Sentencing

Sentencing Paper

Whitney Cervantez

CJS 255

John Eckert

Sentencing Paper

The state and federal objectives of punishment include deterrence, retribution, incapacitation, rehabilitation and reparation. I will explain the objective punishments, following with how sentencing affects the state and federal corrections systems overall. Third explain what is determinate and indeterminate sentencing. Last elaborate on which sentencing model do I feel is most appropriate.

State and Federal Objectives of Punishment

The examples of state and federal objectives of punishment include deterrence, retribution, incapacitation, rehabilitation and reparation. Deterrence is the action of discouraging an action or event through instilling doubt or fear of the consequences. One late night two sisters and one of their boyfriends were out just passing time, eventually they started drinking throughout the night. The oldest sister began to turn vindictive and was saying stuff out of spite just to upset the younger sister. The younger sister got upset because rumors were being said about her boyfriend and she didn’t know what to believe. When the sisters got to the boyfriend’s home the youngest got out of the car and started to hit the older sisters car with a sharp object. The oldest sister got upset and began to physically fight her younger sister. The fight turned into a bloody battle, the youngest used that sharp object to stab her oldest sister. Later in the evening a detective came and took pictures of the witnesses with blood on them. The youngest girl was taken in for assault with a deadly weapon which was determined by doctors was a knife. The oldest sister had three stab wounds and almost bled to death. The youngest sister was a juvenille and sent to a juvenille detention center while the court determined her sentence. There was no weapon found and she was released, the older sister did not press charges. (names were not given because this actually happened, I was a witness) The detterence for the younger sister in this case was having her stay in the juvenille detention center. How it helped her from doing it again (for now) she did not like being in juvie. In one way I think the detention center did not help her is that it scared her. She was going to be locked up for longer had her sister not pressed charges. The youngest said she couldn’t remember what happened and pleaded not guilty. I found out later they got into another dispute and the youngest confessed that she did stab her older sister. The older sister asked why she lied, the youngest said “Why would I plead guilty? I would have been sent to prison.” Retribution in this case, the youngest sister’s boyfriend said he did not know where the weapon was in fear of retribution of also being locked up he helped her ditch the knife. Reparation example for this case, would have been her word and pleading not guilty; sticking to her story. However reparations are meant to be taken with the intent for someone to truly change from their mistake.

Objective Punishment in Present Time

Offenders that experience negative experiences; consequences for their offenses were designed to keep someone from offending again. Punishments can also keep those who see how offenders get punished from pursuing immoral, unethical and offending acts. A nurse practioner I used to see had a book that essentially talked about the only difference between a murdered and a forensic psychologist is they both think about murder; however only one is acting out their ideas. I agree, criminal justice majors have an idea of how crimes works but in the pursuit of the greater good we are studying criminal justice to curb those who cross the line of thought. According to Hartford Courant “Reynolds was convicted of murder in 1995 and sentenced to death for the murder of Waterbury police officer Walter Williams. In 2017, he was resentenced to life in prison without the possibility of release after the state Supreme Court ruled the death penalty was unconstitutional. Reynolds has been confined for 23 years at Northern in Somers, the state’s most secure prison. He is classified for security purposes as a “special circumstances inmate” — the highest classification — and lives alone in a 12 foot by 7 foot cell.” This explains how we are still deciding what is constitutional. Pillory may no longer be ethical but unethical sentencing is an issue.

Detterminent and Indetterminent

According to Study.com “A handful of states use determinate sentencing. This means the judge sentences the offender to a specific time period. The judge doesn't have any discretion when sentencing the offender since the law dictates the precise sentence. For example, rather than identifying a range of one to five years, the law might say burglary carries an automatic prison term of three years. Think of 'determinate' as simply 'the sentence is determined.” (para 5) Most states use indetterminent sentencing where an offender has more of a range rather than a time for their punishment. Essentially how that works is if a judge gives a sentence for 5-10 years the judge knows that 5 years is a minimum but depending on variables of the offender throughout that range of time they may get out at the minimum or serve the full term and hopefully does not get a revised sentence due to bad behavior causing them to sty in longer.

Indetteriment Sentencing with Reparation

The model I feel works best is indetteriment sentencing. Though I also feel criminals will just sly their way to the “free” as the younger sister I mentioned earlier calls society outside of cells reparations need to be placed to reshape a persons conscious. In the case of the younger sister I feel like not enough investigating was done. That night before I was sent home I stayed at the scene and sat on the side walk because I knew cops were going to show up at the scene. Earlier I said a sharp object and that’s because at first I did not know it was a knife she used to attack the car with. Also while they were fighting, this wasn’t new to me. Those two fight all the time, however what was new to me was seeing the oldest sister bleed out like she did. I told her I was going to drive her to the hospital but the oldest sister was being irrational and wanted to be the one to drive. When I said “I’m not letting you drive.” She then said then you can stay here with her (the younger sister) I knew in that moment she wasn’t acting right and so I stayed behind. In the time that I stayed behind I told the younger sister that we were going to stay here and wait for the cops. The youngest sister followed her boyfriend inside his home, which in that time gave them time (presumably) to get rid of the weapon. Finally the detective came and took my statement, took pictures of me, I had blood on me from pulling them apart. The youngest sister could have benefited from staying in juvenille detention center and receiving a prison sentence in my opinion the retribution and reparations at first may have her thinking that she could sly her way out (which essentially she did anyway) but had she stayed in I feel she would have the helped she needed that she wasn’t receiving on the outside such as rehabilitation, counselling, time to think about how to manger her anger and controlling her compulsion.

References

Texas Department of Criminal Justice(n.d). Retrieved from https://www.tdcj.texas.gov/unit_directory/

Study(n.d). Retrieved from https://study.com/academy/lesson/indeterminate-criminal-sentencing-definition-purpose-advantages.html