NCJ Number
89734
Date Published
1981
Length
17 pages
Annotation
This study examines factors contributing to international sentencing disparity, with particular attention to sentencing practices in Western Europe and the United States.
Abstract
Different approaches to offender rehabilitation play an important role in sentencing disparity among countries; e.g., in Western Europe, as different from the United States, rehabilitation has been operationalized through an increased application of noncustodial sentences such as fines, probation orders, and suspended prison sentences as well as the shortening of prison sentences, rather than through indeterminate or otherwise long custodial sentences. Yet, among Western European countries, there are also different sentencing patterns. This can be attributed to differences in judicial value judgments. Value judgments lie in determining the relationship between retribution and general prevention on the one side and rehabilitation on the other side. Such judgments generally depend upon judicial trust in the possibilities of rehabilitation and a readiness to permit compromise in the objectives of retribution and general prevention. Regarding sentencing guidelines, the only guidelines observed by European judges in the past were the statutory minima and maxima and the rules defining the mitigating and aggravating circumstances. Recently, there have been new statutory provisions regarding the choice of noncustodial sanctions. The continental European judge also has to give reasons as to why a specific sentence has been chosen, and sentences can be appealed by the defendant as well as the public prosecutor. The channeling of information pertinent to sentencing also differs between legal systems. Data are provided on the sentencing of adults in the Federal Republic of Germany in 1978.