Rehabilitation & Return to Society - Anybody Remember That?

fascinating

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The trouble with the rehabilitation efforts is that focus seems to go on those who have high rates of recidivism. If a person does their time and is released and goes on to lead a fully functional life, little is ever heard about them again, If a person is released from prison and then goes on another crime spree...or even swipes a candy bar...they make front page news. The repeaters are what make people doubt rehabilitation.

Can people be rehabilitated? I would say yes. Returning to society is a hard road though since while a person is in prison, the outside world is changing. Those changes make adjustment back out into the world tough and depending on the support structure, as well as the individual it can be near impossible to manage.

Through the years I have known persons who would have seemed beyond redemption. In particular a man I know who committed a number of robberies and spent some 30 years in and out of jail. He has been out now for 20 years and is doing okay. I know of a gentleman who murdered 5 people (in 3 different incidents) and he served his time, was released and has held it together.

Then there are the others...the one involved in credit card fraud, the drug dealer, a store robber, a burglar, a mugger, these people seem unable to keep it together for even a month. Are they beyond rehabilitation? Who knows. Do I want them put away for life? Hard call. My feelings about them change fairly often. I am not against giving people a second, or even a third chance, but where is the line drawn?

The only time that I definitely draw a line is when it comes to a pedophile...for them I want a mandatory life sentence, there is no reason for them to ever be released.

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I don't have anything to offer this thread so I will anyway. I have (actually my father has) this relative that in the 1930's robbed and murdered a store owner. He served about 25 years (finding god in prison) and came out as an evangelical preacher. He hasn't earned an honest dollar since.

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Thanks for a thoughtful reply, Sturgis.

Sturgis:

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The trouble with the rehabilitation efforts is that focus seems to go on those who have high rates of recidivism. If a person does their time and is released and goes on to lead a fully functional life, little is ever heard about them again, If a person is released from prison and then goes on another crime spree...or even swipes a candy bar...they make front page news. The repeaters are what make people doubt rehabilitation.

I hear you - and I think you're absolutely right, about only the bad ones getting the media attention. I guess it's just human nature that makes us see only the failures - the same way we strain to see bodies at an auto accident.

I'm mostly interested in the idea of where people stand on the value to society of prison rehabilitation efforts. It seems to me that the very name "Correctional Facility" implies some effort on the part of the state to alter the behavior of the incarcerated. But more and more it seems to me that the politically correct and socially acceptable attitude is "jail 'em, jail 'em longer, fry 'em, and/or forget 'em"

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Can people be rehabilitated? I would say yes. Returning to society is a hard road though since while a person is in prison, the outside world is changing. Those changes make adjustment back out into the world tough and depending on the support structure, as well as the individual it can be near impossible to manage.

And someone else made the point that if a prisoner is released and goes right back to the "old neighborhood" and old habits, they may as well have left via a revolving door.
I just would like to believe that there are people involved in Corrections who are ideologically and intellectually invested in the idea that wrongdoers are redeemable. I just would like to feel as if the moral imperative did not come so much from some imperialistic urge to punish, as from the desire to do what is most in the interest of "the many".

I think that man's fallibility is inevitable, but that mercy may be a touch of the divine in us, and that we would be well advised to find every opportunity to be not only just and wise, but merciful. My opinion.

With the repeat offenders, with the intractably perverse, with those who are demonstratably evil beyond the reach of rehabilitation, I can just as readily as anyone agree to banish them to concrete dungeons - our resources and abilities as a people and a culture have limits.

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Through the years I have known persons who would have seemed beyond redemption. In particular a man I know who committed a number of robberies and spent some 30 years in and out of jail. He has been out now for 20 years and is doing okay. I know of a gentleman who murdered 5 people (in 3 different incidents) and he served his time, was released and has held it together.

It is hard to tell who will and will not react well to a second chance, isn't it?

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Then there are the others...the one involved in credit card fraud, the drug dealer, a store robber, a burglar, a mugger, these people seem unable to keep it together for even a month. Are they beyond rehabilitation? Who knows. Do I want them put away for life? Hard call. My feelings about them change fairly often. I am not against giving people a second, or even a third chance, but where is the line drawn?

That's the crux of the matter, isn't it? I suppose what I'm saying is that there should be genuine deliberation in the correctional business about where to draw that line, and that it is not drawn in so hasty a way that it would preclude those who would serve society if given a second chance.

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The only time that I definitely draw a line is when it comes to a pedophile...for them I want a mandatory life sentence, there is no reason for them to ever be released.

