Nonviolent Drug Offenders Nonviolent drug offenders should not be given mandatory jail sentences because the prisons don’t have the room, it already costs a lot of money to run the prisons, and by them putting the offenders into prison they are taking a parent away from a child who may need them the most. Drugs are illegal and yes most people involved with them are or become dangerous. Those are the types of offenders that should be thrown into prison especially if they are the type that harm our Law Enforcement. But if the offenders are nonviolent there is no need to lock them up when we can’t even afford to. They could get some other type of punishment for getting involved in the illegal activity. It is becoming a problem for prisons to receive more of the dangerous inmates because there is already a limited amount of food, they are having some overcrowding issues, and the cells in the prisons are smaller than the average bedroom. “There are about 2.3 million people incarcerated and about half of them for nonviolent crimes” (Taylor 1). There are over a million inmates in a prison, and these inmates have to stay in a very small cell and sometimes have to share with one or two more of the other inmates. Drugs are illegal and by selling or using them is breaking the law, but …show more content…
Prisons are already overcrowded and by putting them into the prison, they are going to take up space, space that the prisons don’t have and taking away an opportunity to lock up and actual criminal. If we were to take out all of the nonviolent offenders, we could save so much more money, $95 dollars a day just for one inmate. By not putting them into prison, we are not going to be taking a parent away from their child. Children need their parents, regardless of the choices and mistakes that parents make. Therefore nonviolent drug offenders should not be hiven mandatory jail
Community corrections have more advantages over incarceration and fewer disadvantages. Incarcerating people isn’t working that well and the biggest reason is the overcrowding of prisons. According to a chart in Schmalleger’s book, “prisoners compared vs. capacity” there has been overcrowding of prisons since 1980. We are putting more people in prisons than how much capacity they can actually hold. Not only has the prison population skyrocketed but it also costs a lot of money to house all of those people. Why should we send people to jail if they are convicted of a nonviolent crime when we could put them on probation so we don’t overfill prisons? 49% of convicted inmates committed a nonviolent crime. (Class 12/7/09) If we were to put nonviolent offenders on probation then that would make a lot of room for violent offenders.
Mandatory minimums for controlled substances were first implemented in the 1980s as a countermeasure for the hysteria that surrounded drugs in the era (“A Brief History,” 2014). The common belief was that stiff penalties discouraged people from using drugs and enhanced public safety (“A Brief History,” 2014). That theory, however, was proven false and rather than less illegal drug activity, there are simply more people incarcerated. Studies show that over half of federal prisoners currently incarcerated are there on drug charges, a 116 percent percentage rise since 1970 (Miles, 2014). Mass incarceration is an ever growing issue in the United States and is the result of policies that support the large scale use of imprisonment on
I believe that instead of incarcerating them they should be put in facilities that will help them get treatment for their disabilities, disorders, and drug addictions. If they are being rehabilitated the right way it will help prevent further crimes and also will help the offender go back into society and live a crime free lifestyle. For Christel Tribble being locked up actually helped her out to realize that she doesn’t want to be a delinquent. She was motivated by her mother to continue her education and to realize that it’s not worth being in the court system at such a young age because it will be a never ending cycle. For Keith Huff, he went to Kentucky State prison five times serving a total of 27 years in the criminal justice system. He was incarcerated for drug problems, which in the long run won’t help him. It would be more beneficial for him to receive help to prevent him from using drugs. If they sent him to a rehabilitation center where he can receive the appropriate help he need it would prevent him from future imprisonment. As for Charles McDuffie he was an addict and a Vietnam veteran suffering from PTSD. He was sentenced to prison, which was no help for him in his situation dealing with PTSD. He needed mental health treatment to help him deal with the tragedies that he was remembering from the Vietnam War. Luckily when McDuffie got out of prison his friends, who
Some of these crimes such as fraud, gambling, and bribery can really upset the flow of politics and the economy. But the difference is that drug and alcohol crime make up a majority of federal prison inmates, and it’s something that would be treated better with rehabilitation than incarceration. As of January 2014 50.1% of inmates in federal prison are there for drug offenses (a non-violent crime). Over 3200 of these people in are serving life sentences without parole. 83.4 percent of these people received the punishment that was mandatory under sentencing laws. According to the United States Sentencing Commission between October 2012 and September 2013, 27.6 percent of drug offenders were locked up for crimes related to marijuana. The drug policies in both state and national government are not flexible enough. Spending tax payer dollars to incarcerate drug users who don’t get the help they need is a waste of money. The recidivism rate of prisoners continues to rise. Should drug users and alcoholics continue to be incarcerated because they don’t have the ability to help themselves and stop using drugs? That is a form of neglect and continuing to waste taxpayer dollars to neglect the issue is only digging the national debt deeper, and avoiding the real
In the novel High Price, Dr. Carl Hart talks about the injustice caused by the war on drugs. He proclaims that the war on drugs causes more problems than the effects of using drugs. The war on drugs is racially discriminatory and punishes Africans Americans as well as other minorities more often and severely than whites. When individuals predominantly African Americans get caught with drugs they are often locked up for a significantly longer period. As a criminal justice major, I know that incarcerating drug related offenders is ineffective and can damage society. Due to the war on drugs, there is a higher than the average incarceration rate, and our prisons and jails are over populated. Instead of detaining these offenders, we should develop
The problem is that the people who are being incarcerated don’t need to be incarcerated. Instead of trying to do what is best for the offenders and help them we are just throwing them in prisons for so many years and hoping it will help. Yes, this idea is working in some cases, but in other cases throwing the person in for many years is actually making it worse. They are not getting the help or treatment they need. I spoke with a man who was in prison for many years and he said getting drugs in prison is so much easier than getting them outside of prison. He also said that most drug offenders go back to prison, because they do not get help with their addictions. They are being put into a place that is just making their addictions worse.
