Dangerous Offenders Legislation

Capital Punishment Speech Capital punishment is a barbarous survival from a less enlightened and refined age; it is incongruous and incompatible with our present standard of civilization and humanity. It has been abolished by many states and countries, and we must look forward to the day when the other governments will follow suit. The arguments against capital punishment are many and credible, but the pleas advanced in its favor are few and unfounded. Punishment is supposed to be for the protection of society, and for the reformation and rehabilitation of the wrongdoer. Its purpose is to protect society by preventing the same criminals from repeating their crimes, and by acting as a deterrent to other prospective criminals.

Many people often confuse deterrence with retribution or punishment, but that it is not. Instead of serving your “debt to society” for a crime you committed, under the principal of deterrence you are serving your punishment to keep you and your neighbors from doing the same crime. Operating according to the deterrence model necessitates two principal assumptions: that imposing a stiff penalty will dissuade someone from committing crimes in the future and secondly, that the fear of this punishment will prevent future crimes perpetrated by others. (Wright, 2010) One very important idea here is that it is a “stiff” penalty, a penalty that others won’t forget. There are many faults in this argument, with the largest being the amount of faith put into mankind.

State and Federal objectives of punishment Today punishment is the most dominant correctional goal of both the state and federal government in response to criminality. The purpose of punishment is to protect society, rehabilitate criminal offenders, and reduce recidivism. In both the state and federal correctional institutions, their objectives are to use punishment as form deterrence while incapacitating and, rehabilitating offenders. For punishment to be successful it must be so unpleasant that it will hopefully deter inmates from reverting to such life and also deter others from taking part in such activities. In response to the growing public concern over criminality, politicians have adopted a Tough on Crime approach when dealing with law breakers, and have pushed for new legislation to keep criminal offenders from further harming or terrorizing society.

The policy was created to allow for the regulation of determining an individual’s refugee status and the subsequent resulting removal of individuals who did not meet the requirements for refugee status or placement into the community if they do (Hand, 1992). 1998-2004. The 1998 and 2004 reports from the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission stated that Australia’s prolonged mandatory detention breached human rights obligations and standards, while the inclusion of children in detention did not conform to the requirements of the Convention on the Rights of Children (HREOC, 2004) and gave subsequent recommendations for change. The Howard government in power at the time, originally rejected these findings, but after subsequent pressure placed on them by other members of parliament, policy changes were implemented which resulted in allowing children and their families to be released into community arranged detention (Howard, 2005). In 2001, offshore processing was implemented where asylum seekers could be transferred to offshore detention centres where they were required to remain i... ... middle of paper ... ... or knowledge (Cemlyn & Briskman, 2003).

Interpretations of the law allow a lot of leeway in order to shape legislation to the needs of the plaintiff or victim. General crime legislation serves the purpose of protecting the public, yet only certain motivations of crimes enable the judiciary to assign additional charges to a defendant guilty of a hate crime. The protected rights of citizens are believed to guarantee peace and tranquility. The most recent additions to everyday crime legislation have challenged this peace and created chaos between the supporters and opposers of these changes. Despite the United States developing hate crime legislation that suffices to maintain justice within the judiciary system, numerous legislative experts strongly believe these most recent changes create unnecessary bias.

In the traditional court system, it is highly probable that Cole would have been awarded a lengthy prison sentence. Unfortunately, prison further decreases a detainee’s ability to eve... ... middle of paper ... ...sent in the justice system. Through comparison, Miakaelsen proves that healing must be a sector of concentration in justice, if society aims to retrograde the complications created by a crime. As a result of punishment being a fixation in justice, legislation is directly contributing to detriment of our society. By remaining focused on punishment, our governance is failing to erase the taint crime inflicts upon our nescient society.

A recent sentence imposed in the Tasmanian Supreme Court aimed at punishing an offender is the case of Michael Robert Keeling v State of Tasmania in which the judge needed to balance the need to punish the offender and the need to deter him and others from such conduct while keeping the best interests of the community in mind. Deterrent sentences are aimed at deterring not only the offender from further offences but also potential offenders. Specific deterrence is concerned with punishing an offender in the expectation they will not offend again whereas general deterrence is related to the possibility that people in general will be deterred from committing crime by the threat of punishment. An example of ... ... middle of paper ... ...ystem and are seen as a credible sentencing option because of the restorative and rehabilitative effect it has on offenders by allowing them the opportunity to give something back to the community and providing them with education and work experience. There is a lack of evidence to suggest that rehabilitation is neither an effective or non-effective sanction.

The goals of incarceration according to penological principles are incapacitation, rehabilitation, retribution, and deterrence. When exploring the outcomes of a time served in a supermax facility, rehabilitation can be immediately ruled out. Supermax facilities have been said to be potentially damaging to an inmate’s mental health and inflict irrational emotions of rage and lead an individual to lose touch with reality (Haney, 2003). Incapacitation is achieved through the incarceration of inmates in supermax facilities. Inmates are removed from society, preventing future crime.

However, it is ineffective in balancing the rights of offenders. The law has been progressive in protecting the rights of victims in the use and collection of evidence and witness statements. The Criminal Procedure Amendment (Domestic Violence Complainants) Bill 2014, which amends the Criminal Procedure Act 1986, passed the NSW Legislative Council on 18 November 2014. The amendment enables victims of domestic violence to record their statements as their evidence instead of giving oral evidence in court. It also allows police to use body-mounted cameras when entering domestic violence scenes and record the situation to be used as evidence in court.

However, this assumption doesn’t justify using dirty means. Only when an Officer knows guilt exists should dirty means come into effect. Then again, if the Officer knows a person is truly guilty there are ways to bring the evidence to light. This does become a serious problem when there area time constraints as in the movie "Dirty Harry" (TPLE class notes, 2007) (Klokars, 1980). There must be limits to these means, officers must adhere to the Law as well or the legal system becomes redundant.