punished for months or yrs.

problem -oriented policing

the use of the police, in cooperation w/ the local residents, to deal w/ the underlying conditions that cause crime

Retribution and the Death Penalty

Capital punishment has been opposed on religious grounds as a contradiction of the values of Christian traditions and principles of humane government. Opponents of the death penalty claim that even if certain offenders deserve to die, a civilized society should not execute them. They argue that it is immoral for the state to put people to death. Those opposed to the death penalty argue that when an innocent person is executed, there is no way to rectify the error. Supporters argue for retribution, especially an "eye for an eye." The majority of the American public supports capital punishment, especially for someone who brutally murders a child or engages in a lethal terrorist attacks. Capital punishment strengthens the moral order and expresses community outrage at the violation of important values. there is virtually no support in the US for the execution of white-collar criminals

Retribution and Sentencing

In considering how much punishment a convicted offender deserves, judges are influence primarily by the crime that has been committed. Until the 1980s, states relied on indeterminate sentencing, a system in which legislators establish long maximum sentences for different crimes and judges impose any penalty up to the maximum. Since the 1980s the states and the federal government have moved toward a system of determinate sentencing, one that uses fixed terms of imprisonment, which can usually be reduced by credit for good behavior while incarcerated. One form of determinate sentencing is the mandatory minimum sentence which requires certain kinds of offenders to be sentenced to at least some specified amount of time in prison. A related kind of determinate sentencing is truth-in-sentencing which requires offenders to serve a certain percentage, usually 85%, of the prison sentence that has been imposed. Determinate sentences have been implemented through sentencing guidelines that define a narrow range of penalties for offenses that are of a given degree of harmfulness and have been committed by offenders of a specific degree of blameworthiness.

Retribution Rationale

The retribution, or just deserts, rationale proposes that offenders should be punished because they deserve to suffer for the harm they have caused, but that their punishment should be proportional to that harm and to their blameworthiness. (primary justification) Retribution differs from vengeance, which is private and personal and not imposed by an established authority such as the state. Retribution involves an authority with the acknowledged right to punish convicted offenders. is oriented toward punishing beh. that offenders have already engaged in, rather than toward presenting future misconduct Retribution is commonly associated with lex talionis, or the principle of an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. In other words, a person who blinded another person would be blinded in return.

Treatment Programs

Treatment programs aimed at rehabilitating offenders take many forms. Individual therapy carried out by psychiatrists, psychologists, and psychiatric social workers is based on the assumption that offenders are emotionally troubled people who need to solve the psychological problems that have caused them to commit crime. Cognitive-behavioral programs aim to change what and how offenders think in order to alter their behavioral choices, especially their decisions to commit crimes. casework: social workers provide inmates w/ counseling that is intended less to help them understand their motivations than to help them cope w/ the specific problems confronting them

Treatment Programs

Treatment programs also include the following: - Group counseling that allows several inmates to be treated at the same time and at low cost, especially if correctional officers are used as group leaders. - Family intervention programs are designed to improve communication and the expression of feelings, and others try to change patterns of behavior within the family and alter the way that parents manage their children. - Education and work programs allow inmates to work toward a high-school equivalency degree or take courses for college credit. - Behavior modification tries to shape conduct by positively reinforcing desirable actions with money or privileges and negatively reinforcing undesirable actions by withholding rewards or imposing penalties. - Milieu therapy introduces the principle of rehabilitation into all aspects of an institution, including relations between inmates and staff.

Certainty of Punishment

a 100% chance of a one year prison term might deter more crime than a 5% chance of a 20 year sentence

Severity of Punishment

a increased sense of the severity of punishment does NOT nec. lead individuals to avoid crime; it can also produce a sense of injustice that causes them to commit even more crime

Selective Incapacitation

a policy that aims to separate high-risk offenders from low-risk ones and incarcerate only those most likely to commit crime if released. Through interviews, it was found that offenders who had committed the large number of crimes had the following characteristics: (Peter Greenwood) - earlier conviction for the same offense - imprisonment for more than half of the two years prior to the current arrest - conviction before the age of sixteen - previous commitment to a juvenile institution - use of heroin or barbiturates during the previous two years - use of heroin or barbiturates as a juvenile - unemployment for half or more of the preceding two years

restorative justice

aims to reintegrate offenders into the community// focuses on restoring the health of the comm. / repairs the harm done/ meet victims needs/ emphasis that the offender can and must contribute to those repairs

3 Strikes Laws

b/w 1993 and 1995, 24 states and the fed. govt. enacted widely supp. "three strikes" laws that req. long term incarceration of offenders repeatedly convicted of serious crimes instead of demanding sentences of 25yrs to life for all 3 time felons, the public favors 3 strike laws that target the most serious offenders and can be flexibly applied do not seem to reduce crime, partly b/c their provisions are rarely invoked (called upon) many 2nd and 3rd strike convictions were for nonviolent crimes, such as drug possession and burglary, than for serious violent offenses, such as murder or rape

