Home Confinement An Alternative to Incarceration Essay

Home Confinement: An Alternative to Incarceration West Virginia state prisons have a maximum capacity of 2,154 inmates; currently they house 2,363 inmates, and more remain in City and County lockups to manage the overflow (West Virginia Blue Book). Home Confinement solves this problem. Reduction of the prison population should be reason enough to institute home confinement, but other reasons do exist. Would you like lower taxes? Home confinement costs much less than incarceration. Do you favor less crime? For certain types of criminals, home confinement has a better rehabilitation rate. Home confinement also differs from incarceration by the fact that it allows the confined person to contribute to society. For all of these†¦show more content†¦They are allowed to go to work and participate in other selected activities, but their location is known at all times. The device will also alert authorities if it is tampered with; so you cannot simply remove it (Internet). The idea of electronic monitors to track the location of pri soners first arose in the 1960s when Dr. Ralph Schwitzgebel researched, developed, and tested a device capable of doing so. These devices constantly transmit over the telephone or over radio waves (McCarthy 137). Once the prisoner completes his sentence, the device is removed. This seems to be a good idea - it allows someone to be punished but it does not put a halt to their life in general or contribute to the overpopulation of a prison. Aside from controlling prison populations, another reason for home confinement is certainly cost efficiency. An experiment in Kenton County Kentucky, examined 39 prisoners sentenced to home confinement with electronic monitoring devices for a total of 1,172 days. 1,172 days in jail cost Kenton County $44,512, and the same period of home confinement cost $27,068. A Kenton County judge expressed no shock when viewing these figures: Any time you can save a bed-day in jail, you have done something positive for the criminal justice system (Ball 81). In addition, the offender was charged a fee basedShow MoreRelatedCompare And Contrast Juvenile Delinquency Prevention979 Words   |  4 Pageschildren nor mature adults†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Nelson, 2012). Because juveniles are in a process of constant development sociologically, psychologically and physiologically, the juvenile court system focuses on alternative sentences and the creation of programs that will offer them rehabilitation instead of incarceration. However, in cases of extraordinary circumstances, the juvenile system shifts from looking at rehabilitation as a first choice to accountability and punishment (Read, n.d). 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Studies have shown it cost $1.8 billion to house mentally ill offenders whom returnRead MoreIntermediate Community Sanction: Home Confinement and Electronic Monitoring1588 Words   |  7 Pagescouple of decades new methods of punishment has been developed for the minor offender. These fall under the category of intermediate community sanction and consist of electronic monitoring and home confinement. These punishments have proven very useful in dealing with minor offenders, pretrial confinement and others in need of supervision. They seem to be effective and help to transfer some of the cost of prison back to the offe nder. At one time a criminal was either sentenced to death or sent toRead MoreThe Juvenile System And Juvenile Corrections System1740 Words   |  7 Pagesaddition to being monitored but at the same time the outcomes are not clear as the data is not being actively tracked due to the number of offenders in the system (Probation services). 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Examples of alternative confinement include electronic monitoring, community supervision, house arrestRead MoreJuvenile Justice: Incarceration vs. Intervention3212 Words   |  13 Pagesï » ¿ Juvenile Justice: Intervention versus Incarceration Lisa Whipple Professor Sinclair-Appelt English Composition II May 1, 2012 Abstract The national trend towards getting tough on juvenile crime by altering the juvenile justice system to more closely mirror the adult system was examined in order to determine whether secure confinement of juvenile offenders is as effective as community-based rehabilitative and treatment programs for these youth. Politicians