Correction System as a Common Function of Criminal Justice - Research Paper Example

 Correction system is a common function of criminal justice carried out by government agencies, especial in USA. It involves the treatment, supervision and punishment of people who have been convicted of crimes. Convicted people are corrected through a parole, probation or imprisonment where they are corrected. A prison is the most common correctional institution. A correction system is therefore a group of agencies that administer various prisons, paroles and probations of a given jurisdiction. Incarceration is the most successful method of providing correction to offenders, but other alternatives to incarcerations can be used to make the correction system even more successful. The history of correction systems stems from the British penal system. During the medieval era (around 10th century), the British penal system used a barbaric system of hanging offenders (Stohr & Walsh, 2012). During this period, people were hanged for petty mistakes including theft and begging. Even small children were publicly hanged for stealing food to survive. In around 1300s, the concept of housing people who committed crime began. This is how the prison began. The early prisons were unsanitary, overcrowded, inhumane and dangerous. Bribery in the prisons also started in this period as prisoners paid prison guards to feed, unlock and release them because life in the prison was extremely unbearable. Incarceration in this period was done on poor people who could not pay their jailers. Therefore, this system was extremely inhumane. The period of enlightenment lasting through the 17th and the 18th century led to a paradigm shift in correction systems. Creativity was also enhanced through innovations. In 1700s overcrowding in prisons and public executions continued, and the concept of prison ships started. In this case, prisoners in Britain were repatriated to the new world; notably Australia and America (Stohr & Walsh, 2012). This was the beginning of the spread of correction system to other parts of the world. However, in the late 1700s John Howard introduced a humanitarian approach to corrections. He was part of the enlightenment change initiators who advocated for better ways of punishing wrong doers. He introduced the idea of government providing sanitary and separate conditions, and healthy food and water. John Howard promoted his ideas in Europe. Colonial jails led to the first prison in America, which was introduced in1606 in Jamestown, Virginia by the British rule. The oldest jail existing in USA is located in Barnstable, Massachusetts. It was built in 1600s. These early jails were used by the Sheriffs to hold males and females together with their families. People were held in homes, inns and other related structures that were not intended for prisoners. These were run in a family model which involved holding a prisoner together with his family in the same room. The prisoners started to have some freedom; they could walk around freely and wear any type of clothes they want (Stohr & Walsh, 2012). As colonialism stopped and the British and other colonizers moved away, colonized countries continued using jails in the same format as those of their colonial powers, borrowed from the period of enlightenment. The participants of a correction system include prison correction officers, prison wardens, jail employees, probation officers, and parole officers. Each of these groups of participants has a distinct role to play in the correction. These participants play their roles to the extent that no prisoner suffers pains beyond deprivation of liberty (Johnson, 2004). The main role of all participants is to ensure that the prisoners are subjected to confinement as their only means of punishment in the correction system. The participants are also responsible for treating prisoners humanely according to their behaviour. They should also treat offenders with dignity and respect. Prison wardens play the role of putting the prison policies into effect and ensuring that the day-to-day operations of the correction system run smoothly (Johnson, 2004). They are also accountable to various government agencies, auditors, politicians, organized labor, the press and other stakeholders. Supervisors of correction systems direct activities, assign duties, take feedback from employees, and provide expert support to junior staff. Jail employees carry out various tasks within the correction system including attending to sick prisoners, training, etc. Jail employees work in uncertain, unstable and unsafe environments (Johnson, 2004). Most jail employees prefer working in male prisons because they are more prestigious, better paying, give more authority, and are less demanding than female prisons. The role of probation and parole officers supervise inmates who are at the two ends of their sentences. Probation officers supervise criminals who serving a suspended sentence; monitoring their compliance with the probation and their behaviour in general. On the other hand, parole officers supervise offenders who conditionally out of the prison and are joining the community. Corrections administrators face various impediments and issues when running a prison such as budget cut, overcrowding, mental health issues, lack of innovation and limited collaboration. Budget cut is an impediment to administration of prisons because if budgets are slashed