Prison systems of America are corrupt, overcrowded, and very dangerous. It is important that the incarcerated individuals be able to return to society as productive members. As of right now the department of corrections in the United States has the rehabilitation approach for most convicted felons. This means that the department is concerned with healing the individual in whatever he or she needs in order to be a productive member of society. This includes therapy, drug and alcohol control classes, group meetings that help cope with addiction problems and halfway homes to help the individual ease their way back in society. The problem in the United States is: with all this “rehabilitation” why are more than half of criminals going back to prison? “The recidivism rate for prisoners released from prison within one year is 44.1%; this number rises to 67.5% within three years of being released from prison” (Lauren Glaze, 2010). Why is this happening? Strain theory, popularized by Glenn D. Walters, can be paraphrased in the following quote: “every man or women is optimistic but it is society [that] tears down the person and finally he or she will turn to crime to reward themselves” (Glen D. Walters. 1990-06-30 pp. 26). This explains why some criminals continually commit crimes when they get reinstituted into society. “Sixty-seven percent of the people who were rearrested were charged with 750,000 new crimes, which include property offenses, drug offenses, public-order offenses, and other offences, unknown” (Lauren Glaze, 2010). This explains why recidivism is so high in the United States.
The social problem is when the criminals are in prison they network into career criminals and when they get released into society the only tool the criminals have is crime. This situation is very sad. Prison systems of America need to concentrate on creating more job opportunities for these incarcerated individuals rather than have the inmate go into prison as a convict and then get released into society as a career criminal. Inmates are coming out of prisons worse than when they went in. If nothing changes, inmates will just keep returning to prisons. More and more inmates will make prisons their home. When they are out in the real world they have no idea how to get a job or even interact with regular citizens. So they have no choice but to commit new crimes so they get sent back prisons, where they feel at home. Inmates have been incarcerated so long that being incarcerated is all they know how to do. When sent into the real world, former inmates experience too much freedom too quickly. Inmates need structure and positive reinforcement. If nothing drastically happens soon inmates will continue to go back to prisons. This will only add to the national deficit because keeping an incarcerated individual locked up ranges from “$40,000 to $50,000 per year; with 1,613,740 prisoners recorded in 2009” (Lauren Glaze, 2010) the cost to maintain our current system is too great a strain on society. This tax money could have been spent on education but we as a nation keep spending it on criminals.
References
Glaze, Lauren. (2010, Dec. 10). Correctional Populations in the United States, 2009. http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/index.cfm?ty=pbdetail&iid=2316
Glenn D. Walters. (1990, June. 30).The Criminal Lifestyle: Patterns of Serious Criminal Conduct. CA:Sage Publishing.
Great detail and in depth perspectives on how inmates think and react after leaving prison. While reading this blog, i could only think about the movie "the shawshank redemption". How prison are corrupt and how the life term inmates who get released from prison are almost centuries behind normal society. Yes, there are too many offenders in prison especially non violent offenders, but statistics now explain that crime is down. Rehabilitation will be a key factor in determining how much more the US is willing to spend on corrections in the future.
ReplyDeleteI have to agree with what you had to say in your blog. I wrote about recidivism in prisons as well. The main thing that i stressed when talking about recidivsm was on the fact that these prisoners are being released into the real world with no plan. We need to concentrate on providing more resources and job opportunities when leaving to help them get back on their feet. When prisoners are released into the community an dhave nothing going for them, they will return to committing crime. If they have no money they will FIND a way to get some to survive. They are also so used to the inside of a prison and have no idea how to function in the real world. Good job on providing statistics to help support your blog.
ReplyDeleteI agree that we need to create more job related opportunities for criminals in the prison system. It is amazing how a criminal can go into prison, learn how to become a more hard core criminal, and when they come out they are bigger threat to society. If they have more opportunities to learn vocational skills then they might focus more on bettering their life and less on re-offending.
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