Mandatory Sentencing

Many changes seduce occurred over the past three decades with regards to the sentencing systems from both the read and federal official levels. In 1975, any states and also the federal system principally relied on an suspicious sentencing system that accorded judges wide discretion with respect to sentencing and gave parole dining tables practically unchecked discretion regarding the release of pris binglers (Tonry & Hatlesad, 1997). All jurisdictions placed great vehemence on the philosophy of tailoring sentences to reflect wrongdoers characteristics.This strategy represented an get to achieve the rehabilitation of the offender. That uniform response to sentencing has disappe bed in the year 2000, there is no public philosophy or common sentencing practices across jurisdictions in America (Tonry, 1999). All states, however, substantiate adopted statutes requiring obligatory minimum prison sentences for certain violent, drug, and property offenders. The result has been increased sentence lengths (and numbers of admissions to custody) for a wide range of offenses. This, in turn, has led to overcrowded prisons across the country.Mandatory Sentencing disdain many legislative changes regarding specific horrors, 30 states still rely in the beginning on an indeterminate sentencing system which inembodieds parole release (Tonry, 1999). Fourteen states confine eliminated early release at the discretion of a parole board for all offenders, and many more states see substantially reduced goodtime credits, by which pris binglers may earn their early release (Ditton and Wilson, 1999). Some jurisdictions support try to structure sentencing through the theatrical role of presumptive or voluntary sentencing guidelines. several(prenominal) states take in made a conscious effort to avoid democrat punitive policies by requiring legislators to press the impact of a law on criminal moreoverice resources.For example, before approving legislation, Louisiana le gislators essential consider an impact statement on how a mandatory sentencing bill would shanghai jury trials, plea bargaining, overcrowding in prisons, and the corrections budget (DiMascio, 1997). In grievous contrast to the federal sentencing guidelines, eight states have adopted front-end resource coordinated the resources required for the implementation of a sentencing law must be okay before the sentencing law is enacted. This focus on resource matching may create more rational sentencing and al mortified legislators some breathing aloofness in which to resist intense public pressure arising from spicy-profile cases (Frase, 1995, p. 179). These efforts, however, argon infrequent, and policies reflecting penal populism still carry the day more often than not in contemporary America.Criminal ControlTruly, the complexity of the criminal saveice chore is such that issues handle the etiology of abomination and the impact of drug habituation on criminal sort may never be only understood. Because of this, there is much room for the purveyors of scientific snake off to cheat their wares to an unsuspecting public. Proponents of the various programs that are engineered as solutions to such problems as recidivism and umbrage prevention are so diverse in their political philosophies and suppositious schools as to cause the head to reel.Still, the public demands that there be answers, and politicians have mandated that they be found and they have been. Bureaucrats and academics, professional consultants and political activists, government commissions and high-powered think tanks have all been analyzing information and constructing break dance programs for the alleviation of aversion. each of the many camps that have sprung up around this industry has a exceptional theory to espouse and a specific agenda to promote. Most of them have budgets, jobs, and political turf to protect. And whether one is trying to deflect attention out(p)side(a) fr om the failure of law enforcement and its allies or pursuing failure as a means of promoting a political agenda of scapegoating the poor, nothing go forth achieve the goal better than the latest and nigh fashionable unscientific technique for reducing crime.Evaluating the Criminal Justice PolicyCriminological research, just as any other body of scientific knowledge, can lot ideological or bureaucratic ends just as readily as it can serve the advancement of positive genial goals. Indeed, this is the entire manoeuvre of Jeffrey Reimans Pyrrhic defeat theory. By selectively collecting and analyzing some data while ignoring others, one can frequently arrive at whatever conclusion will support the practitioners or researchers respectite theory. At the real heart of Reimans assessment of the American system of nicety is the contention that the law of nature focus on road crime while ignoring white-collar and corporate crime.He notes, for example, that while 9,285 members of th e work force lost their lives delinquent to crime in 1972, 100,000 of them died as the result of occupational hazards (Reiman 1979, p. 66). It is Reimans contention that many of the latter(prenominal) deaths were preventable, and thus were tantamount to negligent homicides. It is no wonder, then, he contends, that corporate interests use their influence to ensure that no legislation that would make such neglect prosecutable educes into being while, at the same time, supporting the aggressive pursuit of street gangs, burglars, and robbery suspects.Samuel Walker and the Criminal Justice PolicySamuel Walker does an splendid job of illustrating the impact of ideology on criminology and the American system of justice. In his book Sense and Nonsense About curse and Drugs, he describes what he refers to as the conservative theology (pp. 17-19) and the liberal theology (pp. 19-20) of crime entertain condition Conservative crime control theology envisions a world of rectify and self- control people exercise self-restraint and subordinate their personal passions to the common good. It is a place of limits and clear rules about human behavior. The problem with criminals is that they wish self-control (p. 17).So goes Walkers account of the stance of the right. He goes on to asses the purview of the left on issues of crime as well Liberal crime control theology views the world as a large and idealized school. It explains criminal behavior in terms of social influences. People do wrong because of bad influences in the family, the peer group, or the neighborhood, or because of broader social factors, such as discrimination and lack of economic opportunity. The liberals solution to crime is to create a different snip of influences. Rehabilitation involves shaping the offender in the direction of correct behavior (p. 19).Samuel Walker and the Mandatory SentencingHaving position the stage, Walker goes on to explain that each of these camps has set upon a sideline f or its own brand of success. He describes the liberal push for reforms in the sports stadium of corrections as the story of a continuing search for the sacred Grail of rehabilitation (p. 19). As for the conservative tendency to equate disincentive with parental discipline, he tells us that The real world, unfortunately, does not work like family discipline (p. 18) Walker then supports these characterizations of the liberal and conservative schools of criminology by roast several of the programs the dickens sides support and the claimed successes for each.One example used by Walker is that of the mandatory sentencing programs so near and dear to the hearts of law-and-order conservatives. The state of spick-and-span Yorks 1973 drug law mandating lengthy prison terms is one of those examined. The law provided that convicted heroin dealers would serve minimum, mandatory prison terms ranging from one year to life for minor offenders, and fifteen years to life for major(ip) offender s (those who either sold an ounce of heroin or possessed twain ounces of the substance).It was found, however, that in the midst of 1972 and 1976, the overall percentage of arrests leading to conviction fell from 33.5 to 20 percent (Walker 1994, p. 92). Walker points out that members of the courtroom work group (p. 48) (prosecutors, judges, and defense squad attorneys) were able to evade the intent of the law by selectively charging and dismissing the offenders. Although he concedes that there was some modest success, in that the rate of incarceration did go up for those who were convicted, the effect of the law was essentially nullified (p. 92).The claim that mandatory sentencing program are, by and large, not successful is further supported by the experiences of both the state of Florida and the federal system. Even though Florida passed mandatory sentencing laws in 1975 and 1988, no significant impact on sentencing practices has resulted. Walker again points out that such fact ors as judicial discretion and good time diminution of prison terms in effect negated the laws impact as an effective legal document for reducing crime (pp. 87-88).The story for the federal system is similar, though it must be conceded that the length of prison terms for those convicted did increase. Walker points out that this served to greatly increase the prison population and add to overcrowding. At the same time, however, punitive officials employed a greater use of good time programs in an effort to ease these conditions. The result is that whatever benefit might have been realized has again been negated (p. 95).An example of how Samuel Walker explains the failure of the left to come up with the right answers to the question of how to control crime is found in his account of the Martinson Report. This 1974 criminological report by Robert Martinson resulted from a review of all of the evaluations of correctional programs that were available in English-language publications b etween 1945 and 1967. Walker informs us that most of this universe of data was eliminated as not bun scientifically valid, for the Martinson team found that they were lacking such vital research components as control groups or drew questionable conclusions from the data (p. 209).The upshot of the study was that although Martinson did descry some positive results from correctional rehabilitation, he also stated that with some and isolated exceptions, the rehabilitative efforts that have been reported so for have had no appreciable effect on rehabilitation (pp. 208-209). Follow-up studies of the type conducted by Martinson, Walker indicates, have resulted in similar findings, fueling a long-term debate on the efficacy of rehabilitation programs.Samuel Walker makes it clear that practitioners and researchers alike(predicate) are guilty of wishful thinking and of stacking the deck in favor of their individual arguments. Time and again he demonstrates that many of the so-called succe sses in rehabilitation have been invented rather than achieved. Closer attention to ethical finding making might have served to advance the state of criminology in these instances, just as it might aid in achieving a more effectively run police department. A brief look at two of Walkers examples will be illustrative.Diversion is one of the programs Walker examines, and he chooses the Manhattan court Employment Project as an example (p. 212). In this program economic consumption services were provided to underemployed and unemployed defendants-not facing homicide, rape, kidnapping, or arson changes. such(prenominal) persons were granted a delay of prosecution and could have their cases dismissed if they secured unchangeable employment. A program evaluation conducted shortly after the project was initiated gave it high marks, including a 48.2 percent success rate and a very low cost.Later, however, another study found that recidivism was not abated and that the cost figures were m isleading. Walker explains that this was due to the net-widening syndrome, (p. 213) a situation in which low risk offenders who would otherwise have their cases dismissed were selected for inclusion in the deviance program. The result, of course, is a skewing of statistics and the incurring of a cost that would otherwise not have been necessary. The net-widening phenomenon suggests that the old diversion did a better job, writes Walker (p. 214).Walker notes that what he means by this is that district attorneys who declined to follow and police officers who elected not to arrest offenders for minor violations of the law did a far more cost-effective and little intrusive job of diversion than did the Manhattan Court Employment Project.Walker also takes a look at intensive probation supervision (IPS), another of the many fads to hit the rehabilitation scene. In IPS programs, probationers are closely supervised with a great number of contacts between the client and the probation offi cer, frequent testing of drugs, and generally much tighter restrictions on behavior and movements. Not all that surprisingly, Walker finds that such programs are not new. As evidence of this he cites the San Francisco Project, an IPS program that was put into place during the 1960s.The San Francisco Project, a federal program of intensive probation supervision, was subjected to systematic evaluation at the time. Control groups were set up, reports Walker, for the purpose of comparing the new intensive measures with more traditional and less restrictive ones. The evaluators learned that there was no significant difference in the recidivism rates of offenders in the various groups (p. 214). Walker points out that there are similar findings in studies of the newest wave of IPS programs. Evaluations recently conducted in California, newfound Jersey, and gallium are equally disheartening. IPS suffers from both confused goals and exaggerated promises, he writes (p. 220). closing curtain After all, a question still remains as to what are we to make of all of these? Confusion and a seemingly endless series of fits and starts appear to constitute our best effort at finding a solution to crime and violence. Samuel Walker provides us with a very good explanation in his book as he goes about the task of illustrating the significant issues that encompass the current criminal justice policy.ReferencesDiMascio, W. M. (1997). Seeking justice Crime and punishment in America. New York Edna McConnell Clark Foundation.Ditton, P. M., and D. J. Wilson (1999). Truth in sentencing in state prisons. Bureau of Justice Statistics Special Report (NCJ 170032). Washington, D.C. U.S. Department of Justice.Frase, R. S. (1995). situate sentencing guidelines Still going strong. Judicature. 78(4) 173179.Reiman, Jeffrey (1979). The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison. New York John Wiley and Sons.Tonry, M., and K. Hatlestad, eds. (1997). Sentencing reform in overcrowded times A comparati ve perspective. New York Oxford University Press.Tonry, M. (1999). The fragmentation of sentencing and corrections in America. National Institute of Justice interrogation in Brief. NCJ 175721. Washington, DC U.S. Department of Justice.Walker, Samuel (1994). Sense and Nonsense About Crime and Drugs A Policy Guide. Belmont, CA Wadsworth.