Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?
Discuss issues related to the politics of the UK, such as the actions of any MP, any current or potential law, or any other factor affecting the British political system.
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Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?the 3 strike law is very popular in the USA, and I was wondering what people here in the UK would think of a similar one.
after the london riots, thousands of those who took part of already committed another offence and this law would try to stop reoffenders like these.
Please read these:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_strikes_law
http://facts1.live.radicaldesigns.org/
http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_br...09/index1.html
http://crime.about.com/b/2012/04/30/...trikes-law.htm -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?No. Never.Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?
The British judicial system is in no way perfect but there isn't a chance in hell I'd want it to be run by some arbitrary 'strike' program. The judicial process is the backbone of our society, not playground discipline. All cases brought to court should be looked upon objectively. -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?I understand where you are coming from but unless there is major reform of the judicial system and the prison system then people will continue to reoffend because they will not get a strong enough punishment.(Original post by jumpingjesusholycow)
No. Never.
The British judicial system is in no way perfect but there isn't a chance in hell I'd want it to be run by some arbitrary 'strike' program. The judicial process is the backbone of our society, not playground discipline. All cases brought to court should be looked upon objectively.
Could a three strike law prevent this? -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?Firstly, there isn't any evidence for the part in bold.(Original post by patrickinator)
I understand where you are coming from but unless there is major reform of the judicial system and the prison system then people will continue to reoffend because they will not get a strong enough punishment.
Secondly, a strike system based ultimately on an arbitrary number of offences allowed before (presumably) a harsher sentence than otherwise, runs contradictory to our British values. We favour open, fair trials by jury - innocent until proven guilty. It goes all the way back to the Magna Carta and I would never want to see some populist tripe about 'repeat offences' destroy that.
Lastly, I think your idea has a huge, giant, massive flaw that even a child can spot. Essentially, it says to Britain that it's okay to commit two crimes, just don't make that third one. -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?Bad environments not bad people.(Original post by patrickinator)
I understand where you are coming from but unless there is major reform of the judicial system and the prison system then people will continue to reoffend because they will not get a strong enough punishment.
Could a three strike law prevent this? -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?Exculpationist alert. You with Nick Davies, Johann Hari and Plan "ill manor" B on this one?(Original post by OSharp)
Bad environments not bad people. -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?You see, it's viewpoints like this, which try to absolve scumbag criminals of all agency and responsibility, which causes criminals to keep offending. And it is infested in our judicial system enough already.(Original post by OSharp)
Bad environments not bad people. -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?So if you get caught littering 3 times, or shop lifting sweets from asda 3 times, you should spend your life in prison? Um I don't think the tax payers want to pay for that. Oh and our prisons are already FULL! Why put more people into a system for petty crimes?!?!
Don't copy America on ANY criminal justice policies!!!!
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?This is not how the american system works. It only applies to felonies, or serious crimes, which in America is defined as crimes punishable by more than 1 year in prison. Here the distinction is between indictable (triable in front of judge and jury) and summary (triable in front of a magistrate, who is limited to a sentence of 6 months in prison and/or a 5000 pound fine). If implemented here, it would only apply to indictable offenses.(Original post by tom177)
So if you get caught littering 3 times, or shop lifting sweets from asda 3 times, you should spend your life in prison? Um I don't think the tax payers want to pay for that. Oh and our prisons are already FULL! Why put more people into a system for petty crimes?!?!
Don't copy America on ANY criminal justice policies!!!!
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?The number of offences is indeed essentially arbitrary, derived as it is from the rules of baseball, but that is not an argument against it. The conventional length of custodial sentences are just as arbitrary. It is just a number that we pick that we think is fair and effective. And while I'm not sure whether there is evidence that the spectre of harsher punishment discourages would-be criminals from committing crimes, I can guarantee you that actually carrying out that punishment and imprisoning someone for life is a near-foolproof way of preventing them from committing any more crimes against the public. Nor does it have anything to do with habeus corpus, trial by jury, or innocent until proven guilty. You still have to be convicted of the crime (all three) with the full operation of all these principles, after all.(Original post by jumpingjesusholycow)
Firstly, there isn't any evidence for the part in bold.
Secondly, a strike system based ultimately on an arbitrary number of offences allowed before (presumably) a harsher sentence than otherwise, runs contradictory to our British values. We favour open, fair trials by jury - innocent until proven guilty. It goes all the way back to the Magna Carta and I would never want to see some populist tripe about 'repeat offences' destroy that.
No, it says that you will be punished for those too, but that you have two chances at rehabilitation and reintegration into society.(Original post by jumpingjesusholycow)
Lastly, I think your idea has a huge, giant, massive flaw that even a child can spot. Essentially, it says to Britain that it's okay to commit two crimes, just don't make that third one.Last edited by AdvanceAndVanquish; 08-05-2012 at 09:17. -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?In many ways it does make sense but i don't think states using it have seen any significant reduction in crime levels.
However I am thoroughly of the belief that people base criminal activity on the likelihood of getting caught rather than consequences (although it is a factor). -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?There is a worry amongst law enforcement and jurists in the US that the 3-strike policy encourages exaggerations of crimes. If for example, a person has committed two felonies, and is on their third - they now have no disincentive to commit murder in pursuance of the third crime, or to avoid detection.
Eg: a person has convictions for assault and burglary. They are in the process of a minor felony - stealing a car or credit card - and are in danger of being caught. They now have no disincentive to murder any witness or pursuer. -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?What difference does the value of the good make? I don't care if someone is shop lifting chocolates or £120 trainers, theft is theft and there was a time when you judged someone for the action not the extent. Id est, stealing meant your hand would be cut off. No one cared what you tried to steal. As a taxpayer myself I would be delighted (quite literally) if I opened the paper one morning and the big story was that over night over 5,000 repeat offenders had suddenly been giving life sentences. That's a sizeable chunk of thieves, drunkards and violent individuals off our streets.(Original post by tom177)
shop lifting sweets from asda 3 times, you should spend your life in prison? Um I don't think the tax payers want to pay for that.
Don't copy America on ANY criminal justice policies!!!!
Second, don't copy "ANY"? I believe that the British method of concurrent sentencing is completely daft. (Incase you don't know what that is I'll explain). In America (the consecutive sentencing method), if you stole from a shop, then ran from the police, then stole a car, then crashed it. When you went to court you would recieve a sentence based on what each of these actions is worth. Be it, 3 months for shop-lifting, 6 months for resisting arrest, 12 months for grand theft auto, and a final 2 months for dangerous driving. Going to prison for a minimum of 2 years.
In the UK however you will recieve a sentence ONLY for the grandest offence. So despite doing all that other ****, you would only get 12 months for what the court views as the "worst". Which is then written off as a first time offence, or you get let out early for good behaviour.
Personally I feel the three strike system is highly warranted, as it would most likely exclude minor traffic offences and petty things such as littering (which using that as an example was simply your attempt to make it seem more irrational than it actually is). There are hundreds of people in the UK who have no place being out on the streets. If by the third offence you haven't stopped being a criminal, does it really seem logical to you to keep letting them out? -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?Ok let's have a look at a few of the shining examples of this policy. Kevin Weber was working as a maintenance man at a local apartment complex. Using his master key he broke into one of the apartments twice, the first time making off with several firearms. On the second occasion the apartment's resident, a police officer, was home and caught him in the act. Weber grabbed a pistol belonging to the policeman's roommate and, in an effort to escape, threatened to use it. He was charged with two counts of burglary and assault with a deadly weapon and went to prison for two years and was released in 1990. In May 1995 Weber was homeless and unemployed. One night he broke into a restaurant whilst drunk and stole 4 chocolate cookies for which, so far as I am aware, he is still serving 26 years. Another victim of this policy is serving two consecutive 25 year terms for stealing nine video tapes. These are not isolated examples.
In general I would say that it's a bad idea to look to America for judicial reforms. They have very high re-offending rates especially when compared to the more liberal approaches of some Scandinavian countries which focus on rehabilitation. Clearly people are not deterred by the harsher sentencing when around one in every hundred American is in prison, which is roughly 2.3 million people. That's twice as many as South Africa, three times as much as Iran and six times more than China. This means that while America only makes up 5% of the worlds population they make up a staggering 25% percent of the worlds prisoners. No society in history has imprisoned more of its population. The ridiculous sentences handed out by the three strikes policy contribute towards this but in general America has very high sentences.
Quite simply I believe we should stay as far away from the American model as possible as a judicial system based on the rules of baseball is clearly not working. Previous convictions are already an aggravating factor when sentencing and that's all we need.Last edited by Logi; 08-05-2012 at 10:00. -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?You do realise that America is 37.92 times larger than the UK? so comparing numbers is pretty ****ing unrealsitic.(Original post by Llamageddon)
the USA is a particularly bad legal system to want to emulate. Results are the only objective measure of success and their results are atrocious.
whilst the UK's rates top 70% on average with 74% of offenders back in prison within a year.
(http://www.justice.gov.uk/downloads/...s-analysis.pdf)
Whilst the UK are terrible for figure fixing due to your concurrent sentencing system, example: There is nothing to stop the UK police force from charging other minor offences to an individual who is on charge for a more serious offence. Which allows them for "account" for more crimes than criminals they have arrested. As they know it won't influence the sentence that the offfender will face. -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?Look, America accounts for a quarter of the world's prison population, so does their own '3 strike rule' or capital punishment act as a detterent for other people not to commit crimes? No. America is one of the most homicidal societies in the world and that is also a fact. So do there tougher punishments again act as a detterent? No. People really believe that we are 'soft' on crime. We're not. The UK is close in terms of prisoners per 100,000 to the US than any other country. The UK for the last 30 years have copied US policies, and all it's lead to is increased fear of crime, which is more of a problem than actual crime levels. Do you know the crime rates have fallen considerably in the last 20 years? Yet people think the UK is this 'soft liberal country'. Look at the prison populations in countries across Europe (Holland, Sweden, Denmark) and there low in comparison to the UK and US societies. Now obviously that's down to the cultures etc, however in the UK, the levels of crime reported in the media far exceed crimes reported in other countries . Our obsession with crime, only makes fear of crime worst.
I stand by my statement, we need to stop looking at america's criminal justice policies and more towards how central European countries deal with criminals.
Readings
Murray lee -Inventing fear of crime
J.Reiman's - The rich get richer and the poor get prison
David Shichor - Profit for punishment -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?Surely it would be fair to take previous offences and their nature into account when sentencing, even if they should have no bearing beforehand on the jury's decision?(Original post by jumpingjesusholycow)
No. Never.
The British judicial system is in no way perfect but there isn't a chance in hell I'd want it to be run by some arbitrary 'strike' program. The judicial process is the backbone of our society, not playground discipline. All cases brought to court should be looked upon objectively. -
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Re: Should the British Government enforce a 3 strike law?This is a very interesting objection that I have not heard before, although it is partially answered by the existence of capital punishment.(Original post by Clip)
There is a worry amongst law enforcement and jurists in the US that the 3-strike policy encourages exaggerations of crimes. If for example, a person has committed two felonies, and is on their third - they now have no disincentive to commit murder in pursuance of the third crime, or to avoid detection.
Eg: a person has convictions for assault and burglary. They are in the process of a minor felony - stealing a car or credit card - and are in danger of being caught. They now have no disincentive to murder any witness or pursuer.
