Lesson7/criminal Ethics

profiledbrown83
Pollock_7e_ch11_final.ppt
Home>Law homework help>Criminal homework help>Lesson7/criminal Ethics


CHAPTER 11:

The Ethics of Punishment and Corrections

Lecture Slides prepared by Cheryn Rowell

*

Elements of Punishment

  • Two people involved, the punisher and the one being punished

  • The punisher inflicts harm on the one being punished

  • The punisher is authorized by law to inflict the punishment

  • The one being punished has been judged to be in violation of a criminal law

  • The inflicted harm is meted out specifically as punishment for that violation of criminal law

*

Treatment

In correctional terminology, treatment is anything used to induce behavioral change.

The goals of treatment are:

  • elimination of dysfunctional or deviant behavior

  • encouragement of productive, normal behavior

*

  • Protection of individual liberty

  • Minimal intrusion in criminals’ lives

  • Justification of each intrusion

  • Crime should be prevented according to the requirements of justice

Suggested Guidelines
for Punishment

*

Punishment Rationale

The social contract provides the rationale for punishment and corrections.

  • We avoid social chaos by giving the state the power to control us.

  • The state is limited in the amount of control it can exert over individuals.

  • For consistency with the social contract, the state should exert its power only to protect.

  • Any further interventions with civil liberties are unwarranted.

*

Correctional Goals

1. Retribution

2. Prevention

  • Incapacitation
  • Deterrence
  • Rehabilitation
  • Reform

Can treatment and punishment occur simultaneously?

Can a punishment system in which “just” punishment is relative and changes with time be ethical or moral?

*

Punishment and Corrections

Treatment programs created in the last hundred years assume that offenders’ criminal activity can be reduced by:

  • treating psychological problems such as sociopathic or paranoid personalities

  • addressing social problems such as alcoholism or addiction

  • resolving more practical problems, such as chronic unemployment, with vocational training and job placement

*

Retribution: How Much Punishment?

Bentham: Criminal offenses deserve punishment that balances the pleasure or profit of the offense

Neoclassicists: Characteristics of the offender should influence the punishment decision

In today’s correctional climate:

  • Determinate sentencing focuses on the seriousness of the offense

  • Indeterminate sentencing tailors the sentence to the individual offender

Retributivists: Balance is restored when offenders have suffered as much as their victims

*

Punishment

The Justice Model of punishment:

  • Promotes a degree of predictability and equality in sentencing
  • Reverts to earlier retributive goals of punishment
  • Restricts the state’s use of treatment as a release criterion

The Just Deserts Model of punishment:

  • Bases punishment on “commensurate deserts”
  • Incorporates incapacitation
  • Equally punishes offenders who commit similar crimes

*

Prevention

Assumes that something should be done to the offender to prevent future criminal activity

Preventive methods include:

  • Deterrence
  • Incapacitation
  • Treatment

*

Deterrence

Specific Deterrence:

  • Preventing a particular offender from deciding to commit another offense
  • Teaching through punishment

General Deterrence:

  • Prevent others in general from deciding to engage in wrongful behavior
  • Teaching by example

*

Incapacitation

Holding an offender until there is no risk of further crime

Because incapacitation is predictive:

  • We might release an offender who commits further crimes

  • We might not release an offender who would not commit further crimes

*

Three Strikes Laws

  • Are these laws justified under retribution, deterrence, or incapacitation?

  • Supreme Court holdings of Lockyer v. Andrade and Ewing v. California.

*

Treatment

  • Treatment is considered beneficial for both society and the individual offender.

  • The control over the individual is just as great as with punishment.

  • Courts define treatment as “that which constitutes accepted and standard practice and which could reasonably result in a ‘cure.’”

  • Much of the treatment in the correctional environment is either implicitly or directly coerced.

  • No single program works for all offenders.

*

Ethical Justifications
for Punishment

Utilitarianism: treatment, incapacitation, deterrence (we punish to benefit the majority)

Ethical formalism: retribution (we punish because the offender deserves it)

Ethics of care: restorative justice (we punish only if it is necessary to meet the needs of all involved)

*

Punishment

  • The American criminal justice system has adopted prison as a standard form of punishment.

