Punishment of Criminals

Punishment of Criminals

How are criminals treated? How are they punished? Do outsiders that have never been in jail really know what it is like? In my opinion criminals have a better life than some who have never committed a crime. The eat more, and have more shelter than those who live in poverty. If that is punishment, maybe we should all commit crimes. I am not saying that they have it easy behind those bars, or that they should be treated worse; I just think it is unfair to people that have never been in trouble, in some cases, to have a worse life than those in jail. What the government should do I can not say, that is not for me to decide. But, maybe we should send some of the funding that prisons receive to those who really need it.

One major problem in the prison area is over crowding of jails. In some states there is a “zero sum” status, which means when a new inmate is admitted another is let go (531). That does not sound like punishment to me. In this case you may not even be sending a “rehabilitated” criminal back in to society. Why even put them in jail in the first place. It sounds to me, that instead of spending the money that they receive in grants to build more facilities to properly accommodate these “lucky” individuals, they use it to improve the life of those kept. Why should these people receive special treatment such as medication and other necessities of aging, when there are senior citizens working minimum wage jobs just to survive? We should be protecting those who cannot protect or do for themselves. We should be spending the money prisons receive for new facilities to help those people instead of just improving inmate’s lives.

Another way of overspending in jails is capital punishment. I am not saying I am for or against it, just that it costs a lot of money. We do not use the electric chair anymore either, we use lethal injection. This method costs twice as much. Some say it is more humane. Are you kidding me? You’re taking a life either way. It is not humane at all. Then you have those that are innocent but not proven before they take the needle. In many cases this was the result of a poorly run trial. Again they are spending all that extra money to execute someone, and even worse killing an innocent person.

Juvenile imprisonment is one of the worst ways that I see the prison system spend money. It is all in how we raise our children in this day in age. Times are changing and children are