Custodial sentencing

• What is custodial sentencing?

  • A judicial sentence determined by a court where the offender is punished by serving time in prison or other closed instituions (e.g. therapy/educational)
• What are the 4 main reasons for custodial sentencing?

  • DETERRENCE
  • INCAPACITATION
  • RETRIBUTION
  • REHABILITATION
• What is deterrence and how is it involved in CS?

  • The unpleasant prison experience is designed to put off individuals/society from engaging in offending behaviour
  • Works on two levels- general deterrence and individual deterrence
  • Based on the behaviourist idea of conditioning through punishment
• What is general deterrence?

  •  aims to send a broad message that crime will not be tolerated
• What is individual deterrence?

  • should prevent individual from repeating crime in light of experience
• What is incapacitation?

  • The offender is taken out of society to prevent them reoffending as a means of protecting the public
  • The need is likely to depend on the severity of offence and nature of offender
  • Individuals in society will require more protection from a serial murderer or rapist
• What is retribution?

  • Making the offender suffer to enact revenge for the crime
  • Level of suffering should be proportionate to the seriousness of the crime
  • The offender should pay for their actions and prison is an option for this
• What is rehabilitation?

  • Prison aims to reform criminals
  • Offenders should leave prison better adjusted and ready to take back their place in society
  • Prison should provide opportunities to develop skills and training or to access treatment programmes for drug addiction
  • Gives offender chance to reflect on crime
• Psychological effects of custodial sentencing

  • Stress and depression
  • Institutionalisation
  • Prisonisation
• Psychological effects- stress and depression

  • Suicide rates are higher in prison than general pop, alongside self-mutilation and self-harm
  • Stress of prison experience also increases risk of psychological disturbance following release
  • Research that suggests there are 9x more suicide rates among prisoners in England and Wales than general pop
• Psychological effects- Institutionalisation

  • inmates may be accustomed to the norms and routines of prison life that they are no longer able to function on the outside
• Psychological effects- Prisonisation

  • the way prisoners are socialised into adopting an ‘inmate code’
  • Behaviour deemed unacceptable outside may be encouraged and reward inside the prison.
• Positive psychological effects?

  • The Vera Institute of Justice found offenders who participate in college education programmes are 43% less likely to offend after release
  • May be the result of greater optimism having learned new skills and had positive interactions during the course
  • Prison is therefore potentially beneficial to many offenders
• Custodial sentencing limitation with psychological effects?

  • In the last 20 years suicide rates in prisons have increased by 15x compared to general pop
  • Prison Reform trust found 25% of women and 15% of men in prison reported symptoms to suggest psychosis
  • An oppressive prison regime may trigger these disorders to those vulnerable
  • therefore CS is not effective in rehabilitation, especially for those with vulnerabilities
• Limitations of custodial sentencing with individual differences (AO3)

  • Cannot be assumed that all offenders will react in the same way
  • Different prisons have different regimes, likely to be variations in experience
  • Length of sentence, prison experience and reason for incarceration may be factors may affect how well CS impacts people
  • Many convicted have pre-existing psychological/emotional difficulties during convincted
  • Therefore difficult to make general conclusions/technqiues for every prisoner
• Strength of custodial sentencing- training and treatment (AO3)

  • Many prisoners can access education and training in prison, increases employability upon release
  • Some treatment programmes involve anger management skills and development of social skills to provide offenders an insight into their behaviour -> may decrease likelihood of recidivism
  • Suggests prison may be a worthwhile experience if offenders can access these programmes
  • However prisons may lack the resources for this