NCJ Number
195991
Date Published
2002
Length
26 pages
Annotation
This chapter examines penal policy's impact on women in Great Britain, with attention to the Halliday Report, which reviews the trend in general penal policy of the 1990's and makes a case for a new sentencing framework to be implemented through legislation and guidelines.
Abstract
In discussing the implications of the Halliday Report for the sentencing of women, the author notes that the report offers only a few brief comments on the effects of penal trends on women in the 1990's; there is no discussion of the likely effects on women offenders of the report's own recommendations. For women, the real threat of Halliday's proposed new framework for sentencing is that there would be no sense of a firm lower limit to the offenses that are appropriately addressed through imprisonment. According to Halliday, sentencers should be given discretion to impose community penalties instead of short custodial sentences, but they are by no means required to do so. Persistent property offending is the crime pattern typical of the impoverished, addicted, deprived, and depressed female offender, and the new sentencing framework makes her more vulnerable to imprisonment than ever before. After examining the impact of the Halliday report for women offenders, this chapter analyzes some debates in penal theory and reflects on their relevance to the sentencing of females in a post-Halliday climate. The final theme of the chapter reflects on debates among penal and legal theorists about culpability and responsibility, looking for ways in which women might be viewed as less blameworthy, without thereby being seen as irrational or irresponsible. This section of the chapter draws on debates in which the author has engaged with legal theorists and philosophers about the possibilities of a "hardship defense" being allowed in English criminal law (Hudson, 1999). 7 notes