Get Smart Replaces Lock ‘Em Up

Our criminal justice system is in crisis. This is not news; you’ve heard it from a politician eager to show how “tough on crime” he is; maybe you know it because you or a loved one have been a crime victim. Or maybe because a loved one who committed a nonviolent crime is serving a long sentence imposed by those tough-on-crime politicians.

The signs of the crisis are that we spend about five times more on incarceration than on schools and incarceration costs have increased 700% since 1985. Yet these staggering costs have not bought us lower recidivism, better victim compensation or safer communities. Such are the findings of the 1997 Criminal Justice Crisis Index just released by Justice Fellowship, the public policy arm of Prison Fellowship Ministries. Among other facts, the Justice Fellowship report found that one out of every 20 persons in the United States will do prison time at some point in their lives.

Prison costs are likely to increase sharply because of the aging of the prison population (the average geriatric inmate costs $69,000 a year to maintain, in contrast to an overall average of $22,000) and because of mandatory minimum sentences, which in practice turn petty offenders into hardened criminals and will force even more prison construction. But if mandatory minimums for lesser offenses are not the answer, neither is revolving-door justice. Too many violent criminals walk free after serving a fraction of their sentences to make room for nonviolent offenders who have received lengthy sentences under mandatory minimums. We are letting too many dangerous persons out to free up space for trivial offenders.

There’s still another startling fact: Most states spend more than five times the amount per prisoner they spend educating their children. While we would not want to suggest that education is simply a matter of throwing money at a problem (any more than criminal justice is), this disproportion has to make us pause. Thoughtful souls may disagree about exactly what misallocation of resources is taking place here, but most of us could agree that there is one.

More prisons, longer sentences, mandatory minimums--these are the standards of what passes today for criminal justice policy. But if these truly were the answers to our crime problem, wouldn’t our population feel safer? In fact, they don’t. Despite locking up more of our people for longer sentences at a huge cost, 41% of the American people say that they are in constant fear of crime. It is clear that neither the liberal approach, which treats crime as a mere byproduct of poverty and therefore solvable through higher welfare payments and more aggressive social work, nor the standard conservative approach, which boils down to little more than “lock ‘em up,” makes our communities any safer.

While there is no cure-all, Justice Fellowship has developed legislative proposals that apply biblical principles and common sense to our justice system. These principles say that states should:

* Grant victims the right to participate with legal representation at every stage of criminal cases.

* Restrict prison to violent offenders and others dangerous to the community. We should lock people up because we are afraid of them, not because we are mad at them. Locking up nonviolent, low-risk offenders is a bad investment.

* Offer community-based punishment with strict supervision to enable low-risk offenders to keep their jobs and make restitution to their victims. Instead of paying off an ill-defined “debt to society” in an environment likely to make them even more bitter and expert criminal, low-risk offenders should be given the chance to make things up to their victims and thus taste real responsibility.

* Make the supervision of those on probation and parole credible by hiring enough agents to adequately supervise them. The agents can be paid by reallocating funds now being poured into prison construction.

* Expand prison industry for those higher risk offenders who must be incarcerated. While inside, they can contribute to the economy and learn skills for which there is demand so that they have a chance, once they are released, of earning their living other than in crime.

Many of Justice Fellowship’s reforms were enacted in North Carolina, and the results have been dramatic. While North Carolina’s prisons are now reserved for the worst offenders, that doesn’t mean other criminals are not punished. In fact, the state has created a system of tough alternatives to prison. It’s a key element to making the solution work. Nonviolent offenders are forced to learn trades, get jobs, make restitution or go to prison. Probation is strict. There is electronically monitored house arrest and frequent drug testing. By not sending some offenders to prison, North Carolina is able to make sure that its most serious criminals serve their full sentences. And for the first time, the state has a prison budget that’s under control.

The next time a politician tells you that he wants to “get tough on crime,” tell him that you would rather he “get smart on crime” and enact solutions like these.