In this country, the judicial system punishes people in the "interest of rehabilitation". What does that mean to the courts? Furthermore, due to the rigidness of sentencing, when is one actually rehabilitated? I feel that once you are sentenced to "rehabilitation via incarceration" you are officially screwed. The courts , especially in Centre County, do not investigate a person before handing down a standardized sentence that does more harm than good.
For example, this town is full of "rats or snitches" which work for the malice prone DA's office. When these "rats" get in trouble they run to the District Attorney and offer to throw a handful of their own friends into jail so they can go on with their "rat" lives. The way they do this is through controlled buys; at least in the recreational drug world. A rat gets in trouble, then goes around to all his friends and tries to score a small amount of anything from them under the supervision of a narcotics agent, when the buy has gone through the "rat" goes free and the person who helped the "rat" out gets a plethora of felonies assessed to his/her record. These felonies do not go away, and are handled with 9+ months of prison. When released from prison, the once future lawyer, businessman, doctor, etc. is reduced to flipping burgers for the rest of his/her life becuase no one hires a felon.(Voices of Central PA, May 2009 http://www.voicesweb.org/node/2488). You can read in depth about what i am talking about via the link.
My point is, when someone is released from prison they are still unable to maintain a proper lifestyle post release. College students that get out of centre county correctional facility with delivery of controlled substance charges that are a result from giving someone who was supposed to be their friend a small amount of cannibis but ended up a victim of Michael Medeira's snitching game can not use their degrees; as far as they are concerned their degrees are placemats for the dinner table. The courts in this county are not in favor of rehabilitation, they are in favor of statistics and national spotlight as "one of the safest counties in America". Where in Centre County is one rehabilitated through the direct actions of the police or the courts? The law around here is not law but a collaborative effort of a bunch of politicians who can create their own fame at the expense of others.
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I completely agree with this post in several aspects. First, i agree with the idea that it is nearly impossible to for someone recently released from prison to maintain a proper lifestyle. Recently released inmates revert back to prior behaviors at astonishing rates, merely because they are not capable of living a positive lifestyle. Employers have little desire to hire people with criminal records, leaving them with no choice by to resort back to illegal means of providing for themselves and their families, leading them only to get caught again, skyrocketing recidivism rates and overcrowding prison populations.
ReplyDeleteThere is every indication that the criminal justice system in America has no real interest in rehabilitation. Probably because most of America itself has no real interest rehabilitation, and consider most convicts subhuman. Slogans such as "tough on crime" are seen as the only reasonable positions to take with respect to crime. It's gotten to the point that most people consider prison rape just part of the standard punishment that comes from going to prison. As if the extremely harsh sentences and permanent stigmatization aren't enough.
ReplyDeleteIt's absolutely bizarre the cognitive dissonance people have when it comes to prisoners. Its as if, immediately after conviction, you lose the right to vote and deserve rape.
I agree when you say that our country is not interested in rehabilition. It is hard to find a decent job if you've been convicted of a crime. Also there are many job positions that won't hire you if you've been convicted of something minor, like an underage. But maybe the country has a reason to doubt people. It's possible for people to change but not always. A study was done by the U.S. Department of Justice to find the estimate percentage chance that a criminal may commit another crime after being released. They determined that a convicted felon has a 67% chance of engaging in criminal activity within three years of being released from prison. So, I believe in most cases that the country has reason to doubt people that have been convicted of crimes.
ReplyDeleteI think this brings up one of the key flaws of the law because there is no real equivalency between crime and punishment. Court systems are not concerned as much with whether a penalty is relevant to the crime committed as they are in preventing a secondary offense that may be inevitable. It is in a sense two wrongs not amounted to what is right.
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