Justice and the Modern Penal System By John Konrad

(abridged and adopted)

It is common to hear criticisms concerning the manner in which the criminal justice system functions in our present society. Our permissive society, it is said, has led us to become “soft” on crime.

We are told that the police are often powerless to act and that the courts are little more than a charade of actors playing out their legal games. Civil and human rights provide excessive protections to the guilty and blatant disregard for the victims of crime. We mollycoddle prisoners who enjoy the comforts of graduate schools of crime. These and other indictments are common-place and, indeed, often popular. At the same time, we are told that our system of justice excels any other developed in modern history. We are governed by law, which is enforced with equity regardless of race, color or creed. Law enforcement and the judiciary are free of corruption or favoritism and the correctional system is more enlightened and humane than any preceding it.

. . . the community cries out for a helping hand; the offender and victim cry out for a friend . . .

Do we find ourselves supporting either view, depending on the most recent media headline or perhaps our own experience? Justice is a very personal matter. When a wrongdoer is severely punished, we say justice has been done; when a police officer uses his discretion and I receive a warning rather than a citation, I also say justice has been done.

It has been said that the penal system acts as a bellwether in terms of the quality of justice in society. Our prisons act as a focal point of all that justice symbolizes. They have been called the “butt end” of our criminal justice system and as such provide a measure of how we ultimately deal with those who offend us.

Notes:

blatant disregard – явное пренебрежение

mollycoddle – баловать

indictment – обвинение

common-place– вездесущий

excel– превосходить

regadless- безотносительно к чему-либо, невзирая ни на что

enlightened – просвещенный

wrongdoer – правонарушитель

discretion– свобода действий

citation- официальный вызов в суд

bellwether– болтун, пустозвон

focal– находящийся в центре, в фокусе, в очаге, центральный

“butt end” – торец

Major models of corrections

In order to examine the major philosophical orientations that have guided the modern penal system, it is important to acknowledge that the use of prisons as a place of confinement, as the penalty for wrongdoing, is of relatively recent origin. Historically, the two major purposes served by prisons were, firstly, to hold the accused person until the trial proceedings were completed (the function we today call “remand custody”), and secondly, to hold the convicted person until the punishments were meted out. In the latter case, the punishments were swift and often final. They included execution, dismemberment, public floggings, branding, the stocks and the pillory and other similar sanctions that today we would generally classify as “cruel and unusual punishment.”

It was primarily in the late 18th and early 19th century that confinement in prisons came to be used as the punishment. Ironically, the use of confinement or incarceration in its modern evolution was viewed essentially as a progressive reform based on a desire to enhance and promote humanitarian ideals in contrast to the use of more barbaric forms of punishment of earlier times. Today, the use of long term confinement in prison has itself become known as one of the most severe and debilitating forms of punishment used by society.

In any discussion of modern penology the focus is almost exclusively on the use and effectiveness of prisons. The word “penal” is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as an adjective, and is essentially “of punishment . . . hence penalty.” And while we think firstly of prisons when we talk of punishment, we need to be reminded that modern penology includes a wide range of sanctions, penalties and consequences in addition to incarceration that the court can invoke or impose in response to illegal behavior. The full range of sanctions available to the court is embodied in our present day in a number of programs which have come to be known as “corrections.” While the term corrections emerged as a specific philosophical approach to dealing with offenders, it has now come to be used to describe the programs through which the sanctions of the court are carried out. While varying over time, many of the programs are community based and seen as a preferred alternative to incarceration.

Notes: