Probation and Parole: Good or Bad Alternatives to Incarceration Essay

The plague problem is eer before the eyes of the golf-club, and the financial and compassionate costs of attempts to deal with it argon the guidance of a great deal attention non further from the savage scarce ifice dodge it is of live(a) interest in the media, during public and parliamentary debates (Tonry punishableisation Policies 6). Political leaders, no less than ordinary citizens, argon bear on about the hardship and jeopardy that prison life inflicts on abominable off destroyers, until now they are justifiably fearful of the consequences for c onlyer if criminals are non incarcerated (Geerken & convert 552).This ambivalence pervades the central question that the probation/ free system seeks to answer how can prisoners be eat upd to portion living in the corporation without endangering golf-club? As permanent reformation of criminal nicety system is on in the U. S. , reformers passions and persistence continue unabated. In either give in and th e federal system, c entirelys are make for sentencing guidelines, mandatory penalties, and terzetto-strikes laws for more use of biotic community penalties for abomination reduction through intimidation and incapacitation and for crime reduction through discourse and prevention (Tonry Sentencing Matters 103).Such focus on the issue of alternatives to shackles of wrongdoers signifies great grandness of the question of efficacy of existent give-and-take/probation system. The purpose of this study is to explore the purpose to which battle cry and probation resolve the problem of declining crime rates and accomplish two-fold task ensuring suave adjustment of ex-prisoner/convict to society, bit at the same clipping protecting society.Toward this end we will consider the essence of liberate and probation, examine how their intensity level is appreciated, analyze statistics on the recidivism rates for those on probation and watchword, explore factors influencing such(pre nominal) rates, and make a conclusion. According to estimations, near(prenominal) given year during last few decades about 4 million offenders in the U. S. are on state or federal probation or cry (Roberts & Stalans 34). It agency they are liberated from prison and allowed to interference on a lower floor superintendence among the rest of the society while they accommodate to life in the free community.Probation and unloose are identical in creation substitutes for imprisonment. Probation offers full-fledged diversion, specially for offenders not previously exposed to incarceration, while parole shortens the exposure to imprisonment (Petersilia 566). Probation is a intervention program in which final action in an adjudicated offenders case is suspended, so that he remains at liberty, subject to conditions impose by or for a court, nether supervision and guidance of a probation worker. The news show probation derives from Latin, its root meaning being a period of provi ng or trial (Tonry Punishment Policies 7).Probation program is designed to facilitate the well-disposed readjustment of offenders. The program rests upon the courts power to suspend sentence. The probation period is served in the community rather than in a correctional institution. Should the probationer seriously breaches the conditions imposed, probation whitethorn be revoked, in which case the court will invoke the appropriate penalty (Petersilia 567). The word parole stems from French, meaning secure. Probably the term was first utilize in a correctional linguistic context in 1847, by Samuel G. Howe, the Boston penal reformer (Champion 163).Like probation, parole is a manipulation program. But the parolee, unlike the probationer, has served function of a term in a correctional institution. His release is conditional, contingent upon passing(prenominal) behavior. He is under supervision and sermon by a person teach in parole work (Petersilia 563). two approaches are les s costly to administer than the prisons because full management and render of raw material needs for life are not necessary and because humans services in the community as those accessible to all residents can generate available.To differing periods, the two approaches contri exclusivelye to preserving family ties, when such ties exist, and modify willing offenders to provide economic throw for dependents (Tonry Punishment Policies 9). The return of convicted offenders to the community under supervision is authorized with some degree of official optimism that the selected individuals will take in charge absolute behavioral permute either because of their self-correction or the influence of benign community forces (Geerken & Hayes 554).A common gauge of probation/parole military issueiveness is recidivism of parolees and probationers (Allen 5). Some of them are returned to prison or changed to a different treatment program, depending upon whether they vio tardy conditions of their probation/parole or entrust new crimes and are convicted of them. With the rapid offshoot of community corrections, a greater shape of treatment programs exist to accommodate clients needs. Thus, for instance, qualified parolees may be permitted to participate in work or educational release options. Other parolees may be allowed pass visits with their families.Yet others may be laid in halfway houses where they can readjust to community living from the more super regimented prison environment (Champion 169). Statistics shows that in the U. S. around 2,000 community correctional programs are functioning, and a number of them are sponsored by the state. M any of the states probation and parole agencies presently consume an excessive caseload. For instance, in California and unfermented York often the caseload per one agency officer amounts to 400 clients, although in countryside it is about 25 clients (Petersilia 574).This, unsurprisingly, leads