The Prisons, do they work?

This assignment looks at why and then whether prison works as an answer to all serious crime committed by adults. Is prison there simply to punish people or to make them better people, to deter them from committing more crime or just to make society feel safer?

People have to be put in prison as a result of the crimes people have committed. Some crimes more serious then others so are treated differently. The more serious a crime, generally the higher prison category and prison sentence they serve.

As a result of going to prison I believe that a lot of inmates return to society and re-offend again due to many reasons. One of those reasons is that some people feel let down and angered by the justice system. Another reason is that people feel out of place in society and are institutionalised. They are so used to prison life they cannot cope and re-adjust normally in society.

English: The main cellblock taken by ghostieguide ...

English: Lörrach: prison Deutsch: Lörrach: Justi...

Mountjoy Prison, the main committal prison in the ...

This issue needs to be resolved by the legal system so help stop re-offending. Some people re-offend due to the lack of skills they have, the average reading age in prisons are those similar to that of a 12 or 13 year old. For some the only way to survive is to commit crime. Due to the lack of educational facilities in prisons, a lot of the re-offending will continue. In juvenile prisons, like Feltham the re-offending rate is up to 80% where are another juvenile prison which has a nick name called "Boot camp", this has American characteristics that disciplines and educated inmates and the re-offending rate is less then half that of Feltham.

Prisons "may well be an obstacle to the fight against crime", (Adam Sampson) in my opinion, prisons, harbour, brew and make criminals stronger and angered...