Persuasive Research Paper

Introduction

            What is the matter with community corrections in the contemporary society? Crime remains a threat to the society and calls for serious interventions. Community corrections have been developed to act as alternatives to custodial sentences but are the community willing to accept criminals back to the society? Is community correction helping in correcting criminal behavior among offender? Is the community safe in the hands of perpetrators who roam freely in the society? Is allowing offenders the freedom to stay in the community exposing victims to harm further and proving leniency in the criminal justice system? Then lastly, how can you feel if a rapist reformatory gets built near your home with your family of seven girls?

Thesis Statement

            Crime continues to be the most social issue hounding all spheres of functionality in the society. Not socially, not, economically and not politically, but all. Having community corrections poses a great danger to the society rather than the perceived benefits it gets associated. This alternative sentence reflects how the law is so lenient to perpetrators. The option exposes the victims as well as the community to the perpetrators to victimize further them. The option does not serve justice to the victims as their perpetrators will freely move in the society. Constructing halfway homes in the neighborhood, for instance, can expose the area to criminal activities. The option is, therefore, controversial to the social controls and should be terminated to serve justice to the society and avoid encouraging potential offenders.

Community Correction Does Not Serve Punishment Principles

            Community correctional programs have existed since the 1970s and have grown rapidly as an option to incarceration especially in nations with the largest population in the prison. In community correction programs, we have probation and restitution programs. The convicted persons serve sentences that do not involve prison time but rather they get in supervised programs in the standard residential. While there exist various advantages on redirecting part of the illegal population from overflowing prison complex, the adoption of this penal system to the public have its drawbacks. As critics of community corrections, these programs usually widen the net in the state social control. Most community-based correctional programs do not serve as an alternative of imprisonment. Instead, they serve as an add-on to the prison sentences. These correctional programs get used as an additional type of punishment, usually in cases where there would have existed no formal punishment in the absence of these programs. Therefore, community-based correctional programs give an increase of not just numbers of individuals under enforcement supervision at a specified period but also it spread offenders from particular institutions such as prisons into the society. If community correctional programs utilize residential facilities in the neighborhoods, they usually enter into the setback of NIMBYism "Meaning not in my backyard)", this process involves the neighbors who get upset about the fact that offenders are getting housed in their proximity to families as well as homes. Even when the offenders in the facilities follow their course of learning or seek jobs, it poses far to the society. It is not a surprise that many offenders who get custodial sentences or sometimes commit severe crimes were initially under community –based sentence (Tindall, Michele, et al., 16-22). Therefore, this alternative sentencing continues to fail since it makes punishment lenient and offers another environment for them to commit further offenses. The presence of the criminals in the neighborhood can end up socializing the children in the society to get into crimes. Security of the residents can also get compromised if such offenders are in the society. These types of sentences are also easy to compromise. Depending on the relationship an offender has with his supervisor, he can end up left free. These sentencing options do not serve justice to the victims. It is very discouraging and devastating if a victim sees his victim working freely in the community. This process can encourage people to device similar offenses to avoid prison at the expense of the victims.

            Legislation in the start defined two initial sentencing outcomes: fine or prison. The two are enough but what lies in between – community sentence – is not fish or fowl: it’s a disposal cannot work as punishment but is used too late and on many serial criminals to work on rehabilitation. Community sentences continue to become sanctions in many developed countries having an unprecedented increase in their use. All this periods these sentences options continue to fail. They get characterized by low completion rates coupled with grave breaches. In 2010, only 52% community orders in developed countries were completed. One-third was not completed satisfactorily while 1 in 10 terminated early due to a cancelation to attract custodial sentences. Official figures present very high rates of recidivism too, with individuals serving such sentence in committing approximately 251,000 crimes in the following year. Unfortunately over 1,500 become extra serious crimes like rape and murder. To my surprise, community sentences public opinion is very. Many people take it as a ‘soft option’. The public usually supports these sentencing options for first offenders. Unfortunately, courts are increasingly using community sentences for recidivists and more so on violent criminals (Rhodes, William, 391-413). Crime Statistics says that the proportion of violence coming from community sentence continues to rise. Failures of community sentences come from the flaws in its design as well as operation. Communities Payback seems to be most punitive of the orders continue to be insufficient. Orders take years, few hours, and week and so on. Many times used by criminals involve doing light duties that are not punitive in nature like working charity shops. These sentences need to match priorities that the public and the sentencing principles have on punishment. Proves of what works shows that focus on the discipline, with full orders involving purposeful duties, may give results. The reason is that sentences having punitive elements provide better outcomes and helps in arresting the escalation of crimes, which is a serious offense prevention aim. It is even better to advocate for new Work Orders regime rather than community sentences. Such initiative is more intensive, visible and closely supervised having sanctions for breaching such as benefits withdrawal (Tindall, Michele, et al., 16-22)

