NCJ Number
165213
Journal
Corrections Today Volume: 59 Issue: 1 Dated: (February 1997) Pages: 40-42,44,46
Date Published
1997
Length
5 pages
Annotation
Corrections issues examined by four journalists consider prison overcrowding, alternatives to institutionalization, the lack of sentencing tailored to offender characteristics, and excessive punishment for drug offenders and its impact on prison populations.
Abstract
Ted Gest of U.S. News and World Report summarizes his magazine's article on criminal justice policies. The July 3, 1995, issue featured a story that examined the conflict between fighting crime and cutting budgets. Much of the story described a variety of corrections approaches being tried around the country, including the prison building boom in Texas; parole's end in Virginia; North Carolina's sentencing-grid scheme; and intermediate sanctions such as drug courts, boot camps, and neighborhood probation supervision. Julia Cass of the Philadelphia Inquirer criticizes the tendency in "get-tough" sentencing to use long-term imprisonment for every offender. Little attention is given to differences among offenders and their suitability for alternatives to incarceration. Dan Morain of the Los Angeles Times documents the overcrowding in California's prisons due to the sentencing of nonviolent offenders to prison. Michael Isikoff of Newsweek decries mandatory sentencing that imprisons petty drug offenders and that distinguishes punishment for crack use and powdered cocaine use. He notes that some drug offenders are receiving longer prison sentences than rapists and armed robbers.