I understand the revulsion and definiteness of your position here. Because they prey on the truly defenseless and innocent. But I think it may be just a little easy to say "they can never change". I think most people can. Even wife beaters. Even pedophiles.

At least we can all agree that this general subject bears a lot of discussion...

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I've been reading and re-reading your initial post since Sunday, snood.

It's an area that I've had a literally life-long interest in, as I grew up in Canada's home of correctional facilities. People I went to school with had parents in the pen/had parents who worked in the pen/are in the pen/work in the pen. There was/in no escape from the influence of the various facilities (federal maximum security male/federal maximum security female/federal maximum security assessment facility/provincial medium and minimum security facilities male/county jail/city jail/military facility). hamburger was a long-time volunteer with a halfway house run by a truly amazing con. hamburger's best friend taught at the corrections college and started the local penitentiary museum. My favourite toy at a friend's house was a rocking horse built in one of the provincial facilities by cons who'd trained in the kitchen under her dad. My favourite turkey dressing recipe is a 'prison recipe'. There is a work-release program home between hamburger's house and where I take the dogs to play when I'm back home.

No escape from the influence.

My first job on graduation from university, working in a vocational rehabilitation department for nearly a decade - some of my clients, perhaps the ones I understood best, were cons.

I've got enormously mixed feelings about the benefits of rehabilitation.

A jumble of feelings/thoughts have been swirling since I first read your starting post

Works for some, useless and a waste of money for others.

The most difficult part, IMNSHO, is determining who's who.

What right do I, or anyone, have to decide whether or not it's worth trying to rehab someone.

I'd rather over-do rehab.

If the spiral gets broken for one person, it's probably worth it.

I can't subscribe to eye for an eye, though I've seen very good results come from the Mennonite Central Committee's restorative justice programs over the past 30 years.

