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B) SpUt into groups of 5-6 students and assign the roles of the panel.

c) Before the beginning of the panel read the following selections carefully and extract the necessary information:

 

— It's a time-honoured misconception that the stricter the punishment, the lesser the crime rate. This misconception has long been debated by history and science. Law cannot, and
must not take revenge: punishment is not an end in itself, but a means of restoring social justice. It's a tool for re-education. This concept should form the guidelines of the new legislation.

— Law is developing: it has no impunity in the court of time. A number of offences should be altogether excluded from the criminal law since administrative measures are quite sufficient against them. Say a driver violates some traffic regulations, and in the accident no one is hurt...

— Unjust law warps and handicaps a nation's morale. Remember when in the not-so-distant past families of the "enemies of the people" hurriedly renounced their relations fully aware that the charges were false.

— We used to say that we had neither Hrug addiction nor prostitution. As long as there were no such problems any legal responsibility was out of the question. Now it is widely claimed that we need criminal laws against both drug addiction and prostitution.

— Could we make, say, prostitution a criminal offence? What could the evidence be? Who could bear witness?

— The violation of law would be extremely difficult to prove and the punishment would necessarily be selective.

— Some would be charged, others would be spared, and a selective application of law is arbitrary rule.

— But the real problem is elsewhere. Is immorality a breach of law? Don't we have to distinguish between a moral and a criminal code? I think we must be weary of the naive desire to make law relieve us of the pains of responsible choice. If every act were dictated by an article of the Criminal Code, rather than one's conscience and moral sense, human beings would become legal objects.

— Prostitution should be fought but the judges should be kept out of it.

— Drug addiction should not entail legal prosecution. Otherwise we may be in for disastrous consequences. People would be afraid to solicit medical help; it would be an impenetrable wall between the drug addicts and those who are able to save them.

— Are changes to come in the types of punishment? The reformatory function of jail is little more than fiction. Rather the opposite is true. The first "jolt" makes an inveterate criminal who won't stay in society for long.

— Even in an ideal penitentiary — if such could be imagined — serving one's time causes serious problems. A cooped-up individual loses friends, family, profession, familiar environment and finds himself or herself a member of a group that is anything but healthy.

— But that's not the whole story. Imprisonment, particularly if it is prolonged, undermines one's capacity to make decisions, to control oneself. Set free after long years in jail, one is unfit for freedom, normal life seems incomprehensible and unbearable. One might be unconsciously drawn to the habitual way of life. Around 30 per cent of former inmates are brought back behind bars after new offences, and half of them during their first year at large.



— According to sociologists, less than 5 per cent of those sentenced for the first time consider their life in the colony as "normal", whereas the correspondent figure for those serving a second sentence (or more) is 40 per cent.

— New penitentiary principles must be introduced. It is real as well as imperative. I believe the solution lies with a differentiation between convicts and separate confinement according to different categories. First time offenders should be kept separately from those with long "case histories"; convicts serving time for particularly grave crimes must not mix with petty delinquents.

— Another urgent problem is that of the maximum term of confinement. Scholars propose that the maximum serving time envisaged by the code and by each article be reduced.

— The legal profession and sociologists know that the arrest itself, the curtailing of personal freedom, is increasingly perceived as the greatest shock by the offender. It is a traumatic, shameful psychological experience. Hence, petty delinquency, such as hooliganism, should entail not a year or two in jail but up to 6 months in a detention home.

 

d) The following issues are to be discussed:

— If every act were dictated by an article of the Criminal Code rather than one's conscience and moral sense, human beings would become mere legal objects.

— Punishment is not an end in itself, but a means of restoring social justice. It's a tool for re-education.

— Should drug-addiction entail legal prosecution?

— The reformatory function of imprisonment is little more than fiction.

 

• Essay (850-1000 words)

• Juvenile justice in the RF

• Juvenile justice in the world

• Juvenile delinquency prevention

Unit 3

Read the text

Status and Duties

A British police officer is subject to the law and may be sued or prosecuted for any wrongful act committed in carrying out duties. Police discipline codes are designed to prevent any abuse of the considerable powers enjoyed by a police officer, to ensure the impartiality of the service in its dealings with the public and to maintain public confidence. Statutory procedures, including an independent element, govern the way in which complaints from the public against the police are handled. The establishment in 1985 of the independent Police Complaints Authority, with powers to supervise the investigation of any serious complaint against a police officer, substantially reformed the complaints system in England and Wales. In Scotland complaints against police officers involving allegations of any form of criminal conduct are investigated by independent public prosecutors.

In Northern Ireland the Independent Commission for Police Complaints is required to supervise any case involving death or serious injury and has the power to supervise the formal investigation of any other complaint if it so wishes; in certain circumstances the Secretary of State may direct the Commission to supervise the investigation of matters that are not the subject of a formal complaint.

Police work ranges from the protection of people and property, road or street patrolling (the trend is increasingly away from the car patrol and back to 'community' policing on foot) and traffic control to crime prevention, criminal investigation and arresting offenders. In urban areas, particularly, police officers have to deal with social problems and may bring in other social agencies and expert help.

Most forces have community liaison departments to co-ordinate their efforts to produce good relations with the community. The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 requires arrangements to be made for obtaining the views of people in the area about the policing of it and for obtaining their co-operation with the police in preventing crime. Almost all areas have police/community consultative groups which enable people to discuss issues of concern with the police in a constructive spirit. Particular efforts are made to develop relations with young people, through greater contact with schools, for example. Emphasis is also placed on re­lations with ethnic minorities; racially discriminatory behaviour by police officers is an offence under the Police Discipline Code, and training in community relations is available to officers.

To release as many uniformed police officers as possible for operational duties, police authorities employ over 41;500 civilians (including part-time employees) in England and Wales and over 2,530 in Scotland. The number of civilian support staff has been growing as forces secure economies by replacing police officers with civilians where posts do not require police powers and training. Traffic wardens (of whom there are over 4,700 in England and Wales and about 540 in Scotland) carry out specified duties concerned with traffic and parking. Wardens are under the control of the chief constable.

Each force has an attachment of volunteer special constables who perform police duties in their spare time, without pay, acting mainly as auxiliaries to the regular force. In Northern Ireland there is a part-time and full-time paid reserve.

Members of the police service may not belong to a trade union nor may they withdraw their labour in furtherance of a trade dispute. All ranks, however, have their own staff associations to represent their interests.

 


Date: 2016-03-03; view: 1115


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B) Spend a few minutes individually thinking of further arguments you will use to back up your own opinion on the usefulness and types of punishment. | Check the comprehension of the text by listening to each question and choosing the answer, which you think, is correct.
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