Deterrence and the Police

cite of the police force and police tactics are NOT impt. b/c the American people and their political leaders often turn to the police to deal w/ crime police saturation of an area for a short time can reduce crime, but this measure is not feasible over the long term police crackdowns might be effective if they are of limited duration and are rotated from area to area police cars isolate officers from the public, reducing their access to info they need to maintain order, prevent crime , and arrest suspects (study -> Kansas City, Missouri 1972-73) -> found that the changes in police patrol practices had little value in preventing crime or making citizens feel safe study had no evidence of displacement effect: a change in the pattern of crime w/o a reduction in its total amount (crime can be displaced from area to area, target to target, or from one kind of offense to another; also refers to changes in criminal's tactics and the times @ which they commit crimes)

Federally sponsored Habitual Serious and Violent Juvenile Offender Program

focused on young people who had prior convictions for serious offenses and were charged w/ murders, robberies, forcible sex offenses, assaults, or burglaries

Seriousness =

harmfulness + blameworthiness usually b. is measured by the # and seriousness of an indv. prior convictions, the assumption being that a crime is more serious if the offender has committed other crimes in the past

Deterrence + Incapacitation

higher incarceration rates reduce crime in subsequent yrs. through a combo of deterrence + inc., even after the reciprocal effect of crime rates on incarceration rates is taken into account one strategy that has been tried as deterrent to delinquency is the "shock sentence" - youthful offenders given a taste of the bars

Incapacitation Rationale

is the custodial control of convicted offenders so they cannot commit crimes against the general public. assumes that offenders will commit a certain # of crimes over a given time if they remain in society and those crimes can be prevented by incarcerating them for that time It is argued by James Q. Wilson (1983) that incapacitation will be effective in preventing crime only if: - some offenders are repeaters - offenders who are taken off the street are not immediately and fully replaced by other offenders - prison does not increase crime by changing inmates in ways that offset the reduction of crime from incapacitation

The marginal deterrent effect

is the extent to which potential criminals respond to incremental (increasing) changes in the threat of punishment.

Deterrence

is the inhibition (blockage) of criminal activity by state-imposed penalties. It assumes that punishment can be useful in preventing crime.

General Deterrence

is the inhibition (blockage) of the desire to engage in crime among the population as a whole through the punishment of convicted offenders. most research focuses on this

Rehabilitation

is the restoration of criminals to a law-abiding way of life through treatment. More specifically, it is the result of any planned intervention focused on the offender that reduces criminal activity, whether the reduction is achieved by changes in personality, abilities, attitudes, values, or behavior. excluded from rehab. are the effects of fear and intimidation, or specific deterrence, and the maturational effects that cause older offenders to stop commit. crimes early approach to rehab = Quakers: penitentiaries plea bargaining can be the first essential step in the rehab. process, b/c it forces defendants to take resp. for their actions

Chambliss

links deterrence to the offender's commit. to a life of crime: the type of offender least apt to be deterred is one who is highly committed to crime as a way of life and who breaks the law for EXPRESSIVE REASONS Instrumental (goal -oriented) crimes by offenders uncommitted to a life of crime are easier to deter, b/c those offenders are more likely to consider the rewards + risks of crime some conventional offenders, such as robbers and burglars, commit crime w/o carefully assessing risks (diff. from the gen. pop.)

Specific deterrence

occurs when an offender punished for a particular crime does not commit that crime again because his or her risk-reward calculations have been altered by the punishment.

subjective appraisals

of social disapproval and the threat of punishment affect crim. beh., but involvement in criminal behavior can alter perceptions of social disapproval and the threat of punishment

reintegrative shaming

process through which expressions of communities disapproval of crim. beh. are followed by gestures of reacceptance of the offenders by the law-abiding community

deterrence rationale

punishment can shape future beh. NOT just to inflict pain b/c they deserve it assumes free will or voluntarism (the idea that people are able to choose how they behave, even if they are limited by social, psychological, and biological factors The threat of a criminal penalty might discourage people from engaging in behavior that violates the law, but deterrence is not the only effect of punishment. Three distinct forces operate independently to keep crime in check: - Moral commitment or internalized legal norms - Social disapproval or fear of informal sanctions by peers - Threat of legal punishment or fear of physical and material deprivation from legally imposed sanctions

Deterrence and the Death Penalty

support for the death penalty has been large and diminish in the US since 1953 capital punishment is supp. by more men than women, more whites than black, and more Republicans than Democrats there is a direct association b/w support for the death penalty and the belief that it is a deterrent, but people do not support the death penalty solely b/c they believe it deters crime study: support or opp. to the death p. is based on symbolic or ideological grounds, rather than in a set of reasoned beliefs