Criminal Justice: An Overview of the Correctional System - Essay Sample

Introduction

In criminal justice, correctional system has a variety of functions aimed at rehabilitating the who have been convicted of crimes. Major components of the correctional system include the police, corrections, judges, and court of justice. Corrections is a term that refers to a process whereby various programs and agencies utilizes techniques, tools, and facilities to facilitate a systematic treatment and security functions aimed at correcting criminal acts in the population level. Some of the roles played by the current correctional systems are different from old correctional systems. Treatment and rehabilitative programs are the major roles played by the current systems and punishments and are not considered as the main role as it was in the historical systems. These systems devote their attention to the development of educational strategies and vocational training, as well as psychological programs (Millett, 2018). The term correction is commonly used in the criminal justice system as a replacement of the penology; this refers to the group of agencies in the society that supervise people in the state of rehabilitation, incarceration, probation or parole. In the current society, the correctional facility has replaced the penal institution, this change of terms referring to criminal justice systems is as a result of a change in their functions. This paper explores some of the major functions, Issues, goals, and objectives in Correctional systems and the effectiveness of various correctional programs.

Background

Corrections is a term that seems broad, and this is because the correctional system is a very important component in the society that is responsible for overseeing a variety of programs such as handling deliquescent individuals who are released conditionally, monitoring offenders who are issued with penalties and they do not require incarceration (Seeds, 2019). It is not a collection of organizations, agencies, physical structures or facilities and instead corrections comprise of practitioners under their service and employs; physical structures and facilities act as tools used by these practitioners to carry out their duties. Criminal justice system comprises of five major segments, and these are the courts, law enforcement, juvenile's justice system, corrections, and victim services. Unlike the police officers whose role is to apprehend individuals who break the law and preventing crimes from happening, the correctional practitioner usually works to change the offender population and at least keep it contained. It is also responsible for supervising inmates in prison. In this system, corrections officers play an important role in implementing strategies and correctional interventions that are aimed at rehabilitating the offenders, their roles are diverse, overseeing the incarceration of those who are serving a sentence is one of their primary roles (Clear, Reisig, & Cole, 2018). Correctional systems have evolved with time; in the past, these systems involved abuse of human rights, cruel punishments, slavery, and unnecessary incarceration. This institution was used to remove the criminals from the community, shape, and control them.

Role of Historical State Correctional System

The original purpose of the correctional system was to remove the offenders from society; corporal punishment was one of the interventions used in correcting the criminals. This involved torturing criminals. Corporal punishment consisted of any physical punishment aimed at inflicting pain or causing discomfort (Seeds, 2019). The objective of this practice was to discourage the future occurrence of crimes. Forms of corporal punishments include:

Amputation- if a criminal is convicted of stealing, the correctional personal could amputate the hands as a way of preventing future crime

Beating, Shackling, Dunking and Locking

The main objective in the historical correctional system was to prevent future crimes by setting exams using the offenders. Physical punishment was based on the concept of deterrence, whereby criminals are injured or humiliated to stop them from committing more crimes.

Functions of a Contemporary State Correctional System

Today, correctional system has different goals and roles in the criminal justice system, the major role of this system is to ensure that the rehabilitation and sentence of an individual offender are appropriately carried out by monitoring them whether they are in prison, jail, community service or probation (Stern,2019). There are five objectives of the correctional system in the current society; these include retribution, rehabilitation, incapacitation, restoration, and deterrence.

Retribution

Retribution refers to punishment for offenses against the society; it involves depriving offender's freedom as a way of making them pay for what they did in the society, it also serves as act revenge for the victim society. Retribution is one of the goals that is viewed as a morally acceptable way of responding to the offense. This concept was introduced to the historical correctional system. However, its application currently is different as it depends on the level of the committed crime.

Incapacitation

Incapacitation is one of the goals of the correctional system that is aimed at preventing future occurrence of crimes in society through physical interventions. For instance, criminals are incarcerated and subjected to consistent monitoring. Therefore, this does not allow one to commit more crimes.

Rehabilitation

Rehabilitation is one of the most efficient for of corrections; it involves restoring offenders to normal and useful life. Rehabilitation is based on a concept that individuals are not constantly criminal, and they can change depending on the interventions put in place by the correctional system. it is aimed at preventing repetitive criminal recidivism

Restorative Justice

The purpose of restorative justice is to ensure that the person convicted of committing a crime is held responsible for it, and they should restore what they have done wrong. If a person is convicted of stealing, therefore, that person should return what he or she had stolen. Also, the offender can admit to the crime and apologize.

