Punishing criminals is more
important than saving money.
Simple possession shouldn’t be a crime but crimes themselves shouldn’t be consequence-free otherwise it turns a city into a shithole. Look at SF over the last few years.
Simple possession shouldn’t be a crime but crimes themselves shouldn’t be consequence-free otherwise it turns a city into a shithole. Look at SF over the last few years.
Would you rather have less crime & better society, or punish people for some vague notion of consequences, even knowing it's a worse outcome for society? Because the consequences of a crime, whatever they are, should also be chosen to have the least negative drain on society.
* Prevention * Deterrence * Veangance
The least-useful of these is veangance. Legislators think it is needed to forestall private acts of veangance. But in itself it serves no purpose.
To deter crime, people have to believe that the likelihood of their being caught and punished is high; without that belief, it doesn't matter how severe the penalties are set.
Prevention by detention is an extreme sanction, and extremely costly. It's only appropriate for incorrigible psychopaths. "Prevention" by court-ordered medical treatment (e.g. rehab, chemical castration) is a human-rights violation. Prevention by supervision, harm-reduction, or education are evidence-based responses that actually have a chance of improving things.
Jail should be reserved for people who a direct physical threat to other peoples bodies or properties. Continued incarceration should be viewed from that lens as well.
Victim Compensation should be a higher priority instead of punishment, instead we put almost no priority to Victim Compensation instead viewing the crime as a "crime against society" and the person "pays a debt to society" that is the wrong position.
I don't think that would work simply because after that person spends the $5M, the government can't claw it back even if that person commits another crime, and if they are in the state where they are considering another crime, the extra $5M debt would probably not deter them too much. This proposal would need to be reworked to align long term incentives of the person with not committing another crime. It would also need to disincentivize people from committing crimes just so they can get this benefit.
In a somewhat related vein, I recall there being a proposal to provide basic housing to the chronically homeless, as certain homeless people cost the taxpayers millions due to arrests and illnesses from being homeless. Although there is no angle of punishment here, there is still the angle of those homeless not deserving free housing. I believe however that there is a strong case for providing such housing, when viewed from a dispassionate point of view, as it is both fiscally prudent as well as humane in reducing suffering.
In your scenario you are adding an incentive to a single commit murder. You are trying to make the point justice is not about utilitarianism but about morality on some level - but your example is so unmoored from reality that it is useless.
The only real reason to object to it would be problems unlisted in this analogy - like the obvious incentive to murder. But we're axiomatically handwaving those intuitive signs of a bad choice away due to a "those turn out to not be an issue".
The problem here is your conclusion ("yes this may look good on paper but your gut instinct clearly tells you this is a bad idea regardless") is based on using your gut instinct, in a hypothetical that axiomatically requires you to ignore your gut instinct. In other words, you're breaking your own rules.
This idea of restorative justice is an abject failure. It might work for first time offenders, which I’m okay with trying on, but once criminals commit crimes multiple times, we need to protect society from them. Locking them up is the best way to do this.
The tides are turning against the idea that criminals shouldn’t see jails, because of how much of a failure it has been. I used to think maybe we shouldn’t be so hard on crime, but after not only being the victim but seeing what it had done to SF, I’m firmly in the camp of throwing criminals in jail. Mainly moderates like myself feel the exact same way in the last 2-3 years and it will show more and more in voting, especially in SF.
https://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(15)01030-X/pdf
Yet you're proposing doubling down on a clearly broken approach?
no it is not, Chesa Boudin did not in anyway advocate for Victim Compensation, he was advocating diversion programs completely different
>Criminals end up continuing to commit crimes because they know there are no consequences.
Absolutely nothing in my statement is about no consequences. It is saying that we can have difference consequences than mass incarceration, one that actually makes the victims of crime, specifically property crime, whole again. Which are current system does not
You seem to believe I am advocating for SF style policy of just not prosecuting theft crimes at all, there is NOTHING in my statement that aligns with that position. Simply opposing Jail time for those offense, which further burdens society and does nothing for the victims is not a solution to shoplifting and theft, nor is the other extreme of just let shoplifters go
The fact that you have a tribal binary response of "if you do not want harsh prison must mean you want no consequences" show your lack of understanding of this topic, there are lots of other models out there
Drug addiction and the crimes that spring from it are a different matter. There is a clear cause for the crime: the addiction. Fix that, no more repeat offenses. However most rehab programs for addicts that end up in the criminal justice system aren't that great, so that's another area that needs fixing.
Regardless, my point is just that consequences for criminal acts should never be simple punishment if there are options with a better net benefit for society. That will of course mean there has to be a detergent aspect to things as well, which may take the form of a punishment, but not a punishment for its own sake.