Living Life in Confinement
Four walls, one bed, no windows, eating less than desirable food, and facing harsh punishment for the slightest step out of place- this is life in confinement. Life sentences are beginning to be a more commonly given punishment in American courts. There is great controversy as to whether a person should spend the rest of their life in jail or prison for a wrongful act they did a long time ago.
The youngest person to be given a life sentence was Lionel Tate at the age of fourteen, though he was twelve when he killed a child his mom was babysitting(Criminal Justice Degrees Guide). His story was that they were wrestling and it was an accident, an injury report showed otherwise. He would have originally spent the rest of his life in confinement for something that he did when he was twelve! He did get out of jail but continued getting into trouble throughout his life. However, we have to question how many of those problems arose from the trauma he suffered at such an early age.
There needs to be an alternative to losing their futures because of one mistake. If a person is a repeated offender and it seems that they just can’t stay out of trouble, there has to be something wrong with them. Maybe their home life is so horrible they will do anything to get away; maybe they aren’t there mentally; maybe they haven’t been taught anything but cruelty.
Life sentences can be given for a countless number of offenses including kidnapping. But those looking from the outside often don’t see the motives for kidnapping. There are multiple cases of one parent stealing a child because the other parent is mistreating them. However, they are charged with kidnapping and their child is taken back. The police may eventually understand the problem at hand and the child may be returned, but drastic measures have to be taken before anything is done. Life sentences may also be given out for drug dealing, but there are very few people who, as a little kid, dream of being a drug dealer. All too often it happens to young kids who need money to support their family or get mixed in with the wrong crowd. They don’t understand the consequences may result in them never seeing their family again- try explaining that to them when their family is starving.
In movies we often learn to love and have sympathy of the villain because we see their backstory and come to understand their actions but in real life we jump to conclusions. No one wants to try and feel nice for this person because they are considered inhuman, we don’t consider if they have a family at home who is crying because their child, brother, mom, whoever it may be, has been taken away due to breaking the law. Character is not determined by one event in our life, it is manipulated by each of our decisions. If there were something in place to show them love, compassion, and the right way to act, not just one life would be saved.
New drivers in high school often cause accidents and sometimes even cost lives but they don’t deserve to have their future robbed from them before their brain is fully matured. When will society learn that taking the offender’s life to make up for an accidental loss of a life is not equal? There is no one human equal to another. It is tragic, yes, but that is not “justice”. Many don’t spend the rest of their lives behind bars but do serve time. Arguably, the worst thing they have to live with is the fact that they killed another.
A program for the people in these cases would be the best thing possible. There, they would work to pay for their stay, benefiting the community because they aren’t living on government funding. It would also occupy their minds and what they produce would be of use to others. There would be administration there to teach them how to manage problems and get to know them as a person, building bonds and life long friendship. They would also be allowed to have pets teaching them responsibility and receiving the calming effects of animals. Their animals would also be another bond they create. When you feel you are letting someone down, no matter who it is, it’s a powerful feeling that may be strong enough to change their minds. There would be activities to help them discover their strong points and skills which would later be used to find them a job. Ultimately they would be grateful and happy to live in this program because they know the other option was a grim life behind bars.
After, an evaluation would serve to say whether the person may be released and allowed to live alone or if they needed to have a guardian present. Follow-ups would be made regularly and paid for by their mandatory job. Instead of throwing them into jail for the rest of their lives on government funding, they would learn how to be a productive member of society.
