Incarceration

Incarceration is the detention of a person in prison, typically as punishment for a crime (custodial sentence).

People are most commonly incarcerated upon suspicion or conviction of committing a crime, and different jurisdictions have differing laws governing the function of incarceration within a larger system of justice. Incarceration serves four essential purposes with regard to criminals:

to isolate criminals to prevent them from committing more crimes

to punish criminals for committing crimes

to deter others from committing crimes

to rehabilitate criminals

Incarceration rates, when measured by the United Nations, are considered distinct and separate from the imprisonment of political prisoners and others not charged with a specific crime. Historically, the frequency of imprisonment, its duration, and severity have varied considerably. There has also been much debate about the motives for incarceration, its effectiveness and fairness, as well as debate regarding the related questions about the nature and etiology of criminal behavior.

A custodial sentence is a judicial sentence, imposing a punishment (and hence the resulting punishment itself) consisting of mandatory custody of the convict, either in prison (incarceration) or in some other closed therapeutic and/or (re)educational institution, such as a reformatory, (maximum security) psychiatry or drug detoxification (especially cold turkey). For some crimes, such as cases of child sexual abuse, a custodial sentence is almost inevitable.

Although usually not labeled as such (at hence not in the legal sense) it can be considered a type of corporal punishment, even if no further physical punishments are practiced within the institution (these can also be informal, without any rights of defense), since it constitutes a physical coercion. Indeed the technical term duress is equally used for loss of liberty and for coercion.

The concept of penal harm often induces additional elements of physical endurance.

Every other sentence and punishment is non-custodial, such as fines, judicial beatings, various mandatory but 'open' therapy and courses, restriction orders, loss or suspension of civil rights, or even suspended sentences.

Date: 2015-01-29; view: 882