http://www.mcc.org/canada/restorativejustice/faqs.html#eye

~~~~~~~

and finally, is it more difficult for Setanta to live with a Christian or a Christian to live with Setanta? Shocked

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ehBeth wrote:

If the spiral gets broken for one person, it's probably worth it.

What if the sprial remains intact for one more victim? Does one successful rehabilitation make up for all of the failures?

I understand that rehabilitation is a valiant effort and should at least be tried (for lesser charges and non-violent criminals). What I don't understand is why we are so worried about the criminals and forget all about the victims.

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jpinMilwaukee wrote:

What I don't understand is why we are so worried about the criminals and forget all about the victims.

I didn't understand that this was a topic here.

But I'm sure, the US - like in other countries - has got victim supporting programs, aids for 'white collar' victims, etc. etc. (Avtually, I would think, the US is leading here.)

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during my career as a state employee, for 18 months I was assigned to work in one of the state "correctional facilites" in an administrative capacity. I met many convicts of which I would guess 80% were pretty much just stupid (the reason they were arrested in the first place). On the other hand I hired as an assistant one young man (about 25 yrs old) who had been arrested 3 times for relatively minor offences (joy riding-shoplifting-reefer madness) which as a 3 time offender was given 20 years. He and a few others I would have offered all the "rehabilitation I could imagine. Another young man in prison that I met was there for possession of LSD, served 2 years and upon being release became a volunteer (parole requirement) in a social service agency, he is currently the state director of that agency.

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jpinMilwaukee wrote:

ehBeth wrote:
If the spiral gets broken for one person, it's probably worth it.

What if the sprial remains intact for one more victim? Does one successful rehabilitation make up for all of the failures?

I understand that rehabilitation is a valiant effort and should at least be tried (for lesser charges and non-violent criminals). What I don't understand is why we are so worried about the criminals and forget all about the victims.

To begin with, I believe strongly that many criminals were victims themselves. The studies seem to bear that out. Not all. Not all the time. But the prison population does not reflect the general population - too many aboriginals in Canada's prison system for example.

Restorative justice programs take the victims into account - and get quite positive response from victims.

http://www.realjustice.org/library/rjsurvey.html

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Wholly apart from any examination or assessment of rehabilitation as a concept, an objective appraisal of the statistics relating to recidivism force the conclusion the rehabilitative model currently employed is ineffectual; about a third of those incarcerated and released for any reason remain for the rest of their lives otherwise uninvolved with the justice system. For any number of reasons, related to the proximate cause of the original incarceration or not, the remainder at some point find their way back into "The System". 1-out-of-3 is not a success rate.

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Well Timber if the issue is statistics, I have to agree. On the other hand realistic approaches to rehab are virtually non-existent in the US of A. All the barriers put in place by "society" intended for social protection (not at all unwarrented) are also prescriptive rather than proscripting for recidivism. ( ie employment, housing, education). I would guess, just based on my anecdotal experience, that the 1 in 3 could be alter to 1 in 2. An improvement yes? I still content that stupidity is the barrier.

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You probably know, timber, that this "1/3 : 1/3 : 1/3" law exists elswhere as well.

In the probation office we had a rule:
- 1/3 runs well without anything done by us
- 1/3 needs a lot of work
- 1/3 returns after the next conviction.

Similar happened in prison.

However, since no-one can say precisely before who will turn up when where - it is always worth working with everyone and trying to rehabilitate her/him.

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I'd certainly have to agree with that . . . i've said for many years that crime usually does not pay because of the calibre of the people who go into the profession. Stupidity of the species to which you refer (i.e., willfully making bad or even preposterous choices in life) is not to be forecast by education, either--ostensibly intelligent and well-educated people are known to consistently make stupid choices.

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ehBeth wrote:

To begin with, I believe strongly that many criminals were victims themselves. The studies seem to bear that out. Not all. Not all the time.

This argument doesn't fly with me at all. I don't care if criminals were victims. They made a decision to commit a crime. Many people have hard lives and don't all grow up to be criminals. This argument is good for stronger victims support groups... not for excusing criminals of their crimes.

ehBeth wrote:

Restorative justice programs take the victims into account - and get quite positive response from victims.

http://www.realjustice.org/library/rjsurvey.html

Again, for lesser crimes I think that rehabilitation is to be applauded and tried. The statement you made was "If the spiral gets broken for one person, it's probably worth it." My problem with that is that no matter how many criminals you let out of jail (supposedly reformed) and no matter how many of them return to crime (thereby creating more victims) you justify it all by saying "Well that one guy over there we let out didn't kill somebody else."

In my opinion, when it comes to violent crimes, these people have already ruined the life of another person and should not be given the chance to ruin another one. My wife was raped and although she was young and it was a rather non-violent rape and even though she is a very strong person it still, to this day, 11 years later, affects her to the point of near complete breakdown during times of stress.

Why, when these people have already done that, or worse, to a person would you find any redeeming value in them? Everyone of them that you let out of jail is one more chance of a repeat crime. I think that one more victim that could have been prevented by keeping this person in jail, is one to many. I would gladly pay taxes for the rest of my life to keep these people in jail, then allow them to get out of jail and cause that pain to one more person.

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Regardless why the statistics stack as they do, they stack as they do. That calls to serious question the present model of rehabilitation, which is my point - the way we go about it now does not yield the desired result. As a concept, its fine - even to be desired. In current practice, it is a failure, a fiction, a problem in and of itself.

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jpinMilwaukee

I know someone for more than 30 years now who was raped - and that was NOT a rather non-violent rape - by her father.
He didn't go to prison (he wasn't accused, family denied the dead at first etc), but didn't do anything wrong (such related) later as far as we know.

The raped person, which I know very well, got help during two therapies.

Like you wish all violent criminals to stay lifelong in prison, I wish, all victims wouldn't just suffer but accept offered help and act to get out of their sad dilemna.

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I'm not quite sure what your point is Walter.

Yes victims should get help. That point has nothing to do with keeping violent criminals in jail in order to keep them from creating more victims.

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Jail is a reaction of the justice system for a crime.

"Creating more victims" means prevention and that has not much to do with (and in prisons) but with aid, guidance and ... rehabilitation.

But I agree that this difficult to understand in a different law system and with a different cultural background. (Our system is still more Christianity related.)

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Walter Hinteler wrote:

Jail is a reaction of the justice system for a crime.

"Creating more victims" means prevention and that has not much to do with (and in prisons) but with aid, guidance and ... rehabilitation.

But I agree that this difficult to understand in a different law system and with a different cultural background. (Our system is still more Christianity related.)

I disagree. With every rehabilitated person you let out of jail there is a chance of a repeat crime. We could gaurantee 100% no repeat crime by keeping those people in jail.

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jpinMilwaukee wrote:

Walter Hinteler wrote:
Jail is a reaction of the justice system for a crime.

"Creating more victims" means prevention and that has not much to do with (and in prisons) but with aid, guidance and ... rehabilitation.

But I agree that this difficult to understand in a different law system and with a different cultural background. (Our system is still more Christianity related.)

I disagree. With every rehabilitated person you let out of jail there is a chance of a repeat crime. We could gaurantee 100% no repeat crime by keeping those people in jail.

We could be evern more sure if we just executed them all, eh?

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Rehabilitation & Return to Society - Anybody Remember That?

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