Supervisory challenges and problems in correctional facilities

Supervision in the Criminal Justice Field

Mentoring inmates

Problems and challenges facing a criminal justice organization

Supervision in the criminal justice system is an integral aspect of the inmate rehabilitation process. In this paper, we conduct an intensive investigation and examination of the supervisory problems as well as challenges that are unique to the criminal justice organizations. In our analysis, we provide the details of general supervision, management, leadership, personnel evaluation, motivation, mentoring and training.

Keller (2002) pointed out that inmate violence, vandalism, escape, unsanitary conditions, inmate suicide, and high level of stress as well as low staff morale are the main issues that inspire supervision in the correctional facilities. It is therefore necessary that effective inmate supervision as well as behavioral management be made integral elements in all correctional facilities. Keller (2002) went on to indicate that in a historical perspective most correctional facilities have been designed and run with a focus on the physical confinement of the convicts so as to ensure that there is safety as well as security of both the staff and the inmates. The safety of the staff has often been treated as an issue that is achieved by the construction of physical barriers between the staff and the inmates. Consequently, the inmates have been left with little or no supervision. This lack of supervision has basically resulted in several problems in the jails. Supervisory problems and challenges in the criminal justice system.

A lot of focus has been placed on the criminal justice system at present, both at the state and community level. The main reason is the fear of crime and what there is to do about it. The other reason is the growth of the criminal justice system which take a greater portion of the states' budgets. These factors have prompted state officials and criminal justice judges to fully comprehend how the criminal justice system functions.

A lot of people are currently on probation supervision in the United States of America. A small number of them have committed an abomination or minor violations, and the greater percentage are on acquittal for felonies they committed. Many countries now use or are presently preferring private companies to administer minor offenders. About 10 states employ private companies to aid in probation supervision (Reynolds, 2000; Sparrow, 2001).

Despite the opposition to this approach by state probation framework, state financial plans have been unable to maintain the expansive number of people on probation and individuals sentenced to community supervision.

The rise in number of offenders on probation has brought about a situation in which each supervising officer takes charge of several offenders. This means supervisors divide their time as per the number of allocated offenders, hence reducing the effectiveness of supervision.

Private companies try to minimize the general number of offenders by focusing on the care of criminal offenders. Going by findings of a certain source, private companies in charge of criminal offenders have a mean caseload magnitude of active offenders of between

200 and 250 clients (Leznoff, 1998).Literature shows that private probation is one phenomenon that has not been fully explored. As opposed to private prisons, only a few documentaries on probation changeover attempts from public to private have been found (Courtright, 1995; Sparrow, 2001). Even though the government has funded the changeover process private companies are still being used for to provide probation supervisory services and have their basis in the law. This study was carried out on Missouri laws that deal with private probation procedures and a comparison made with states that legalize private probation.

Inmate behavioral management

Prior to the initiation of inmate supervision, it is important for the prison authorities to classify the prisoners in terms of their risk levels and needs (Thigpen, Beauclair and Hutchinson,2009).An effective inmate classification system must be reliable, valid and equitable. The concept of correctional supervision is based on the assessment as well as classification of the offenders in an objective fashion. A number of risk assessment instruments are employed and must be administer by staff members who are appropriately trained in correctional systems. These must be leaders and officers who are professionals in the use of these instruments (Onifade, Davidson, Livsey, Turke, Horton, Malinowski, Atkinson, & Wimberly, 2008).

Literature review

A review of literature indicates a myriad of problems as well as challenges affecting the criminal justice system. The Associated Press (October,2010) illustrated the situation in Texas City jails where hundreds of inmates were allegedly left dangerously in unsupervised state. This it was pointed in the article happened despite the evidence contained in reports indicating that unsupervised inmates tend to commit suicide and live in unsafe conditions (LGIT,2009;WHO,2000;Atlas,1989) .Drapkin (2009) discussed the management as well supervision of inmates having mental disorders . His work enables us to recognize as well as understand the common mental disorders that jail inmates suffer from. Drapkin (2009) also discussed the implementation procedures of effective policies to be bused in the management of inmates suffering from mental disorders. His work also shows the techniques of effectively training jail staff so as to effectively follow the laid down procedures. These enable the prison staff to formulate a workable system that enables the inmates to receive the best professional.

Mentoring inmates

Brimhall (2011) defined a mentor as a wise, trusted teacher or counselor. A mentor can also mean an influential supporter. A mentor might also be called an adviser. The mentoring of inmates has been indicated to have along history (Brown and Ross,2010).Mentoring has been indicated as the only criminal justice technique of "intervention" that is least developed in regard of the empirical studies as well as the theoretical frameworks (Brown and Ross,2010). Several scholars have been dedicated to mentoring in the context of criminal justice (Sherman et al., 1998).Offender mentoring has been described by Brown and Ross (2010) as the pairing of an adult offender with a community member with the intention of initiating a positive transformation to their lifestyle. It is a form of intervention that is in the form of a social program. The merit that it has is that it acts as leverage to the fiscally strained non-government organizations through leveraging the services of various community volunteers in the provision of after-care services. Johnson & Larson (2003) pointed out that there are various form of mentorship programs. Some are faith based that emphasize the importance of education, employment/work, restructuring of values as well as life skills using a program that is based on biblical teachings. The effectiveness of the offender mentoring programs has been cast in doubt.The work of Sherman et al., (1998) and DuBois et al. (2002) indicated that mentorship programs are not effective in reforming inmates.

Problems and challenges facing a criminal justice organization

The major challenge facing criminal justice organizations is the issue of public policy and difficult questions of justice in the rise of terrorism that has brought unrest among many people. The challenge involves improvement of the less efficient criminal justice policy that can combat terrorism. The manner in which judicial systems handle the cases of terrorism has raised concern (Wilson, 1985).The other challenge involves offender punishment.The issue of what form of punishment be given to criminal offenders is paramount. Different groups of people and especially the human rights activists differ with the kind of punishment given saying that some are inhumane. Another main challenge faced by the criminal justice organizations is the provision of services to demeanor offenders. There has been raising concern on how the criminal justice combats crime. For instance, it is always said that the police take a lot of time to respond when alerted in times of crime. This is mainly fueled by deficiency of tools and machinery that facilitate war against crime, for example, inadequate police vehicles and lack of good communication systems in the force (Raine, 1993)

The other challenge faced by many organizations of criminal justice is the kind of charges filed in courts and decisions arrived at in trivial offences which are regarded to be of poor value and usually not rational or well argued. The courts also are widely criticized for applying mutual punishment that does not allocate individual accountability and thus the criminals and the offenders are not properly charged. There is also the challenge of protecting the witnesses and the issue of intimidation of the witness. According to latest findings, the relevant systems of justice should embark upon deficiencies in the application of the existing law to make sure that witnesses are fully protected prior to, in, and after the trials.

There is also an issue of investigation by the criminal justice organization. This implies that the investigators involved should be highly equipped with skills, training, and knowledge that will help them in their investigation and hence come up with desired and best methods of investigation that will be able to identify criminals. The use of technologies in curbing criminal activities is of prime importance but also with other technologies criminals can use them in fostering their criminal activities and protecting themselves from being apprehended by the law enforcers. So law enforcers have to be equipped with unique technologies that will help them track the criminal activities without much difficulty (Wilson, 1985)

Another challenge faced by the criminal justice organizations is the constant delays of hearing criminal cases. There is a lot of bureaucracy in judicial systems which have contributed to a lot of inefficiencies in hearing cases related to crime. There is a big challenge in terms of scheduling hearings which is constantly affected by for example by the absence of one defense team and especially the state representatives. This issue is mostly attributed to multiple accused persons thus delaying the courts hearings procedures. So the criminal judicial organizations have to curb such delays by using methods such as hearing of cases of single accused persons in order to increase the pace of court hearings.

There is also another challenge of sentence whereby the judicial systems lack appropriate sentencing thus there is presence of unfair and illegitimate sentencing of individuals. The judges are faced with the challenge of providing uniformity and justice when they are giving out their opinions. The issue of focusing on severity of the crime, the height of participation of the offenders, and other justifying factors should be of priority to judges.

The other title challenge faced by the criminal justice organization is the issue of states cooperation. In essence the respective states or governments play an important role in ensuring that the rule of law is uphold. But usually states are found to be the one encouraging the violations of laws and thus leaving the criminals free because they influence the responsibilities of criminal justice organizations. The senior officials in the governments are found to be contradicting the rule of law through their various undertakings because they are normally feared by the law offenders. However, this is common in third world countries where the officials of the governments are regarded to be mighty and law enforcers fear to hold them accountable. (Eysenck, 1996)

Recommendations

All correctional facilities should adopt the guidelines developed by the National Institute of Corrections (NIC) in 2001 for use by jail administrators as well as their staff in effectively supervising the inmates in their facilities. The most effective method of supervising inmates is the direct and active supervision. The role of prison therefore shifts towards maintaining as well as appropriately controlling the behavior of inmates. One of the main benefits of inmate supervision is the reduction in the level of liability (Keller,2002). The active as well as continuous inmate supervision ensures that the ability of the jail to provide adequate safety of the inmates, visitors and staff is maintained. The supervision should be documented. The active supervision can be made more efficient by increasing the level of officer presence. The staff should also be given the responsibility as well as the authority of conducting regular and even impromptu inspections and be able to make decisions based on their findings. There should be recognition as well as rewarding of the staff behaviors that support the improved roles of both the inmates and staff.

Conclusion

There are many challenges that the criminal justice organizations face and we cannot exhaust them in this paper. These challenges cannot be solved within a short a period and appropriate strategies should be applied in order to ensure smooth transition. Criminal justice administrators should be highly trained to cope with the ever changing world which will help them in carrying out their duties well. The states on the other hand should play a major role in ensuring that the criminal justice organizations enjoy a favorable environment of solving such challenges (Eysenck, 1996).