Solutions To Prison Overcrowding

Prison Overcrowding has been an issue for many years in the United States but a good solution has never been put into action. The reason that prisons are overcrowded is because there are a high rate of criminals and the Criminal Justice system has not developed a plan to reduce the crime rate. As a result of prisons overcrowding inmates do not feel safe in the prison. Prison overcrowding can cause fights, diseases and mental illnesses. It can cause fights because there are too many inmates in one location and people might get angry because they are so close to each other in the cells. It can cause disease because if one inmate is sick in a cell or in the prison the other inmate could get sick. It can cause mental illness because you are locked …show more content…
This tool could be used more often and could help some inmates get out earlier. I would have the inmate serve half of his term in the prison and then have doing probation. This would apply more to the medium to low risk offenders. I would first use the PSI to determine if the inmate should be allowed to serve the split sentence. Then if I thought that the inmate would be a low risk, and would not recidivate i would allow him to go home. Their would be conditions though such as having to find work and talking with the probation officer at least once every two weeks. Some issues with split sentencing would be that the inmate in jail does not spend enough time in jail and commits a violent crime because prison did not affect the inmate’s attitude. An additional issue for split sentencing would be that the released inmate does not talk to his probation officer and he decides to flee the country which would result in a warrant for his …show more content…
I also hope that we can make a dent in the incarceration of prisoners, hopefully in the near future the incarceration rate will start to go down. Prisons have been around for a long time and will always remain a long time as well. In conclusion, the problem of prison overcrowding is one that has developed time. The solution to overcrowding is to reconsider our goals for punishment and also balance rehabilitation, incapacitation,deterrence, restoration and retribution. We also need to make changes to our sentencing guidelines. We should return to indeterminate sentencing with intermediate sanctions that allow the inmate to show that the inmate has learned his lesson and changed his life