  • Imprisonment does not carry the physical pains of flogging or mutilation.

  • Imprisonment is painful because it involves:
  • banishment,
  • condemnation,
  • separation from loved ones,
  • deprivation of freedom, and
  • an assault on one's self-esteem.

  • Prisons are extremely expensive.

*

Cruel and Unusual Punishment

Unusual (by frequency): Punishments that are rarely used become unusual.

Evolving standards of decency: Punishments acceptable in the past (flogging) may not be acceptable today.

Shock the conscience: A punishment is cruel and unusual if it shocks the public conscience.

Excessive or disproportionate: Any punishment that is disproportionately administered or excessive to its purpose is considered wrong.

Unnecessary: The purpose of punishment is to deter crime; only an amount necessary to do so should be administered.

*

Thinking Point

In May of 2010, the US Supreme Court ruled that sentencing a juvenile to life imprisonment without parole is considered cruel and unusual punishment when the crime is not murder. Until the recent Graham v. Florida ruling, judges around the country could sentence anyone under the age of 18 to life in prison for crimes such as aggravated robbery, rape, and murder.

Did the Supreme Court make the right decision? Why?

“Shaming” Punishments

Stigmatizing shaming rejects the individual and may have negative effects.

Reintegrative shaming rejects only the person's behavior, thus creating a healthier relationship between the individual and his or her community.

*

  • Prison authorities have long segregated the most notorious prisoners into special units.

  • Today, some states have constructed the most secure facilities, referred to as supermax prisons.

  • Supermax conditions are extremely harsh, including individual separation of all inmates around the clock and limited recreational activity.

  • Challenges due to conditions, procedures, and who is sent there (non-violent, mentally ill)

Supermax Prisons

*

Private Corrections

Private prisons are built by a private corporation, then leased to the state or actually run by the corporation, which bills the state for the service.

What ethical issues do you think arise with the privatization of prisons?

*

No ethical issues listed

Evaluating Private Corrections

  • A General Accounting Office study found that private and public institutions cost about the same

  • Private corrections tend to pay lower salaries than state corrections departments

  • Officers often transfer to state corrections departments after they are trained

  • Turnover is high in both private and state corrections

Where is incentive to rehabilitate?

*

Public support

1966: 44 percent

late 1990s: 75–80 percent

2008: 63 percent

Who is in favor?

Whites

Fundamentalist Protestants

Politically conservative

Men

Capital Punishment

Ethical Justifications

RETENTIONISTS

Utilitarianism: deterrence

Ethical formalism:

proportional harm

Religion:

“an eye for an eye”

ABOLITIONISTS

Utilitarianism: deterrence ineffective

Ethical formalism:

categorical imperative

Religion:

“turn the other cheek”

Capital Punishment

Does failure to apply capital punishment

fairly invalidate its use?

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled against executing:

  • the mentally ill
  • the mentally handicapped
  • juveniles (under 18)

*

Recent Challenges

  • “Fast track” death appeals (OK)

  • Lethal injection (OK)

  • Execution for rapists (Not OK)

Community Corrections

  • Most offenders are under some form of community supervision (probation or parole, halfway houses, work release centers, and intermediate sanctions).

  • Community supervision poses different ethical challenges than institutional corrections.

*

Formal Ethics for
Correctional Professionals

Common across all ethics codes:

  • Integrity
  • Respect for and protection of individual rights
  • Service to the public
  • Importance and sanctity of the law
  • Prohibition against exploiting professional authority for personal gain

*

Correctional Officer Subculture

  • May consider inmates, superiors, and society in general as “the enemy”

  • Accept use of force as a routine job element

  • Show a tendency to redefine job roles to meet minimum requirements only

  • Show a willingness to use deceit to cover up wrongdoing by staff

*

Subcultural Norms

  • Cynicism towards clients

  • Lethargy from heavy caseloads and poor pay

  • Individualism: an officer running his/her caseload in the manner he/she sees fit

*