Increasing Judicial Responsibility Can Reduce Prison Overcrowding (From America's Prisons: Opposing Viewpoints, P 139- 144, 1991, Stacey L. Tipp, ed. - See NCJ-159858)

• NCJ Number: 159876
• Author(s): B L Benson; L A Wollan Jr
• Date Published: 1991
• Length: 6 pages
• Sale Source: Greenhaven Press
• Publication Type: Survey
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This article argues that proposals to alleviate prison overcrowding should focus on decreasing the demand for prison beds, rather than increasing the supply through construction of new facilities.

Abstract

Early release programs represent a mistaken approach to relieving overcrowding, because dangerous criminals are often released to make room for new admissions. The authors argue that judges play a key role in dictating the level of demand for prison spaces. Under the proposal outlined here, judges would be assigned a certain amount of prison space. They would have to evaluate each of their cases carefully to determine which offenders, and which offenses, merit a prison space. In effect, judges would be forced to send the most dangerous criminals to prison, while finding alternative sanctions for less serious offenders.