Prisoners held in record numbers

[Uthman]

Prisoners held in record numbers
Record numbers of prisoners are being held in prisons and police cells in England and Wales, the BBC has learnt. Official figures are not due to be released until Friday but the BBC understands there are now 80,199 inmates, including 351 in police cells.
Space in police cells has nearly run out, forcing the Home Office to use cells in courthouses.
Paul Cavadino, chief executive of crime reduction charity Nacro, said prison overcrowding increased reoffending.
The number of inmates has risen from just under 80,000 in February.
Police cells are being used as part of Operation Safeguard, which was implemented to try to ease overcrowding.



The law should require sentences to take account of the capacity of the prison system
Paul Cavadino
Chief executive of Nacro
But there are only 49 places left, so the National Offender Management Service is planning to use cells at two courts in the South East of England to cope with demand.
Both measures are part of a plan to provide an extra 8,000 cells across England and Wales over five years.
Mr Cavadino said: "The crisis of prison numbers is seriously damaging public safety by pushing up reoffending rates.
"The government should take urgent action to remove the option of imprisonment for low level offenders.
"The law should also require sentences to take account of the capacity of the prison system."
Prison governors are already sending inmates with only two weeks to serve to some of the spare beds that are available in open prisons.
However, the limits of this scheme are understood to have been reached because of the need to ensure inmates are suitable for a less secure environment.
Home Secretary John Reid last month announced plans to build two new prisons - one in Merseyside and one in London.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/h...cs/6507475.stm

Published: 2007/03/29 17:20:04 GMT

© BBC MMVII

postamble();

[Uthman]

:sl:

I feel this has some religious significance as well and it could make for some fruitful discussion about the application of the death penalty in Islam.

*Hopes the thread doesn't get ignored*

:w:

[wilberhum]

:sl:

I feel this has some religious significance as well and it could make for some fruitful discussion about the application of the death penalty in Islam.

*Hopes the thread doesn't get ignored*

:w:

What is the "Religious Significance"? :skeleton:
The death penalty is barbaric. :raging: And yes I know the US still does it. :omg:

[Uthman]

Hi Wilberhum,

Hope you are well. :)

What is the "Religious Significance"? :skeleton:

That is clarified by the rest of the post (death penalty). Sorry, I should have been more clear.

The death penalty is barbaric. :raging:

Well, I think it's another one of those 'world-view' things, much like the roles of women in Islam. I think the death penalty and the application of other similar punishments in Islam could save a lot of the hassle explained in the article. Don't you agree?

And yes I know the US still does it. :omg:

Didn't know that. Contrary to what you might believe, I'm not very well-versed in politics. :-[ Can you expand on this a little bit, please?

Peace

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[Woodrow]

If it is like here in the US nearly all of the incarcerated will be for drug related reasons. We worry about bombs and terrorists but our real war should be against drugs and drug suppliers.

[wilberhum]

Osman,

The US still has the death penalty and uses it. I don’t know what more there is to explain.
I think the death penalty and the application of other similar punishments in Islam could save a lot of the hassle explained in the article. Don't you agree?

No! I thought I made that obvious.
In Islam. Where is that? Iran, or where?

[Uthman]

Hi Wilberhum,

The US still has the death penalty and uses it. I don’t know what more there is to explain.

Fair enough. But for what crimes?

No! I thought I made that obvious.

No? So you think that the problems presented in the article would continue regardless of whether capital punishment was in place, or not?

In Islam. Where is that? Iran, or where?

I meant as part of the Islamic belief system.

Regards

[Woodrow]

Hi Wilberhum,



Fair enough. But for what crimes?

the crimes punishable by death will vary state by state. Texas uses the Death Penalty for more crimes than any other state.

A New one was just added:

Repeat sex offenders to face capital punishment in Texas
From Wikinews, the free news source you can write!
Jump to: navigation, search

March 7, 2007

A bill on death penalty for repeated child sex offenders was given preliminary approval by Texas House of Representatives. The bill is called Jessica's Law, after a nine-year old Florida girl who was raped and murdered by John Couey, who had a prior history of sexual assault on minors.

Jessica's law is intended to crack down on sexual offenders who continually repeat the crime. With this bill Texas becomes the sixth American state to allow death sentence for continual sex offenders.

The lawmakers voted to set up a new category of crime: repeated sexual assault on a child or children. This category of crime carries 25 years in prison or capital punishment for a repeated sexual abuse of a child.

At first the Lone Star State's House of Representatives delayed voting on a broader death sentence provision as the lawmakers had worries that it could lead some assaulters to kill their victims. They came back for a vote after talking to district attorneys and victim advocacy groups.

The bill implies a so called "Romeo and Juliet“ exception that is intended to avoid prosecuting high school romances.

Jessica's Law also annulates the limitations for many sex crimes against children, such as indecency with a child and aggravated sexual assault.

Texas leads the USA in executions. I can't find a full list of all the crimes that carry the Death penalty here. But it is a fairly long list.

