Week 4 The Purpose of Criminal Punishment

In this weeks blog I will be discussing how I believe criminal punishment is split between retribution and prevention. On the retribution side it insist that only the pain of punishment can pay for offenders’ past crimes. In other words, punishment justifies itself. As for the prevention side utilitarians insist with equal passion the pain of punishment can and should be only a means to greater good, usually the prevention or at least the reduction of future crime. The principle of punishment holds that no crime can be said to occur where punishment has not been specified in the law. For example, a crime like larceny, would not be a crime if the law just said, “It is illegal to steal.” Punishment for the crime must be specified so that if a person is found guilty of violating the law, sanctions can be lawfully imposed. Our text book reads that punishment, in the sense of a sanction imposed for a criminal offense, consist of five elements:

·         It must involve an unpleasantness to the victim.

·         It must be for an offense, actual or supposed.

·         It must be of an offender, actual or supposed

·         It must be the work of personal agencies; in other words it must not be the natural consequence of an action.

·         It must be imposed by an authority or an institution against whose rules the offense has been committed… (Banks 2013, p.114).

When dealing with retribution it can be argued that punishment benefits not only society, but also criminals. For example, just as society feels satisfied by paying back criminals, giving criminals their punishment, offenders benefit by putting right their evil. It is my opinion that society pays back criminals by retaliation; criminals pay back society by accepting responsibility through punishment. Which I feel both paybacks are at the heart of retribution. Retribution has several appealing qualities. It assumes free will, thereby enhancing individual autonomy. However, determinists which include most criminologists, reject the free-will assumption underlying retribution.

Supporters of prevention argue that prevention looks forward and inflicts pain, not for its own sake, but to prevent future crime. As I researched some tools on prevention I discovered that theirs four kinds of prevention. 1. General deterrence, 2. Special deterrence, 3. Incapacitation, and 4. Rehabilitation (Samaha 2011, p.24). These four ideas formulate the classical deterrence theory. In other words these four indicate rational human beings will not commit crimes if they know that the pain of punishment outweighs the pleasure gained from committing crimes.

Finally, I believe if we could obtain empirical support for criminal punishment, deterrence is unjust because it punishes for example’s sake. I feel punishment should not be a sacrifice to the common good; it’s only just in my opinion if it’s administered for the redemption of particular individuals, say the retibutionists. To be clearer I believe punishment is personal and individual, not general and societal. Please do not misunderstand me I believe that those who commit crime should be punish. However, I feel as long as offenders are in fact guilty, punishing them is personal. It is noteworthy I mention that I believe we live in a country where it is just to use individual punishment for society’s benefit. Historically, societies has justified punishment in my opinion on the grounds of retribution. But, this in my opinion will soon be replaced by rehabilitation because rehabilitation programs can reform offenders. The “if they knew better they would do better” theme will soon dominate the reform discussion widely publicized on the effectiveness of treatment programs.  

 

References:

Banks, C. (2013). Criminal Justices Ethics (3rd ed.) Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publication, Inc.

Samaha, J. (2011). Criminal Law (10th ed.) Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning