Should all crimes be punished with a prison sentence?

[HBK-aholic]

It seems today in the UK, more and more people are getting off ‘lightly’ with their sentences. Now, some are deemed as too unimportant to warrant a prison term, despite a clear break of the law. ‘Community Service’ seems to be the popular ‘punishment’ when it comes to some aspects of the law, specifically assault.

Speeding is another good example, where fines are usually the most someone can get. Most people have had a speeding fine in their life time, and that doesn’t mean they should be in jail now. However, for constant violations, or speeding of over 10 miles per hour over the limit, prison should be an automatic sentence. The more violations or the faster they were going, the longer the sentence would be. I think it’s important to remember here that if the person had caused an accident, maybe death to another, they would be in court facing jail immediately. Just because there wasn’t anyone around for them to hurt, speeding still suggests that could happen, and they should be punished appropriately.

Carrying a knife is another thing that should warrant a prison sentence. In England these laws are becoming tougher, and I think an automatic prison sentence from anyone found with one would deter many from carrying them around because it’s ‘cool’ or for ‘protection’.

What do you think are the worst things about the legal system? Should all people found guilty of a crime face a prison sentence?

 

[Sparky]

No i don't think so. I get into a fight with somebody other something and get charged for assult i don't want to get sent to jail for a month or something.
Now with the knife part, I carry a knife around for most of the week. i need it for work, i got pulled over the other day and the cops found it in my pocket. are you saying i should have to go to jail? becouse i don;t think the cops are going to beliave be when i say its for work. Big things yes. massive battery or Assualt where weopans where used yes they deserve jail time. but not when it was just a drunkin fight or a small fight where one person charged the other.

 

[HBK-aholic]

And once work verified that you needed the knife for work, you'd be free to go. It's as simple as that. But what's not simple is that teenagers are dying due to the amount of knives on the streets nowadays. Someone can be found with a knife, given a warning, and sent on their way. But if the police hadn't stopped them they could have gone around the corner and stabbed someone. I'd rather you have an hour at a Police Station while they check your work status, as opposed to a dead teenager.

 

[Uncle Sam]

This is something I'm quite liberal on. Unfortunately for me, Labour - the centre-left party - are become more and more authoritarian with crime. The Conservative have a near identical stance to them, so no help there. Who'd have thought the Lib Dems really were the real alternative?

Prison sentences aren't as powerful a deterrent as you might hope, and it can breed crime easily, particularly when sending impressionable young people into prison. The social causes of crime are what need to be looked at - something which Labour twigged on to a while ago and Cameron's Conservatives have twigged on to in turn. Y'know, "tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime" and all that? Moderate redistribution of wealth and more balance when it comes to education and living conditions are what's needed.

Am I saying that we should go easy on criminals? No, not by any means. In fact, serious crimes should be dealt with severely; more severely than they currently are, you could argue. But chucking everyone into prison for relatively minor offences isn't going to help anything.

 

[Mr. TM]

There needs to be better reform institutes it seems. Instead of putting a person in prison for a month for gang like activity of the such, where they are just about as likely to gain more allegiances or whatever, they need to be put in a reform institute. A place where people can find out the problems with gangs.

There is a former Canadian gang leader, who was quite big it seems. He was arrested and instead of put in a prison to rot, he was given the chance to reform. He was able to get his BA in sociology and was recently elected an Member of the Legislative Assembly in the province of Saskatchewan. Obviously reform worked for him, he was given a second chance, and now is a great person in our society. Now he was an extreme example, but maybe if we educate youth in gangs better, they will stay out of them.

 

[The Big Gunnzbowski]

Wow...I'm not trying to sound like an asshole or anything, but Knives are all you guys have to worry about!? We've got assholes over here that shoot you for looking at them funny...

But to answer your question, no. I don't think that all crimes should be punished with prison time. 2 reasons for this, mainly.

1) The overcrowding in prisons is bad enough as is. You start throwing people in for every little crime, you've got a major crisis.

2) The cost for keeping prisoners in prison is horrid anyways. You start throwing more and more people in, the people who pay the taxes are NOT going to be very happy.

Not to mention the fact that sometimes people DO make honest mistakes. In the last 3 years alone, my drivers license has been suspended over 5 times. I probably did 2 of the things they said. Others were bogus charges that I couldn't prove otherwise. I've been to jail twice because they said I didn't pay a fine. I paid it....TWICE! There's got to be more to it than just "Throw everybody who commits a crime into jail".

 

[Ms. TM Canada]

I don't think prison is a great idea in general (at least not the way we do it), but I agree with you that in many instances community service is not a useful punishment. I say this not because its an "easy" sentence, but because it does nothing to reform the criminal's behaviour. Like TM said, in cases where prison sentences are necessary for public safety, reform should be the objective. As mentioned by Gunnz, it is very expensive to keep people in prison just to let them out and have them commit the same crime again.
Our justice system is much better at throwing criminals in prison and forgetting about them than it is at finding the roots of problems and fixing those.
There should be more mandatory post-sentence counselling to help keep ex criminals from falling back into old habits and toxic relationships. By helping the ex criminals set and follow through on goals that can help them be productive members of society, we could steer them away from feeling stigmatized by their past actions and prison sentence. If a person gets out of prison and is still treated like a criminal, that person is not going to become a productive member and will likely fall back into illicit activities. This is exactly what happens far too often.
So, yes, I think dangerous crimes should be punished with a prison sentence, but I think the lengths, stipulations and goals of those sentences need to be seriously re-evaluated.
I also see where you're coming from with the speeding issue; that is a misdemeanor that is dangerous to other people, however with the sheer number of people who speed it's unreasonable to put each of them in prison. Perhaps the government should first look at putting a very good, graphic, sad anti-speeding campaign in place. If that doesn't yield results, perhaps if you get more than 1 speeding ticket per year you must do 60 hours of volunteer work at a charity. If parting with money isn't a wake up call (which it currently isn't for most), taking 60 hours out of your weekends for awhile might be.

 

[The Big Gunnzbowski]

Other things are more complex...
In my state, recently an 8 year old boy allegedly killed his father and his fathers friend. Shot them with a .22 rifle. AN 8 YEAR OLD BOY... This is not your clear cut case of murder. Also, the case has been handled poorly from the get-go. The police interviewed the the boy alone and got him to confess. It was a video taped interview, so we've all seen it and heard the boy confess to killing his dad and friend. The problem? There was no lawyer or guardian present. The confession and video interview have been thrown out as evidence. The reason the boy gave for doing it? He got spanked...alot. They found a diary he had been writing in. He said in the diary that his "limit" was 1000 spankings. What should be done in this case? It SOUNDS like the boy may have been abused. What do you think should be done? Jail/Prison is NOT going to do this boy any good. He will not benefit from it at all. He needs to be reformed, or "fixed" so to speak. NOW, the police are saying that somebody else could have committed the crime. With so much that goes on and so many variables in so many cases, prison is not always the answer. Look at how many innocent people go to prison for crimes they didn't commit. There's so much more to this argument, Becca, that it's really hard to say in general...

 

[HBK-aholic]

Murder should definitely carry a prison sentence, I don't care what the circumstances are. And if he thinks it's okay to go around killing people then I think it's the safest place for everyone. I have a 6 year old who knows killing is wrong, don't try and tell me he didn't know what he was doing. But someone cannot knowingly get a gun and shoot 2 people without a punishment such as prison.

 

[agentmichaelscarn]

Im one of those people that think prison should be reserved only for violent crimes that can cause harm to another person. As far as felonies like fraud, insider trading, stealing(without a weapon or threatening anybody) or things like that prison shouldnt be necessary because for one our prisons are overpopulated(atleast here in Michigan) and from what I heard it costs alot to take care of a prisoners. You should definitely be punished for those crimes but I would rather have them be punished by doing something that would contribute positively to the society like community service, on top of fines and in some instances house arrest. When you add up all the money you are going to spend on court fees, fines, lawyer fees and add that to the time you're going to have to put in in community service and or house arrest I think it would still make people think twice about doing that. Obviously though if they keep repeating the crime than you may need to be sent to prison.

As far as driving offenses Im one of those people that feel its not taking seriously enough here in the U.S. What I mean is if you're going to send somebody straight to jail for having 5 or 6 drinks and driving on top of roughly $5,000 in fines, court costs and community service then how come you dont do something similar if a guy is going 20 over the speed limit or running a red light? You run a red light and here in Michigan you get a couple points on your record and about a $150 fine, and you are certainly putting somebody's life in danger by doing that just as you are by drinking and driving. Same thing with people that are swerving and not paying attention to the road because their talking on their phone or texting on it, they are dangerous drivers yet nothing happens to them for doing that? Im not condoning drinking and driving at all but what Im saying is if you're going to punish somebody that severely(compared to other driving offenses) for drinking and driving you should do the same for other things people do that our hazardous behind the wheel.