Transcript CJS - Chapter 7

CJS - Chapter 7
To conservatives
discretion = “soft on crime”
** (discretion – police, courts, prisons)
“Liberal” judges and policies?
CJS - Chapter 7
What is preventive detention and how does it relate to
the right to bail?
Short history:
Poorhouse to ROR to Poorhouse
before 1960s
1960s
since 1980s
CJS - Chapter 7
Why is formal preventive detention
usually not used even when available?
Already done!! - court culture
(bail)
Could it be done better?
Probably not - the prediction problem
CJS - Chapter 7
Overall, what proportion of people on
bail commit serious crimes?
Many petty, few serious
“Prediction problem”
High False pos to True pos ratio
CJS - Chapter 7
Why would “speedy trial” be a better way to prevent
crime by people on bail?
It wouldn’t!!
(I disagree w/Walker here)
Most cases don’t go to trial!!
And
...... resisted by court culture
-- jail is used to coerce guilty pleas!
CJS - Chapter 7
What are selective incapacitation and gross
incapacitation?
How does the prediction problem relate to selective
incapacitation?
How does unemployment relate to this?
Already talked about these
CJS - Chapter 7
Does “gross incapacitation”
(the imprisonment binge) prevent crime?
Already talked about this
CJS - Chapter 7
Do “Megan’s Laws” work??
Sex offender registration/notification
Exagerated reoffending rates
Misleading publicized cases
Harms offender re-entry
CJS - Chapter 7
What are:
(relate to discretion)
mandatory sentencing - judges
“truth in sentencing” - early release
“3 strikes" laws - “chronic offenders”
CJS - Chapter 7
What did the 1973 New York drug law try to do, and
did it work?
“RDL”
“Toughest drug law in the country”
It failed (mostly petty offenders!)
NY still struggling with problems today!!
CJS - Chapter 7
Did the Federal Sentencing Guidelines work?
Mostly abandoned over the last ten years!
CJS - Chapter 7
Does mandatory sentencing reduce
serious crime rates?
No - it gets the wrong people
(petty offenders)
CJS - Chapter 7
Do 3 strikes laws reduce serious crime?
Rarely used - except Calif!
40,000 prisoners
Costs 2 billion dollars a year
Where used, mostly petty offenders (serious already got long terms!)
CJS - Chapter 7
Walker’s five conclusions:
(Lock ‘em Up strategies don’t work)
CJS - Chapter 7
1. Select incap - can’t id HROs early
enough to be effective
2. Gross incap overloads system,
and turns into a huge disaster
3. Court culture resists gross incap,
but eventually loses and changes
CJS - Chapter 7
4. Gross incap doesn’t reduce crime
(aging in + supply and demand)
5. Cost is enormous - money could be
used more effectively elsewhere
(Education, Treatment, Social Programs, Family
Programs)