Out of our 50 States 42 have the Death Penalty for various crimes. Here is a list on how the 42 States compared by number of executions.

http://www.statemaster.com/graph/cri...ons-since-1930

I did find an older listing of offenses that require the Death Penalty by State:

http://www.statemaster.com/graph/cri...pital-offenses

[Uthman]

:sl:

I have to say, that information is completely new to me. Says a lot about me, I suppose.

Brother Woodrow, do you find crime rates have reduced or are reducing generally in your Texas?

:w:

[Woodrow]

:sl:

I have to say, that information is completely new to me. Says a lot about me, I suppose.

Brother Woodrow, do you find crime rates have reduced or are reducing generally in your Texas?

:w:

Texas is unusual.

Texas always had a very high rate of execution. Under the old Republic of Texas there was no actual law except that enforced through privately hired police.

In spite of have the toughest laws in the nation the Crime rate has increased dramatically. Rate now Texas has one of the highest rates for violent crime of all of the states.

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0004912.html




Here is a list of prisons in Texas that are managed by TDCJ (Texas Dept of Criminal Justice)

http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/stat/unitdirectory/all.htm

Right now Texas has 706,600 Prisoners incarcerated in The State prisons.

http://www.cjcj.org/pubs/texas/texas.html

That is just in the Prisons under TDCJ

Each county also has it's own jails so outside of the State Prisons we have 254 county Jails, one for each county. I can't find the number of inmates in them ,

Texas has always had very tough laws for law breakers and the State shows no mercy.

However, Austin here in Travis County has about the lowest crime rate in the entire nation. the crime rate is 83 per 100,000 residents. Roughly about 100 crimes per year for the county. Violent crimes are low with typicayl no murders in any given year and the average number being 1 per year.

http://www.forbes.com/finance/lists/...&datatype=Misc

[Uthman]

:sl: Brother Woodrow,

Jazakallahu Khayran for all the information.

Texas is unusual.

I'll say. I would have thought that the tough laws would act as some sort of deterrent for Texas as a whole. Travis County seem to make a lot more sense though in that regard.

Regardless, I still feel that the presence of capital punishment is responsible for Saudi Arabia having one of the lowest crime rates in the world. I don't think there is any coincidence that the countries with the lowest crime rates are the ones with capital punishment.

:w:

[wilberhum]

:sl: Brother Woodrow,

Jazakallahu Khayran for all the information.



I'll say. I would have thought that the tough laws would act as some sort of deterrent for Texas as a whole. Travis County seem to make a lot more sense though in that regard.

Regardless, I still feel that the presence of capital punishment is responsible for Saudi Arabia having one of the lowest crime rates in the world. I don't think there is any coincidence that the countries with the lowest crime rates are the ones with capital punishment.

:w:

I think you are ignoring the thousands of factors involved and only looking at one. Research shows that capital punishment is of little deterrent.

[Woodrow]

:sl: Brother Woodrow,

Jazakallahu Khayran for all the information.



I'll say. I would have thought that the tough laws would act as some sort of deterrent for Texas as a whole. Travis County seem to make a lot more sense though in that regard.

Regardless, I still feel that the presence of capital punishment is responsible for Saudi Arabia having one of the lowest crime rates in the world. I don't think there is any coincidence that the countries with the lowest crime rates are the ones with capital punishment.

:w:

:w:

Like I said Texas is very unusual. One thing that may have seen an increase in the number of crimes is because of drug trafficing. Texas has the largest unprotected Southern border in the US so the majority of drug traffickers do pass through Texas. Even if a person has a fast vehicle it is over 24 hours of non stop driving to cross the state.

Drug crimes have been increasing throughout the country so there are now more drug traffickers passing through the state. I just got to wondering how many of the people convicted of crimes in Texas were Texas residents?

[Trumble]

Going back somewhat, this has very little to do with serious crimes, let alone the death penalty. The increase is principally due to many more receiving custodial sentences for lesser crimes in an attempt by the government to be seen as 'tough' on crime.

[Woodrow]

Going back somewhat, this has very little to do with serious crimes, let alone the death penalty. The increase is principally due to many more receiving custodial sentences for lesser crimes in an attempt by the government to be seen as 'tough' on crime.

That is true. right now I know that the majority of the peoplw in the Texas jails would not have been in jail a few years ago. they would have paid a fine and gone home. But, the push now seems to be for jail time.

It might be that the crime rate hasn't increased but the number of arrests have.

[Uthman]

Hi, :)

I think you are ignoring the thousands of factors involved and only looking at one.

I agree with you that there are other factors involved. I'm not sure whether you meant 'thousands' in the literal sense but I agree that there are quite a few. However, I also think that capital punishment is quite a significant one.

Research shows that capital punishment is of little deterrent.

