CORRECTIONS, PRISONS AND JAILS.

                                    CORRECTIONS, PRISONS AND JAILS.

Abstract

This paper focuses on different aspects of prison privatization and challenges of law enforcement. The aspects of prison privatization covered are its advantages and disadvantages, impact on the prisoners, impact on the constitutional rights of the prisoner and its compatibility with the democratic values of the society.

                                               Advantages of Prison privatization

Financial savings is the main advantage of prison privatization. States save money when they transfer inmates to private prisons. The reason for this is that they pay a fraction of the cost that they would have otherwise spent on the inmate. Also, they do not have to pay for accessory services such as the cost for maintaining the gym, and building new prisons. Another advantage of private prisons is that they decongest the state-run prisons. Most private prisons have greater accommodative capacity for prisoners than state-run prisons. They also allow the government to maintain a lean and efficient workforce in the prison service, due to reduced workload (Ingram, 2011).

                                  Disadvantages of prison privatization.

Most private prisons are oriented towards profit maximization. Thus, they would strive to maintain the operation costs as low as possible. To do this they remunerate their guards poorly and such guards are capable of violating the human rights of the prisoners. They may also skimp prison amenities. Moreover, incarcerating a prisoner in a private prison owned by a private entity violates the following fundamental human rights of the prisoners as enshrined in the US constitution: right to liberty and the right to human dignity (Ingram, 2011).

                                     Role of private prisons in curbing recidivism.

According to the research carried out by Coventry (2010), prisons inmates from private prisons have a lower rate of recidivism than inmates from public prisons (p789). This indicates that the rehabilitative services given to prisoners in private prisons are better than the same service given in public prisons. These rehabilitative services imbue in the prisoners the moral values and skills that enable them to successfully integrate into the society once they are released.  Most of them become productive members of the society (Coventry, 2010).

                              Government responsibility and the constitutional rights of inmates.

The relevant government regulatory bodies responsible for the inspection and regulation of private prisons are unable to execute their functions effectively. This is due to the fact that lobbies supported by these private prisons interfere with their functions either overtly or covertly. Also, some of the private prisons enjoy special privileges outside the realm of the constitution. For most part, the government is not liable for gross violations of the constitutional rights of the inmates that are committed by the guards or other personnel employed by the private prison(Coventry, 2010; Ingram, 2011).

                                 Role of private prisons in a democratic society.

I agree that private prisons have no place in a democratic society. I base my arguments on the research done by Coventry. Coventry showed that private prisons, due to lack of government oversight, do commit gross violation against the human rights of the inmates transferred to them. This was evident in Ashfield prison and Buckley hall prison, both located in Britain, where violent prison riots occurred due to the mistreatment of the prisoners by the guards (Coventry, 2010).

                                         Challenges of law enforcement.

The greatest challenges associated with illegal drug activity, drug abuse and gambling are outlined below. Illegal drug activity is associated with money laundering and increased level of crime. Drug abuse is associated with high levels of crime and juvenile delinquency. Gambling is associated with white collar crime and money laundering. Law enforcement can deal with these challenges by exposing and shutting down casinos involved in criminal activity (this strategy was effective in Paraguay). Also, they should increase their surveillance and rely more on human intelligence to identify drug dealers, drug abusers and the middlemen. They should arrest, capture or kill the drug dealers, as it evident that cutting off supply of illegal drugs reduced the problem of illegal drug activity and drug abuse. This strategy was successfully applied in Colombia (Sokolov, 2011).

                                                      References.

Coventry, A. (2010).  Analysis of private prisons. Journal of Criminology, 56(9), 497-523.

Ingram, J. (2011). Private prisons: Are they viable? Journal of Sociology, 45(3), 674-97.

Sokolov, B. (2011). Challenges facing law enforcemet officers. Contemporary Criminology, 34(4), 421-56.