Liberal justice: experts expect less punitive, more principled approach to crime

Canadian criinal 'justice' is already a joke.

We see it every day, in on this forum.

So, the solution is even more lenient sentences, easier parole, and more 'healing circles' and 'oh you should sit and think about what you've down, maybe write an essay about it.

Well, at least the criminals will be happy.

If our criminal justice system is such a joke, why is it that we have one of the world's safest societies? Lowest crime rates? Lowest recidivism rates? It may seem like a joke to the pound-of-flesh frothers, but it works, better than nearly anywhere else.

Conservatives don't care what works. They don't care about facts much at all really. They just want whatever makes them feel good inside, whether it's rational or not, and damn the consequences. That's why they can fall in love with know-nothings like Ford and Palin and Trump among a long list of others, and why Harperites and their ilk can wage war on science, sex education, and eliminate the census (they weren't reading it anyway). Because facts don't matter to these people. Not one bit.

What a load of full-on partisan drivel.

"Justice" isn't just about the punishment laid to the convicted.

There are victims of crime and their feelings and future well-being need to be taken into consideration too.

I know that Liberals like you have a hard time with this as you rarely think about the victim, you think of how we can rehabilitate the convicted criminal.

I suspect that if you were touched by a crime that hurt your family, you'd be far more concerned with how the "justice" of the case made you feel rather than the eventual well being and future status of the criminal.

Not even in the top 10 of safest countries.

http://www.therichest.com/rich-list/ric ... -countries




No top 10 for us here either.

http://www.elist10.com/top-10-countries ... rime-rate/

Police in the UK will no longer come to burglaries.
You can send an email. And I'm sure the crime rate will go down, because no one
will bother reporting it any more.





Nope.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/article ... 390.ref016



See, now you can go get pissed off and start insulting me, because the facts don't
support anything you say.

ummmmm.....we've got better healthcare than....some Americans?

Hmmmm. Link says




None of the links compare "hard on crime vs soft on crime" and the various parameters Lemmy brought up, so I'd have to call Martin's reply a fail.

"Justice" isn't just about the punishment laid to the convicted.

There are victims of crime and their feelings and future well-being need to be taken into consideration too.

I know that Liberals like you have a hard time with this as you rarely think about the victim, you think of how we can rehabilitate the convicted criminal.

I suspect that if you were touched by a crime that hurt your family, you'd be far more concerned with how the "justice" of the case made you feel rather than the eventual well being and future status of the criminal.

First off, what you fail to understand is that there's no magic sentence that satisfies all victims for a given crime . You speak as if there's some magic universal formula that says for example all car theft victims will be satisfied with sentences of 5 years or something. In reality some victims would be fine with 2 years and some will never feel safe again even if you executed the car thief.

And for really serious offences like murder or rape, there's nothing that will make the family of the victim feel better or feel avenged because it still doesn't undo the crime.

So as a sentencing guide it's practically useless. Of course the victim is scared, hurt and angry. They'll still be scared hurt and angry even if we execute everyone who breaks even a minor law.

Justice is not synonymous with revenge, something you fail to understand. And we shouldn't pursue policies that lead to worse crime rates and more victims in a futile attempt to cater to the insatiable feelings of the current victims. Longer, harsher sentences lead to higher recidivism and less rehabilitation and that's just a fact.

I clicked on your link. It had Singapore came up first. I lived in Singapore. Compared to Canada, or even the USA, safe it ain't. I clicked ahead on the list: Georgia and Malta. Are those even countries? What's next up the list? Andorra? What's #1? The Vatican? C'mon, man.


"Your" facts, internet link facts, aren't necessarily "the facts". Canada is a safe place, whether it's the first safest or 20th safest place in the world (not that that can be measured objectively). Our justice system works. And don't make it personal. I'm a staunch supporter of the death penalty. I'm not easy on crime. I think criminals should be punished. But overpunishing doesn't work. All the experts know this. It makes society less safe. Let the experts run the show. They know what they're doing.

"Justice" isn't just about the punishment laid to the convicted.

There are victims of crime and their feelings and future well-being need to be taken into consideration too.

I know that Liberals like you have a hard time with this as you rarely think about the victim, you think of how we can rehabilitate the convicted criminal.

I suspect that if you were touched by a crime that hurt your family, you'd be far more concerned with how the "justice" of the case made you feel rather than the eventual well being and future status of the criminal.

First off, what you fail to understand is that there's no magic sentence that satisfies all victims for a given crime . You speak as if there's some magic universal formula that says for example all car theft victims will be satisfied with sentences of 5 years or something. In reality some victims would be fine with 2 years and some will never feel safe again even if you executed the car thief.