correctional facilities will lack funds to run various administration activities, and may be forced to shut down. Overcrowding occurs in prisons when prison population rises. It causes tensions among prisoners and increases gangs; hence causing more safety issues. Increasing number of prisoners with mental problems also causes more problems to corrections administrators because they cause chaos and disruptions in the correction facilities. Furthermore, the corrections environment faces continued changes and uncertainties which require appropriate innovations and adaptations to the changing environment. Without sufficient innovation, corrections administrators will not be able to adapt appropriately to the changing needs of offenders in various prisons. Lastly, lack of collaboration among corrections departments, and administrators has become an obstacle in the process of running a prison. Lack of collaboration in prison departments is mainly caused by competition for resources. Inmates inside correctional facilities have certain rights including to be housed in humane facilities, to be free from inhuman conditions, to be free from sexual harassment, to complain about conditions in the prison, to access medical care, to be free from segregation, and to be free from unauthorized deprivation of their personal property (Johnson, 2004). Detainees should also not be punished or considered guilty while waiting for their trial. Inhumane conditions and facilities are more than the ordinary punishment of offenders. They manifest cruelty and unusual punishment to the offenders. Various forms of sexual harassment which need to be avoided in prisons include rape, sodomy, abuse of female inmates, and sexual assault. Inmates also have the right to complain about their conditions of work and other concerns about the treatment they receive. Inmates also deserve to be given medical attention required to treat short term and long term conditions and illnesses. This medical provision should be adequate and effective. Prisoners should also not be segregated in terms of gender, age, or race; unless such segregation will lead to preservation of discipline and security in the prison. The administration of required services by prison officials should meet the interests of prisoners and ensure that the prisoners do not suffer pain that is greater than their punishment (Johnson, 2004). The services should be administered in a way that the prisoners receive services according to their behaviors. Prison administrators need to treat prisoners humanely and with respect and dignity. The administration of required services in prison also requires effective innovation and communication. The administrators need to explain innovations and mechanisms or running the prison to other subordinates and inmates. Furthermore, principle administrators require training in order to avoid errors when administering services. Corrections take many forms including imprisonment, parole and probation. Imprisonment is the restriction of someone’s liberty in order to punish him or her for wrongdoing. A prisoner is restrained in any place where he/she cannot be able to have liberty (Barklow, 2005). Such places include home prisons, gaols, state prisons, in the stocks, or any other place that can restrain one’s liberty. Probation is another form of corrections in which an offender is given an order to follow conditions provided by the court, failure to which the court will order him to be sent to prison. Under probation, an offender is supervised by a probation officer. At this point, the offender is required to avoid using firearms, remain employed, obey curfews, and not to leave a given jurisdiction. The offender may also be required to avoid contact with the victim and to avoid the use of alcoholic drinks. A parole involves the release of an offender who shows a satisfactory adherence to certain conditions before the maximum period of sentence is completed. In criminal justice, parolees are taken as if they were still serving their sentence, but outside prison. Another alternative form of corrections is rehabilitation and reintroduction into the society which involves the reintegration of an offender into the society. This is a form of criminal recidivism which is intended to counter habitual crimes (DeFina and Hannon, 2013). During rehabilitation, offenders are helped to maintain ties with the outside world. They are also placed in areas without bad heath threats and other bad conditions. Rehabilitation also involves provision of medical care services in order to ensure that offenders remain healthy. Through rehabilitation, offenders also learn new skills to enable them earn a living when they go to the outside world. Offenders under rehabilitation should also be subjected to statutory regulations in order to clarify the safeguards applied in the use criminal records. The main function of rehabilitation is to prepare offenders to return to the society and not to re-offend. This protects the entire society from re-offending by released prisoners. In order to achieve this objective, there should be a structured programme of rehabilitation to ensure that the offenders return to the society successfully. In the process of rehabilitation, ex-prisoners should be treated decently and humanely in order to encourage them to integrate successfully into the society. Rehabilitative activities should be provided alongside improved conditions so