            Perhaps the main perceived advantages associated with community corrections are the greatest disadvantages to the population. Can drug programs as well as boot camps developed in the community expose the community to the danger of drugs? .Of course, the answer is yes. There is no hundred percent prove that placing such offender on community programs help to treat all the offenders. Placing them in such reformatory environment offers them to continue the drug pursuit since the law is soft on them. The presence of such individuals in the society can end up incriminating the youths in the locality and the end the society can rot with criminality. In situations where the perpetrator landed in the court after a victim reported him, the offender can come to revenge against the person As I previously said, drug interventions, as well as boot camps, eases crowding when they place prison-bound criminals in a community treatment program that allow chances of avoiding incarceration. Additionally such programs get filled with criminals who should not get a lenient sentence. The situation is called net-widening and it usually happen when judges, as well as prosecutors, fill such program with criminals who do not need such interventions (Tindall, Michele, et al., 16-22). Prison-bound criminal gets chance placed in programs having access to the services. This process increases punishment cost. This situation occurs because the officials always feel that they have to maximize the program capacity since it is available. Community correction usually compromises public safety. Offenders quickly become able to go on with criminal activities than if they remain confined in prison (Rodriguez, Nancy, 181-215). With funds going custodial institutions, resources never keep pace with the community corrections development. With the resources spreading thinly, correctional officers supervise more criminals and spend less time on offenders. Technology continues to replace human supervision. Unfortunately, even if home confinement get combined with monitoring technology, enforcement authorities cannot get assured that perpetrators will end up refraining from crimes. For instance, the fact that community confinement programs allow the offender to leave residences for different activities like work, shopping, and recreation, it is easy that crimes can end up getting committed even when the offender is legally out of the home. Various community supervision interventions get disconnected from treatment services aimed at addressing the problems o f the offenders. This disadvantage affects offender’s success to get rehabilitated.

Conclusion

            My personal opinions, community corrections do not serve the principles of punishment. The fact that it decongests prison cannot hold water to support it. In fact, it aims at spreading the offender in the community posing security threats to the society. It also gives another opportunity for the offender to go on with criminal activities. It can be very worrying if institutions to handle offender in the community gets developed in the community. This process can escalate crimes and public fears because there is less prove that this option corrects behavior. The correction does not serve justice to the victims as perpetrators will be back in the society even laughing at their victims. From the statistical facts that many convicts had at one time put on a community sentence, it is daylight truth that this option does not serve as a crime control strategy.

            To conclude; therefore, policy makers in the criminal justice system need to come up with other sentencing option apart of community sentences. Crimes should remain crimes, and they should meet the full force of the law if the society wants to eliminate crime. Abolishing this sentencing option send a deterrence message to the potential criminal who take advantage of the sentence to inflict harm on their victims. The fact that punishment is supposed to be victim friendly, community sentences turn and make the criminal friendly. I therefore strongly stand against this sentencing.

  

References

Ng, Irene Y.H. "Where Juvenile Serious Offenders Live: A Neighborhood Analysis Of Wayne     County, Michigan."Journal of Criminal Justice 38.2 (2010): 207-215. Academic Search       Premier. Web. 23 Nov. 2015.

Rhodes, William. "Estimating Treatment Effects and Predicting Recidivism for Community         Supervision Using Survival Analysis with Instrumental Variables." Journal of   Quantitative Criminology 26.3 (2010): 391-413.Academic Search Premier. Web. 23 Nov.           2015.

Rodriguez, Nancy. "Concentrated Disadvantage And The Incarceration Of Youth: Examining     How Context Affects Juvenile Justice." Journal of Research in Crime &    Delinquency 50.2 (2013): 189-215. Academic Search Premier. Web. 23 Nov. 2015.

Tindall, Michele, et al. "Factors Associated With Recidivism among Corrections-Based     Treatment Participants in Rural and Urban Areas." Journal of Substance Abuse            Treatment 56. (2015): 16-22. Academic Search Premier. Web. 23 Nov. 2015.

Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in cheap term papers if you need a similar paper you can place your order from top research paper writing companies.