Deterrence

Deterrence can be compared with retribution; this is because it perceives punishment as a form of threat that is meant to prevent people from committing crimes. This concept is based on the fact that incarceration of criminals acts as a warning to people and that they cannot think of committing crimes in the future to avoid the punishments.

Criminal Justice Issues for Corrections Practitioners

Some of the principles which drive the objectives of the criminal justice system are sometimes unjust and irrelevant. For instance, in most cases, retribution principles are usually criticized as a result of the fact that correctional personnel follows a defined set of tariffs that often contributes to a failure in considering important circumstances (Drawbridge, Taheri, & Frost, 2018). This can result in an unjust decision. Also, punishments may sometimes become inappropriate since the criminals may not consider future the impacts of future punishments before committing a crime. This renders some forms of punishment practically useless. In some case forms of punishments are not stressed equally. Under community supervision, the treatment of the offenders differs from those in prison. In the case of substance abuse, probationers and parolees can still have access to drug abuse since they are not extremely restricted; this gives room for more possibilities of relapse, unlike those in incarceration. People in probation can also violate the objectives of the correctional program since they are not under strict supervision. There are several issues to do with people under community supervision; these include negative attitudes of the counselor, barriers to treatment, and the possibility of relapse.

Furthermore, rehabilitation centers have poor environments; some of the issues that were of concern in early forms of rehabilitation are still evident. The conditions of some of the facilities are very poor, and as a result, it has led to the development of diseases. High rates of communicable diseases are evident in some of these facilities. The criminal justice system should ensure that rehabilitation and supervision of the incarcerated individuals are effective; however, failure to consider improving conditions in these facilities have led to so many inconveniences. Most of the correctional programs have failed as a result of these issues. Even though rehabilitation of criminals is the main function of the correctional system, some issue may act as obstacles to achieving rehabilitation programs. These issues include insufficient human resources, poor infrastructure, and insufficient finances.

Constitutional Rights of Offenders

Correctional practitioners should observe the rights of the offenders; the law governs the administration and the establishment of correctional facilities and the rights of the inmates. Human dignity should be observed through the process of rehabilitation or incarceration, law enforcement, correctional personal, and courts should ensure that these rights are not violated. Even though people convicted of committing a crime do not enjoy all constitutional rights, the law protects them against unusual and cruel treatment (Smith, 2016). They are required to have minimum stared of living with essential materials and basic needs provided. Regardless of the crimes they have committed, offenders retain some of the important constitutional rights these includes:

• Unusual punishments and cruel treatment- every criminal has a right to be free from inhuman treatment or anything considered as unusual and cruel.
• Discrimination- all offenders are entitled to practice correctional measures without discrimination by the supervisors and the authority.
• Mental healthcare and other medical services- lawbreakers have a right to receive medical care as well as a mental health treatment.
• Sex crimes and sexual harassment- all offenders have a right to be free from any form of sexual harassments like being molested or raped while in custody of correctional personal.
• Correctional personnel not only have the responsibility to conduct rehabilitation programs but also to respect human dignity and the essential rights of the offenders.

Impacts of Incarceration and Social Issues

The unique features of incarceration facilities have significant implications for treating criminals in this environment. Health problems and cruel treatment are major concerns in prisons. In social life, the families of the incarcerated victims face many challenges in adjusting to the situation. Family members remain as hidden victims of incarceration since they are neither given a chance to be heard nor acknowledged (Hairston, 2017). They receive little support from the correctional system programs; hence, they do not benefit from them. As the number of criminal offenses increases, the level of incarceration has risen, and therefore, more families have to cope with a situation where one or more family members are in incarcerated. Foer instances, children who have incarcerated parent may develop health problems such as depression. Incarceration of parents have led to some of the children engaging in drug abuse at their teenage

Health problems during incarceration are one of the negative impacts in correctional facilities, high rates of infections are evident in incarcerated population than the normal population, in most of the institution's criminals are medically underserved and therefore increasing the number of mental illnesses, substance abuse, and infectious diseases. Environmental issues also contrib...