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Corrections
Current Issues in Corrections
Issues in Corrections
• Multiple purposes—individual deterrence,
general, incapacitation, rehabilitation
• Sometimes conflicting
• Does prison punish/deter? Rehabilitate?
• Incapacitate until they age out?
• Serve as a “school for crime,” resulting in
none of the above, prisonization
Issues
• All of these phenomena might occur for
particular individuals, canceling each other
out
• This might explain why nothing seems to
have any effect
History
• Hunter-gatherers
• Agriculture—hoarding, more specialization
of labor, social classes
• Civilization—development of criminal
codes
• Hammurabi, Draco, Justinian
• Early punishments brutal
History
• Usually torture or death
• Prisons in the Roman empire, workhouses
in the 1500s, accelerating by the 1700s
• John Howard, State of Prisons, 1777
• Advocated sanitation, inspections,
abolition of fee system
• John Howard died of “jail fever” (typhus)
History
• Transportation, hulks, gaols, workhouses
and prisons
• PA and Auburn systems
• Reformatory movement (1800s)
• Series of stages, graduated freedom
• American Prison Congress, 1870
• Forerunner of ACA (1877)
• Elmira Reformatory
History
• Industrial and plantation prisons
• Hawes-Cooper and Ashurst-Summers
Acts
• Prohibition of sale of products on the open
market (late 1920s)
• Profound financial implications
• 1930s—era of shame
• Expansion of FBP
History
• Due process revolution of the 1960s and 1970s,
use of section 1983
• 1970s: disenchantment of rehabilitation
• 1980s: punitive orientation and the War on
Drugs
• Results:
• Longer sentences
• Very large increase in correction supervision
History
• Prison construction
• Very high prison costs
• Growth of alternative “intermediate
punishments” and community corrections
• Search for other alternatives
Characteristics of male
offenders
• About 94% of prison populations are male
• About 22% for drug offenses (a dramatic
change)
• 15% for robbery
• 12% for murder
• 10% for assault
Characteristics (males)
• Young (under 30)
• Heavily concentrated geographically: CA,
TX, NY, OH, MI, FL, and IL
• IQ: average 87 as compared to 100 in
the general population
• Over ½ score below 90 (80% score above
90 in the general population
Characteristics
• Poor verbal skills as compared to
performance skills, LD & ADHD
• Low level of educational attainment: 63%
have not graduated from high school, as
compared to 36% in the general
population
• Over one-half score below 8th grade level
on academic achievement tests
Characteristics
• More than ½ are minorities. The
proportion of African Americans under
correctional supervision has doubled. 1
out of 3 young males currently under
correctional supervision
• Marital status: about ½ are married on
admission, drops to ¼
Characteristics
• High percentage of truants, dropouts
• Underemployed or unemployed
• In one survey, ¾ had been working. Of
those not employed at all, ½ reported they
were looking, ½ not
• 1/6 were above the poverty level before
incarceration
Characteristics
• Limited job skills
• More health and medical problems,
including poor nutrition, problems
associated with drug use, more diabetes,
epilepsy, hepatitis, kidney dialysis,
HIV/AIDS, other STDs such as syphilis,
gonorrhea, herpes
• 100% need dental care
Psychological problems
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MMPI: variety of psychological problems
20% Antisocial Personality Disorder
10% seriously mentally ill
10% mentally retarded
Drug and alcohol problems
Drink 3 times as much as other young
males
Characteristics
• 75-85% use illegal drugs
• 2% of the general public has used heroin,
33% of prisoners
• Came from seriously deprived
backgrounds
• High crime neighborhoods with limited
opportunities
• One parent homes with low annual
income
Characteristics
• Skill deficits
• Social, anger management, assertion, life
skills
• Do not know how to use available social
services in their communities
Issues in corrections
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Classification: security and treatment
Dealing with prisonization
Homosexuality and violence, riots
Correctional officers (discretion, turnover,
isolation, boring yet stressful, training)
• Correctional law, section 1983
• Prison Litigation Reform Act
Ways to avoid lawsuits
• 1. Documentation, keep records
• 2. Establish policies and procedures
• 3. Consult the states attorney general’s
office for a legal opinion
• 4. Keep up with current laws and trends
• 5. Insurance. Indemnification if in “good
faith.”
Lawsuits
• 6. Adequate training of employees, keep
records
• 7. Ethics training
• 8. Common sense
Issues
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Developing viable correctional programs
Security
Counseling (personality, social skills)
Vocational
Medical/dental
Educational
Recreation
Correctional programs
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Independent living skills
Religion
Aftercare
Current lack of individualization
Alternatives
• Surprisingly little research about shortterm or community corrections
• Probation, ISP, home confinement, EM,
boot camp, shock incarceration, day
reporting centers, halfway houses (halfway
in and halfway out)
• No good evidence that recidivism rates are
lower
Alternatives
• On the other hand, their costs are
considerably less
• Programs tend to be aimed toward low risk
offenders
• Net widening