Criminal Justice - Corrections Criminal

Criminal Justice - Corrections CRIMINAL JUSTICE: REDUCING CRIME RATES In this Module, there were two ways of estimating how much crime is saved merely by getting them off the street, two ways of estimating the "incapacitation effect. One way is to conduct self-report studies of offenders just entering prison, asking them to report their criminal involvement over the past year.

Are there any strengths to this approach? Are there any limitations? How might you conduct such a study? In principle, the incapacitation approach to crime reduction hinges on the accurate identification of criminals whose prior criminal history is associated with a higher degree of repeated or continual criminality (Visher, 1987). In that regard, self-report studies are potentially useful, particularly to the extent those studies disclose criminal conduct for which prisoners imprisoned for other crimes were never prosecuted because those crimes were never detected (or never solved) by authorities.

Except for one-time offenders, it is presumed that the vast majority of offenders commit many more offenses than those for which they are eventually incarcerated (Visher, 1987). The most significant limitation to this method of identifying criminals with a higher degree of repeated or continual criminality is that it depends completely on the honesty of a population with a demonstrated propensity to violate rules of law, moral principles, and the rights of others.

In general, these traits are much more consistent with untruthfulness than truthfulness; more particularly, the most "successful" criminals are likely to be the most wary of providing authorities with information about their undetected past crimes. One possible method of increasing the accuracy of information provided by more "successful" criminals is to provide assurances of immunity with respect to disclosures.

Especially since the incapacitation approach depends on identifying offenders with the greatest likelihood of repeated criminality, the failure of those offenders to provide accurate information of past crimes undermines the entire concept. Therefore, because self-report studies may fail to identify the very offenders on whose identification the success of the incapacitation approach to reducing criminality depends most directly, reliance on self-reporting represents a crucial limitation. 2. Various authors have argued that since the 1970s, we have been conducting a natural or real world "experiment" in whether prisons "work" to reduce crime.

As a correctional policy, do you think that the expansion of prison as a key way to control crime in the United States has been warranted? According to Visher (1987), the approach to reducing crime that relies on increasing prosecution, sentencing, and prison populations across the board do not correspond particularly well with crime reduction. First, prior studies indicate that even with respect to serious crimes thought to be most indicative of future criminality, a relatively small minority of offenders account for a disproportionately high percentage of crime.

Second, retrospective analysis of the statistical effect of increasing prison populations through across-the-board increases in prosecution and the length of sentencing suggests that the relationship between merely increasing prison populations and decreased crime rates is insufficient to justify focusing on this approach. Since a relatively small percentage of criminals (even serious criminals) account for a disproportionately high percentage of crime (Visher, 1987), merely increasing across-the- board imprisonment of criminal offenders is not an approach likely to reduce crime substantially.

Specifically, increasing prison populations by 10 to 20% through collective incapacitation corresponds to only 1% reduction in crime; similarly, even the implementation of increased imprisonment through selective incapacitation is projected to produce only marginally better results in the neighborhood of perhaps 5% crime reduction associated with a 5 or 10% increase in prison populations (Visher, 1987). On a cost-benefit analysis alone, (let alone the ethical issues raised by this approach), the implications of achieving crime reduction primarily through expanding prison populations are not particularly advantageous. 3.

What is the difference between collective and selective incapacitation? How large is the incapacitation effect? Has the "prison experiment" been a success or a failure? Collective incapacitation refers to the crime reduction approach of increasing prosecution and sentencing of all criminal offenders across the board.

Selective incapacitation refers to the targeted approach to reducing crime by increasing prosecution and sentencing of those offenders whose past criminal history, other behavioral patterns, and specific offenses are statistically (and logically) associated with higher likelihood of future criminality than that associated with all offenders in.