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Originally Posted by FUBLUE
I do not have the document in front of me, but I will look for it, so you know I'm not making this up. A study done several years ago showed that punishments do not deter most crimes. The study was about the death penalty (the ultimate punishment in the minds of some). It showed that most murders will openly admit that they did not care what the penalty was; they were going to commit the murder. Having talked to several muderers (as their teacher) they honestly did not care what the penalty was...they were going to do it.
Crimes of necessity? A great topic for debate! Having already debated this, my class decided that there should still be a penalty, but (again, from their experiences) it was still worth it to commit the crime (i.e. stealing money for food or rent or whatever they deemed necessary).
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Of course there should still be a penalty. Punishment is also about punishment.
For example, the threat of prison may not deter people the first time, (I believe it does on a big level though -and admittedly I dont have numbers in front of me, just personal experience of dealing with these issues every day- not in a class room either) - most people do not want to go back to prison once out. I've literally seen people tatoo on their hand "No mistakes" to remind them not to get into trouble so they dont find themselves back in prison.
For those that Prison does not work on - leave them there for life or until they have no life left 65-70 y/o.
For those that commit capital crimes, execute them (sooner the better). Will it deter? No, but they are punished and gone. Its a nonissue. There is no detering those who will do it whether they will be executed or not. So forget about that end - These people are useless to society and turn your stomach when you look at them. Their momma may miss them, me and you certainly wont.
The BIGGEST fraud on society is behavioral and diversion programs, which are actually excuses to let the criminals the streets because we CANT keep them, so we trick them into thinking we'll be nice and let them out of jail if they do their weekly program or if they be good, we'll dismiss the charges. Its money for the program teachers, thats about it. Rehabilitation is a joke until the person WANTS to rehabilitate. That comes at the point when they have hit bottom and been crushed beyond the point of functioning. Crush them sooner, and they probably would want to rehabilitate sooner.