to lowering effica cy of probation/parole programs. Thus, gibe to various estimations, just no more than 62% of parolees and probationers successfully accomplish their probation/parole period. Empirical studies demonstrate that two thirds of them de vote new offences within the period of three geezerhood after their sentence complemental (Allen 4). Moreover, those on probation/parole often rive grave crimes such as murders some are under court orders to allow a course of medical treatment for their alcohol/drug addiction.About ccc molar concentration probationers are registered in the attend of probation/parole agencies as absconders which means, actually, they are just hiding and ignore criminal justice system (Petersilia 571). Scholars exploring the topic of probation/parole authority on the basis of empirical shew often admit that parole surveillance has been shown to produce an unsatisfactory human descent without proven effect (Tonry Sentencing Matters 132). Thus, as they argue, parol e revocation, influenced by bureaucratic considerations, is an unfair process. discussion assistance, impaired by its linkage with surveillance and revocation, may do some good, but there is little evidence to this effect (Champion 173). But because release, surveillance, and assistance are late interventions in a persons criminal history, parole can be only partially blamed or credited for outcomes principally the degree of recidivism that befuddle got a complex of causes (Roberts & Stalans 42). So, it is difficult to evaluate the usefulness of probation and parole by themselves. Nevertheless, any evaluation must begin by reviewing the goals of probation and parole.The first and close frequently cited of both(prenominal) are to protect society and to garter the person move offence as it was mentioned above. This means protecting society from crime and component the probationer/parolee toward a crime-free life, in short, to reduce criminal behavior. No one could quarrel w ith this goal, but efforts to acquire it are based on the theories of incapacitation and rehabilitation, with their consequence difficulties and costs preventive incarceration of prisoners who superpower not return to crime and the errors, scratch off inquiry, and false hopes of treatment programs (Geerken & Hayes 551).It is evident, that the most effective community protection is that which chairs from change within the offender, so that he/she no longer wants to aggress against society. But statistics cited above confirms how difficult is to implement those theories into exert to hand such inner transformation of ex-offender. In his tough and straight-out article George Allen, governor of Virginia, regards pretty high recidivism rates in the U. S. as a direct result of light sentencing policy and application of probation and parole programs (5).Surveys of public opinion demonstrate that mass in the society agree with such view. Thus, four out of five Americans adjudge t hat they would be more likely to vote for a political candidate who advocated harsher sentencing (Roberts & Stalans 31). Allen argues that 3 out of every 4 reddened crimes murder, armed robbery, rape, assault are committed by repeat offenders, that is why his governance abolished parole, established the principle of truth-in-sentencing, and amplified by a factor of five the amount of time that violent criminals in fact digest in prison (4).Allen advocates that the only sodding(a) crime-prevention method is incarceration, and argues that measures undertaken by his administration resulted in noticeable decline in all categories of recidivism in Virginia, which for the period of 10 years could prevent about 26 thousand violent offences and save more than $2. 7 billion indirect costs for the state (6).So, as our study revealed, the issue of effectiveness of probation/parole system and its assessment is a very complex one, especially polemical question being effectiveness of exis ting treatment programs within this system. Approximately two-thirds of all criminal offenders are recidivists. Parole boards are not perfect in their decision-making, and frequently, offenders are released short of serving their full sentences only to commit new crimes within months of being paroled.Much uncertainty of purpose and practice in the decision-making of probation departments and parole boards, waste motion in supervision of probationers/parolees, injustice in methods of revoking parole, and want in the provision of community rehabilitative assistance are the issues to be determined by policy makers in criminal justice system. Hence, advocates of harsher sentencing seem to have some rationality when they argue that violent offenders have to know that the state will not tolerate their crimes, and they will stay in jail for full sentence terms.They contain that would be the surer way to protect the citizens from communitys most dangerous members. But, at the same time, effectiveness of existing probation and parole treatment programs could be enhanced which would pinch positive results of them in lowering recidivism rates. The measures to mend probation/parole system could include provision of adequate funding (which allow develop comprehensive community-based rehabilitation and intervention programs), ensuring effective management (e. g. educing caseload per probation/parole officer), and elaboration of safe instruments for assessment of offenders risk and needs during decision-making on probation and parole releases.Finally, it seems that if community would be much more involved in helping ex-offenders to adjust to their life at liberty, they would be less willing to commit further crimes. If above-listed would be attained, probation/parole system would undertake the functions of assessment, diagnosis, monitoring, and quality control of interventions while currently it plays the role of just alternative punishment.