that offenders accept their new positions in the society. Alternatives to incarceration include restorative justice, transformative justice, victim/offender mediation and counseling, and complete abolishment of incarceration. These alternative strategies to incarceration have their own advantages and disadvantages in relation to traditional incarceration methods. These alternative methods help to integrate offenders into societies in form of rehabilitation and reintroduction (DeFina, and Hannon, 2013). These alternative methods become successful mainly when the offenders support them. Restorative justice involves systematic responses to offenses in order to encourage healing the wounds of the offenders, victims or members of the society affected by the crime De (Mesmaecker, 2010). This means that the approach aims at meeting the needs of victims, offenders and the community at large rather than satisfying the needs of an abstract legal system through punishment of the offender. In this case, the offender takes responsibility of actions while the victim and the community participate in the reform system. The offender may apologize, pay back stolen money, or participate in community service. One of the pros of this alternative method is that it acts as an alternative to judicial system when the judiciary fails to decide on an appropriate punishment for a specific case. It also reduces prison overcrowding and the use of economic resources which usually occur in incarceration. The disadvantage of restorative justice is that it undermines legal systems which are meant to guide the society, and trivializes crime by encouraging offenders to carry on with crime. Victim offender mediation and counseling is a process of bringing together the offender and the victim to discuss the differences and solutions to their problems. it involves a few participants and originated from Canada. Its main advantage is that if the offender and the victim reach an agreement, both will be freed from frustrations and stress and they can continue living happily in the community. Another advantage is that it requires few resources and funds to implement the correction system. Its main disadvantage is that it does not serve as a good example for other criminals or offenders to stop their criminal nature. Transformative justice as an alternative to incarceration is a strategy of responding to conflicts through philosophical mechanisms. It uses systems approach to provide corrections in the society. In this case, problems are not only seen as the results of crime but also the causes of crime. In this case, an offense is treated as a transformative opportunity for victims, offenders and members of the community to relate and educate each other in an appropriate manner. It is concerned with causes and outcomes of crime and other civil offenses. There is no relative comparison made in terms of time or relative harm caused by crime, and the victim is usually not part of the transformative justice (Lederach, 2003). The advantage of this system is that victims can be educated about the importance of peace; hence reducing overall crime. Its disadvantage is that the victim may take revenge while the offender may lack remorse. Lastly, complete abolishment of incarceration involves elimination of incarceration methods such as prisons. The proposers of this alternative suggest that prison and other incarceration methods are not effective in elimination of crime and do not reform offenders effectively. One of the advantages of this alternative is that it avoids rooms for injustice in the correction system because most of the people accused of crime cannot afford to pay fines or lawyers to defend them. Secondly, abolition of incarceration reduces the costs associated with maintaining incarceration systems. In terms of disadvantages, this system fails to provide an alternative for reforming offenders. It is like running away from the problem which is not a solution to the problem. Abolishment of incarceration also encourages offenders to continue with their wrongdoing because they know that they will not be punished for doing the wrong. In conclusion, it is clear that incarceration involves imprisonment, probation and parole. These methods are successful in promoting correction of offenders. However, there are other alternatives to incarceration which can be used to correct offenders. Such methods include restorative justice, transformative justice, victim/offender mediation and counseling, and complete abolishment of incarceration. Although incarceration is the most successful method of incarceration, the above alternatives are necessary to make the correction system even more successful. Works cited DeFina, R. and Hannon, L. (2013). The impact of mass incarceration on poverty. Crime & Delinquency, 58 (4), 562–586 Barklow, Rachel E. (2005). Federalism and the Politics of Sentencing. Columbia Law Review, 105 (4), 1276–1314. De Mesmaecker, V. (2010). Building Social Support For Restorative Justice Through The Media: Is Taking the Victim Perspective The Most Appropriate Strategy? Contemporary Justice Review 13 (3), 239–267. Johnson, L.R. (2004). Alternatives to Incarceration in the State of Wisconsin. Journal of undergraduate Research, 7, 1-7. Lederach, J.P. (2003). The Little Book of Conflict Transformation. Intercourse, PA: Good Books. Stohr, M. K., & Walsh, A. (2012). Corrections: The essentials. Los Angeles: SAGE. Read More