In today's world, it seems like all too often we have woken up to another mass shooting, terrorist attack, or hate crime. However, the injustice does not end with the perpetrator. These acts of violence and hate are terrifying and receive a lot of media attention, yet there are many injustices that continue to permeate our society that are not often discussed. One of these is our incarceration system. The system is flawed and oversaturated with nonviolent drug offenders. Out of the approximately 2.2 million people in our nation’s prisons and jails, about one in four are locked up for a nonviolent drug offense (Criminal Justice Facts). According to the Department of Corrections, the largest single category of offense among prisoners is “drug
Those who abuse drugs need to have proper treatment in order to refrain from continuing their addiction after prison by being sent to a rehabilitation facility, or in the case that money is not available, a free program or sober living household instead of putting them in jail. The use and abuse of drugs in our country is a large and rising issue. A start to solving this problem is as simple as having those arrested instead sent for a cure for their addiction. Each user sent to rehab is another user cured from our world and more drugs off the streets. The reduction of drugs will come one step at a time, and this could be a huge step forward if the leaders of our nation are willing to give it a try.
“More than half of federal prisoners are incarcerated for drug crimes…” (Branson, 2012). Nonviolent drug offenses in America are unrightly over punished, causing more harm than good to those charged and all American citizens. Drug arrests and imprisonments are far too common and are taking focus off of more important crimes. The sentences for nonviolent drug crimes are far too long and harsh for the crime. Punishment against nonviolent drug crimes are not working and is causing more harm than good. The harsh punishment for nonviolent drug offenses might not seem like a problem at first, but it causes a huge toll on everyone involved. A simple nonviolent drug arrest could ruin an otherwise law abiding citizens’ life. The war on drugs is damaging
Prisons are not places where nonviolent offenders can serve time and then be released a better person, more fit for society. The prison environment is wrong, and as a result a nonviolent offender will leave unimproved. It is my belief that the alternatives of community control programs, rehabilitation programs, and restitution programs are the answers to the sentencing of nonviolent offenders.
To begin, Mandatory minimum sentences result in prison overcrowding, and based on several studies, it does not alleviate crime, for example crimes such as shoplifting or solicitation. These sentencing guidelines do not allow a judge to take into consideration the first time offender, differentiate the deviance level of the offender, and it does not allow for the judge to alter a punishment or judgment to each individual case. When mandatory sentencing came into effect, the drug lords they were trying to stop are not the ones being affected by the sentences. It is the nonviolent, low-level drug users who are overcrowding the prisons as a result of these sentences. Both the U.S. Sentencing Commission and the Department of Justice have determined that mandatory sentencing is not an effective way to deter crime. Studies show that mandatory minimums have gone downhill due to racial a...
...ration even when they are being incarcerated inside correctional facilities is an unfortunate fact that needs to be addressed. The smuggling of illegal drugs into prison walls is a shameful fact to our correctional system and a threat to our children, friends and family. I believe that we need to look for the new alternatives in order to correct these problems.
Suffering from an addiction is punishment enough, sending drug addicts to jail is not the solution. Addicts are suffering already by not having a place to stay. Most of the time addicts do not remember where their family is located at and they need help to get better.That is why I am saying that addicts should go to rehab instead of prison.
Some people argue that non-violent criminals shouldn’t be incarcerated because it’s such a huge financial drain on society. Well in my opinion a non-violent criminal is still a criminal; the only difference is they weren’t violent at that particular time. Many crimes have been committed without any physical abuse. Who’s to say the next time they decide to break the law they won’t become violent or a threat to someone. Furthermore, I believe if you do the crime, you have to do the time.
People who are in prison strictly because of drug use should be given the chance to get better instead of being incarcerated. However, I believe that those who commit other crimes while under the influence of drugs should still go to prison and get treatment where available.