Prisoner Rehabilitation: Benefits Beyond Punishment - Essay Sample

Introduction

Criminal law comprises several bodies that work together into realizing the goal of offering justices to people who have undergone through the hands of crime, punish and rehabilitate crime offenders and prevent different acts of misconduct in the future. People pay attention to the justice of the affected people and the punishment of the offenders forgetting that even the criminals are still ordinary human beings. This paper discusses the benefits of prisoner rehabilitation programs.

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Criminals may be considered not fit to mix with society; it does not mean that they should not be taken care of in their different aspects of life. The prisoner rehabilitation programs are one of the programs which try to help the crime offenders recover from their acts and have a pleasant experience afterward. The plans have different objectives in their work and have achieved a lot in their field. There are also several challenges that they face as they go about their business. Prisoners are persons who have been found guilty of committing different kinds of offenses and are serving their punishments with jail terms (Gallant, Sherry, et al. 2015). Prisoners undergo various psychological and health problems. Everyone who is a prisoner may have ended there with different reasons, and therefore it is essential to reconsider their welfare and to be given a second chance to change for the better in their lives. The prison itself serves as a rehabilitation center for offenders. Still, there are the special rehabilitation programs which are rolled out to prisoners both in jail by government or non-governmental organizations. Considering that prisoners are people who have committed different types of offenses, it is essential to group them into different categories where they can receive their rehabilitation programs at an individual level.

Rehabilitation can be termed as trying to intervene in a person's behavior or experience and regain the better side of the person. Rehabilitation programs are not only done to law offenders but other different kinds of persons like drug addicts, suicide attempts persons, sick persons, or persons undergoing psychological distress (Jonson & Cullen, 2015). The programs involve different activities depending on the persons receiving it. As mentioned earlier, rehabilitation is carried out by different people in different places but especially in areas where there are clients.

Regarding prisoners, their rehabilitation programs are different from the others; they involve mental interventions or sometimes physical but health-wise. The responses require specialists and may take some time. The most common things that include the process are trying to help the prisoners accept the situation and the experience that is going through. By allowing their case, it will help them to overcome the mixed emotions that come with the realization of their situation. It will also help them to serve and finish their jail terms with more ease, which is free from stress (Bosma, Kunst, et al.,2016). The other activities may involve taking them through the process of doing away with the behaviors and actions that led them to jail.

In some cases, prisoners might be bitter about their situation and would want to revenge by doing another wrong. By helping them to learn how to resolve the issue more critically, not to them only but to their targets too so that they will be able to get back into society as changed people. The primary purposes of prisons are to help individuals do away with their bad behaviors, which may have landed them into jail and be fit to go back to society. It is important to note that there are prisoners who are serving life imprisonment and are probably going through worse psychological problems. For them, they will be provided with different activates as part of rehabilitations, which they can involve in and make them live a healthy life. Acceptance is more important for those who are serving a lifetime jail because the fact might affect their new life and ends up having a miserable life in prison again.

There are many identified importance and benefits of rehabilitation programs for prisoners, which have been tested and proven. Rehabilitations help prisoners become self-sufficient with what is at hand. Considering that they do not have the freedom to do whatever they like, rehabilitation is there to equip them with what will supplement what they could want and become self-sufficient (Long, Sullivan, et al. 2019). Sports are there, and for sports lovers, it will be home away from home for them. Different career is also laid down for the prisoners to choose the ones they feel comfortable. The second benefit is to reduce the tendency of prisoners getting back into crime. Several prisoners have been getting back to their initial criminal activities after serving their jail term.

Rehabilitation helps prisoners to consent to their bad behaviors and learn how to engage in other meaningful activities. It will be an excellent achievement for a person to finish his or her jail term and come out a changed man or woman. That is what rehabilitation in jail helps to achieve. The third importance and achievement that rehabilitations for prisoners are determined in achieving are to lower the cost of prisoners. At a different angle, it is expensive to keep prisoners in jail. Prisoners require all the needs that a human being needs to live at the cost of the government (Lehmann, 2017). By providing rehabilitation programs, those who may have changed for the better might be released, and the price will have been cut down. By making prisoners turn, it means that they will not engage in crime, and the government will not have the burden of containing individuals who keep doing the wrong every time. The extreme importance of prisoners' rehabilitation is that it helps individuals regain the desired morals, which had been a problem even to themselves. Some people may be suffering from disorders, making them commit crimes. Rehabilitation helps those people to recollect themselves and control their bad behaviors through medical treatment or counseling.

The benefits that rehabilitation brings to prisoners and the general public does not come in a silver plate. Some challenges are associated with the processes. The cost of the process is expensive, and sometimes the resources are not enough, sacrifice is what helps to achieve the goals that are intended. The method of intervening in a person to regain a particular behavior is also not secure. In conclusion, when the objectives are achieved, it brings a positive impact on the people affected and eventually a better society, which is crime-free.

References

Gallant, D., Sherry, E., & Nicholson, M. (2015). Recreation or rehabilitation? Managing sport for development programs with prison populations. Sport management review, 18(1), 45-56.

Johnson, C. L., & Cullen, F. T. (2015). Prisoner reentry programs. Crime and justice, 44(1), 517-575.

Bosma, A., Kunst, M., Reef, J., Dirkzwager, A., & Nieuwbeerta, P. (2016). Prison-based Rehabilitation: Predictors of offender treatment participation and treatment completion. Crime & Delinquency, 62(8), 1095-1120.

Long, J. S., Sullivan, C., Wooldredge, J., Pompoco, A., & Lugo, M. (2019). Matching needs to services: Prison treatment program allocations. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 46(5), 674-696.

Lehmann, V. (2017). The prison library: A vital link to education, rehabilitation, and recreation. Education Libraries, 24(1), 5-10.