The Failure Of The American Prison System - 940 Words

The Failure of the American Prison System What if someone broke into your house and stole everything of value and sold it so they could buy their next dose of heroin? Would you rather see them spend the next ten to fifteen years in prison? Or would you prefer the crime never happened because they got the rehabilitation they needed so they never robbed you for drug money? The United States correctional system uses both punishment and rehabilitation when dealing with offenders. There are many ways that the justice system handles these punishments such as incarceration, probation, and sometimes death. However, punishment does not seem to work. It seems that the only way to effectively handle criminals successfully is with rehabilitation.†¦show more content†¦Currently there are over three thousand criminals on death row, with seven hundred and forty six from the state of California (DPIC). While many people argue that the death penalty is an effective way of deterring crime th e reality is that most criminals on death row spend their entire lives in prison and die without ever receiving a lethal injection, and wasting the tax payers money. Punishment is not the only way that we currently deal with criminals. Rehabilitation is another form of justice used , although it is not used as much as it should be. It seems like most people believe incarceration is a form of rehabilitation, when in-fact it isn’t and more and more criminals are no longer scared of prison. There are many forms of rehabilitation such as drug treatment, community service and mental institutions. The most common of these rehabilitation’s is Drug Treatment. In 2013 there were 210,200 inmates serving on drug related crimes (BJS, 2014, p.16) By helping these offenders to quit doing drugs, we can reduce the number of drug related crimes in the future. I feel the best way to handle criminals is by rehabilitation and not punishment. Not all criminals can be rehabilitated and for these criminals we have punishment such as prison, death, or probation, however, minor crimes should not be punished. Many