Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Analysis of the Criminal Justice System of the United States

Majority of Americans commented that the criminal justice system of the United States is ineffective and broken. Solely punitive approach to crime is not effective such that, changes must be made. Many studies revealed that it is better to analyze the cause of the crimes rather than punitive approach. The progressive approach of understanding the reasons behind the commission of crimes rather than focusing on punitive approach is more effective to lessen high criminality rates. One of the major decisions in order to balance state budget, is to decrease budget in prison expenditures. There had been campaigns that counseling and treatment is the best way to handle drug abusers, rather then incarcerate them. Dumping prisoners in jail who are found to be drug abusers for a period of time and releasing them thereafter is not effective since they would go back into the streets with the same behavior. For sure, recidivists are those drug abusers who were able to experience being in prison due to commission of a crime. The pattern of criminality of offenders must be taken into consideration and prevent them from doing another mistake by submitting them into treatment and counseling. Hence, prevention is the primary goal of the criminal justice system and not the implementation of purely punitive approaches.

Moreover, criminal justice system of the United States focused more on criminals and their wrongdoings and not on the prevention of crimes itself. There are many criminal offenders in the country who are allowed to be punished and then given probation, but committed another offense when brought again to the streets. Why do we have to focus more on punishment through sentences rather than putting them into rehabilitation and counseling? There are times that police officers deal more on the crime committed but not on the real cause of the misbehavior. For instance, the case of John Evander Couey who is a recidivist under probation and later on kidnapped, sexually assaulted and killed a minor, made the people realize that there is something wrong in the criminal justice system. Essentially, the causes of crimes are extreme poverty, illiteracy, unemployment and dysfunctional families. Hence, the government must focus on these factors rather than imposing excessive punishment on crimes committed by offenders.

Finally, there are things that forced criminals to react inappropriately in some situations. On important issues like racism and discrimination, ineffective justice system and failure to focus on prevention, the primary consideration is the root causes of crimes itself. Anyway, if social conditions that affect unfortunate individuals can be altered, crime rates would surely decrease. The impact of the said issues in the criminal justice system is alarming since the social condition of the society worsened. Therefore, we must be more concerned of the future and not the past crimes of offenders if we need to impose punishment. Treatment, rehabilitation and counseling must be implemented in a higher degree rather than following the pattern of arrest to punishment and from probation to recidivism. Finally, justice and fairness must not be taken for granted in assessing and deciding on a given case especially in the matter of sentencing a convicted criminal.

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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is there as same as we see in america films?

Yantchill said...

Most stories that we see in American films are somewhat the reflection of reality. But as we know, film stories are works of fiction unless based on true stories.