And for really serious offences like murder or rape, there's nothing that will make the family of the victim feel better or feel avenged because it still doesn't undo the crime.

So as a sentencing guide it's practically useless. Of course the victim is scared, hurt and angry. They'll still be scared hurt and angry even if we execute everyone who breaks even a minor law.

Justice is not synonymous with revenge, something you fail to understand. And we shouldn't pursue policies that lead to worse crime rates and more victims in a futile attempt to cater to the insatiable feelings of the current victims. Longer, harsher sentences lead to higher recidivism and less rehabilitation and that's just a fact.

You could have just saved a lot of typing and said;

It really doesn't matter about the feelings of victims.

Let's see how 'liberal' you are with your justice opinion if a drunk driver happens to wipe out a member of your family or your newborn child. Since your feelings are secondary to things like recidivism rate, I suspect you'll be fully understanding and accepting of the sentence, regardless of the outcome.

I clicked on your link. It had Singapore came up first. I lived in Singapore. Compared to Canada, or even the USA, safe it ain't. I clicked ahead on the list: Georgia and Malta. Are those even countries? What's next up the list? Andorra? What's #1? The Vatican? C'mon, man.


"Your" facts, internet link facts, aren't necessarily "the facts". Canada is a safe place, whether it's the first safest or 20th safest place in the world (not that that can be measured objectively). Our justice system works. And don't make it personal. I'm a staunch supporter of the death penalty. I'm not easy on crime. I think criminals should be punished. But overpunishing doesn't work. All the experts know this. It makes society less safe. Let the experts run the show. They know what they're doing.

Yea, who needs facts, eh?

Lemmy doesn't care about facts or stats. His experience trumps crime statistics.

It appears the economist has wandered a little beyond his depth.

Are you saying you've come up with a sentencing formula that will magically heal all victims feelings? No?

1) Consideration of victims feelings should be reserved for rhe court room in a specific case. Politicians in Ottawa are not capable of dealing with a specific persons feelings in the abstract through acts of parliament that don't recognize victims as individuals. If you really think individual victims feelings are unique and important, you would would want a sentence based on the way a specific victim actually feels not on some law written by politicians that presumes all victims feel the same in every case. Otherwise what you're promoting is a law that just forces a sentence regardless of the particular victim or the facts of their case. Victims feelings are best used by the judge as one of several considerations when determining where in a particular range of options a sentence should fall. This is the case today. What you propose would actually make a victims feelings irrelevant because the federal government has already mandated the sentence on the basis that it already knows what all victims feel.

3) However as mentioned earlier, often victims will feel what they feel no matter what the sentence is. And that would include me in the event that I become a victim. Each victim feels differently depending on their situation and philistinism.

4) Not all crimes are the same and mandatory minimums rob the prosecutor and the judge of the ability to hand out punishments that fit the crime. That's why in the US you have people doing decades in jail for petty crimes like shoplifting or minor drug possession or in sentences that fail to take extenuating/ mitigating factors into account.

Victims feelings matter for a lot of things and they do potentially have a role to play in the courtroom during a specific trial when determining where in the range of sentencing options a particular sentence should fall. But let's discuss it rationally and stop the politically correct claptrap that invokes "victims" as a magic word to shut down any argument.

Victim's feelings should not matter in sentencing. So what, a victim says "I hated my dad anyway, I'm glad he was murdered," that perp deserves a lighter sentence? Or some stoic guy doesn't show much emotion as a victim, while some woman turns on the waterworks, the perp in the latter case deserves a harsher sentence? A homeless victim with nobody to speak for him - lighter sentence for the perp? We're basically saying here that some people's lives are more valuable than others.

Primary consideration should be protection of the public. That includes not only locking the perp up, if needed, but providing rehabilitation opportunities in prison as well as when he gets out, and proper monitoring when they are out.

Denunciation also has a role to play in sentencing.

I do agree with longer sentences the more times a perp appears before a court. Often judges just give up and hand out minimal sentences when stiffer ones don't seem to work. They do work in the sense of keeping the perp off the street. I think we should be going for dangerous/habitual offender designation more often, if warranted, especially with sex crimes.

I think the judiciary should get together and work out a way to have more uniformity in sentencing. It really does seem that depending on the judge you can get a very wide gap between sentences for very similar crimes. But you can't really mandate this with mandatory minimums. (I think we all agree with mandatory minimums in some cases, murder, say.)