Rape and politics

[IAN 2411]

That's a little different, then - but they already get a one-third discount, as I understand it.

Not in England its not automatic any more, they have to earn it and prove that they have changed for the better.

A better place for that, surely, would be a parole hearing? Impose the full sentence - then, if the inmate participates fully in some process which might reduce reoffending, then let them out earlier. In effect, suspending part of their sentence, so if they do reoffend they have to serve that time as well.

Good point, but we are talking about Money now because Parole boards cost money. These people dont come cheep and it is for that reason they are only used for Major crimes.

Be well IAN 2411

[js207]

Not in England its not automatic any more, they have to earn it and prove that they have changed for the better.

Interesting - it isn't set at one-third here, but there is a requirement for the sentencing judge to take the early guilty plea into account. The sentence will always be given as "I would have given you two years in prison for this offence, but in light of the guilty plea I am reducing that by six months." It varies depending on how early in the process the guilty plea was tendered, and hence how much of the court's time was spared by the plea.

Good point, but we are talking about Money now because Parole boards cost money. These people dont come cheep and it is for that reason they are only used for Major crimes.

That sounds rather silly: why can it not be done cheaply and efficiently? I know, having worked on taxpayer-funded projects where we had a member of staff counting rows in a spreadsheet by hand (to generate our monthly website activity report, an admin assistant spend over a day going through the spreadsheet line by line, until I replaced that job with a script doing the same in 31ms) that efficiency and public sector don't always go together, but even having a checklist for early release (signs of remorse, engagement with treatment programme, etc) would help.

Of course, just making the early release conditional on actual good behaviour in jail, rather than reducing the sentence beforehand, should improve behaviour a lot - and I suspect couching it as an optional early release subject to good behaviour, rather than an extension of sentence in the event of bad behaviour, would avoid a lot of human rights quibbles.