Incarceration
Incarceration has been the central strategy in the United States for crime reduction since 1980. In 1980, just fewer than 2 million people were in the criminal justice system—probation, incarcerated, or paroled. By 2004, the number exceeded 7 million; this equaled 2.3% of the population. The theory behind incarceration is that it “takes a slice out of an individual career” (Bhati & Piquero, 2007, p. 208). This high level of incarceration leads to one of three possible outcomes: a criminogenic effect, in which subsequent crime activity increases; a deterrent effect, leading to a decrease in future criminal activity or a null effect. Bhati and Piquero argue that it is critical to understand the impact of various corrections programs to develop strategies “that minimize any criminogenic harm and maximize any deterrent benefits that result from it” (2007, pg. 209). They suggest that the impact of incarceration in the aggregate has received far more study than the impact on the individual.
The “classic perspective” of crime holds that “swift, certain and severe punishment” will serve to dissuade individuals from crime; once the individual errs and is punished, the memory of the sanction will be an effective deterrent. Research on the specific deterrent effect of punishment on “subsequent criminal activity is not conclusive, though [it] tends to suggest that the certainty of punishment exhibits a small but significant deterrent effect” (Bhati & Piquero, 2007, p. 211). An alternative point of view suggests that instead of punishment serving as a deterrent, it instead leads to “labeling,” which in turn leads to ongoing criminal behavior. The offender becomes labeled as a delinquent or criminal; this label is internalized, and makes it more difficult for the individual to opt for more acceptable pathways. Bhati and Piquero suggests that like the research on deterrence, the research on labeling is less than conclusive, although there does seem to be an “indirect labeling effect” (2007, p. 211).
Laub and Sampson completed a longitudinal study on 500 Boston area delinquents, looking at the impact incarceration had on job stability; they found a lack of job stability had a positive correlation with subsequent criminal activity. A key theme that emerged from the interviews with these men was that most found the entire
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system corrupt and disinterested in helping them find a new pathway. Prison was a place to “toughen up,” serving as no deterrence at all. For some, there may even have been a criminogenic effect, for they spent their time in jail without job training or any other services that may have lead to future employment (Bhati & Piquero, 2007).
Domestic violence offenders are a group that offers a unique chance to study the dispute between the specific deterrence and labeling understandings of the impact of punishment. By the early 1980s, feminists were pushing police departments across the country to move beyond merely separating violent partners and to use their power to arrest to stop what they clearly saw was criminal behavior. A Police Foundation study in Minnesota showed that in 85% of spousal homicides, the police had been involved at least once in the past two years; often they have intervened five or more times in these families (1976). However, the data was not complete enough to determine if making more arrests would have reduced the homicide rate.
At this time, in Minneapolis, police had three options when confronting a domestic violence suspect. The officers and their colleagues often urged separation, creating short term peace. The training officers generally recommended a form of counseling, trying to get both parties to get to the underlying cause of the “dispute,” implying that at some level, both parties were at fault. Women’s groups urged protection and law enforcement to deter future violence. An experiment was conducted. As police responded to misdemeanor domestic disputes, they were instructed to implement one of the three options outlined above. Victims were then followed for six months, undergoing extensive interviews with female officers, designed to elicit information about any subsequent violence. Police records for the household were also tracked. The study’s authors found many flaws in the execution. Randomness was not always maintained; officers occasionally manipulated the situation to obtain the outcome they saw as most desirable. This was potentially significant since it tended to remove “bad guys” out of the mediation group and into the arrest pool; thus results on deterrence might be less than fully valid. Still, they felt that they had a pool of 314 untainted cases to consider (Sherman & Berk, 1995).
Of the 314 cases in the Minnesota domestic violence study, 59% had a prior arrest rate, and an 80% prior domestic violence call, so the perpetrators were not strangers to the criminal world. A failure in this experiment was considered a fresh call to the police. Of the 314 cases, the group with the lowest recidivism rate was that of the men who were arrested (19%); mediation and advice resulted in the highest rate at 37%. Sherman and Berk took into account the fact that arrests could lead to incarceration; men in jail aren’t apt to be re-arrested for domestic assault. They found that arrests seldom lead to significant jail time. Even when the couple was reunited within hours, in no instances within this study did the violence return in the next 24 hours. It seemed to be the arrest and possibility of incarceration that was enough to serve as a specific deterrence (Sherman & Berk, 1995). They do acknowledge however that the arrest might have been seen as undesirable by the victim (loss of a day’s wages, for example) and thus a subsequent call to the police might have been less likely for this group.
White collar criminals have never received as much scrutiny as their “street” counterparts, largely, Weisburd, et al. argues that because they are seen as one time operators, they see an opportunity, take it, and are not likely to repeat the behavior. However, an investigation of a substantial number of white collar criminals found that almost 40% of the sample had a prior arrest record. They contend that because white collar criminals have more to lose than most street criminals, they make for an excellent case study on the assumptions of specific deterrence theory (1995).
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In a study of 742 convicted white collar criminals, Weisburd, et al. looked at cases from 1976 to 1978, and compared the effect of imprisonment and non-prison sanctions on recidivism over a ten and a half year period. Specific deterrence theory holds that to be effective, punishment should discourage the criminal from future illegal activity by ensuring that he or she knows the consequences of the action. The focus is on the individual. As these individuals were followed, those that received the more drastic penalty (prison time) were no less likely than those with non-prison sentences to repeat their criminal activity (Weisburd, et al., 1995). Prior to this study, most of the focus has been on the role that general deterrence played, and frequently, the target was corporate rather than individual actors. General deterrence theory suggests that those in white collar professions, often with a high stake in society, would be susceptible to the influences of being aware of the consequences of misbehavior.