Paying for the past : the case against prior record sentence enhancements /
Virtually all modern sentencing systems consider the offender's prior record to be an important determinant of the form and severity of punishment, often carrying more weight than the crime being sentenced. Repeat offenders "pay for their past," even though they have already been puni...
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| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
New York, NY :
Oxford University Press,
2019
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| Subjects: | |
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| Summary: | Virtually all modern sentencing systems consider the offender's prior record to be an important determinant of the form and severity of punishment, often carrying more weight than the crime being sentenced. Repeat offenders "pay for their past," even though they have already been punished for their prior crimes. And the majority of sentenced offenders have at least one prior conviction. This topic thus lies at the heart of the sentencing process; every well-designed sentencing scheme needs to have a carefully conceived approach to the use of prior convictions. But the vast literature on sentencing policy, law, and practice has generally overlooked this issue. Moreover, the apparent justifications for prior record enhancement--the repeat offender's assumed greater culpability and risk of re-offending--are uncertain, and have rarely been subjected to critical appraisal. Nor has sufficient attention been paid to the substantial negative consequences of such enhancements, which: increase the size and expense of prison populations; impose penalties disproportionate to offense severity; fill prisons with nonviolent and aging, lower-risk offenders; increase racial disproportionality in prison populations; and undermine offenders' efforts to reintegrate into society. This book focuses on prior record enhancements under sentencing guidelines systems in the United States because sentencing rules operate more transparently in those systems. But the policy implications are much broader. Similar enhancements are informally applied, with substantial impacts, when judges sentence without guidelines. And most jurisdictions have statutes (three-strikes and career-offender laws; higher penalties for second and subsequent violations) that impose much more severe penalties on repeat offenders |
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| Physical Description: | xiv, 315 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references (pages 269-289) and index. |
| ISBN: | 9780190254001 0190254009 |