Having done some research of my own, I have concluded that there are statistics and evidence to support both sides of our argument. You could cite yours, I could cite mine yet what I really want (with your consent) is to talk about the moral justification of capital punishment. (I assure you this is not a cop-out)

You said that the death penalty is barbaric. I disagree. I feel that if someone murders with deliberate intention, then they deserve to die. I think this is Justice.

Aside, I know that that the article isn't directly related with the discussion we're having. It's just a stimulus I posted with the intention of steering the discussion this way. Sly, don't you think? :X

Regards

[wilberhum]

Osman,
It has been about 5 years since I have done any research on capital punishment. What I found is what you found. Some find that it makes no difference, some find it makes a little difference.
Whether or not it is barbaric is personal openion. Your openion is as valuable as mine. So I guess we will just agree to disagree.
My turning point from pro to anti capital punishment came about mostly because we have a flawed legal system. Inocent people DO get executed.

[Woodrow]

Inocent people DO get executed.

That is a side of the coin that has to be shown for people to make eduacated decisions about it. I believe it has been shown here in Texas over 30 people were found to be innocent after they were executed.

[Uthman]

Hi Wilberhum,

Thanks very much for your post. :) I guess we will agree to disagree.

My turning point from pro to anti capital punishment came about mostly because we have a flawed legal system. Inocent people DO get executed.

I'm pretty sure that you will already know this, but I would just like to add that under Islamic law no punishment is applied unless there is absolute certainty that the person is guilty.

So I am pro capital punishment with the correct implementation that I believe Islamic law offers.

Our stances are clear, so thanks for your posts.

Peace

[wilberhum]

I'm pretty sure that you will already know this, but I would just like to add that under Islamic law no punishment is applied unless there is absolute certainty that the person is guilty.

So I am pro capital punishment with the correct implementation that I believe Islamic law offers.

You are back to dreaming. Governments are operated by people. People lack perfection, some are down right evil. You speak of Utopia, I speak of reality.

[Woodrow]

Hi Wilberhum,

Thanks very much for your post. :) I guess we will agree to disagree.



I'm pretty sure that you will already know this, but I would just like to add that under Islamic law no punishment is applied unless there is absolute certainty that the person is guilty.

So I am pro capital punishment with the correct implementation that I believe Islamic law offers.

Our stances are clear, so thanks for your posts.

Peace

I will agree with the, but I would add that capital punishment shoule not be used by any country that has shown it's legal system can have errors.

I will agree that under true Islamic Law only the guilty would ever be punished, so that is a different situation.

[KAding]

So I am pro capital punishment with the correct implementation that I believe Islamic law offers.

How does Islamic law lead to less innocents being executed? What about the system prevents innocents from being convicted?

[Woodrow]

How does Islamic law lead to less innocents being executed? What about the system prevents innocents from being convicted?

The burdan of proving guilt against a Muslim in a Muslim country is a very difficult thing to do.A Muslim is considered to be valued at his word and as a Muslim he would be obligated to admit to guilt and be willing to accept his punishment. To prove that he is a liar requires many witnesses and much verifiable evidence as it is a grave sin to call another Muslim a Liar and it not be true.

However, that is a moot point as there is no true Islamic country. And there is no country in which true sharia law could be implemented in today's world. so in a true Islamic Country and under true Sharia Law it would be impossible to punish an innocent man as the fact he says he is innocent is sufficient to prove his innocence.

[wilberhum]

the fact he says he is innocent is sufficient to prove his innocence.

One major gaping hole. It operates on the assumption that no Muslim would Lie. Hardly realistic.

[Woodrow]

One major gaping hole. It operates on the assumption that no Muslim would Lie. Hardly realistic.

In todays world that is true. It would take a fully Islamic Country and for all of the inhabitants to be strong pious Muslims for it to work without error. I doubt if we will see that until the Mahdi and Jesus(as) come and a true Caliphate is established.

[wilberhum]

In todays world that is true.

?????????????????????????????????????????????
Is that operating on the assumption that there was a time when no Muslim would Lie?

[Woodrow]

?????????????????????????????????????????????
Is that operating on the assumption that there was a time when no Muslim would Lie?

It is operating on the assumption that I was not alive before my birth and the future hasn't come so the only things I have personal knowledge of are what I see in today's world

I can see the possibility that at some times in the past there were times when no Muslim would lie. However, I can not offer any verification of such, so that would be either an assumption or a hope, as far as trying to explain it to a Non-Muslim. But, I think many Muslims including myself do believe that there had been some true caliphs in the past and those that lived within the caliphate would not lie.

[wilberhum]

and those that lived within the caliphate would not lie.

I believe that would be matter of faith.

[Keltoi]

I'm sort of like Wilberhum on this issue of capital punishment. I used to be a supporter of execution, but after studying up on the issue I realized that the number of innocent people executed by the legal system was unacceptable. There will probably never be a perfect legal system, but if capital punishment is allowed, there should be a very high standard of evidence.

[Woodrow]

I'm sort of like Wilberhum on this issue of capital punishment. I used to be a supporter of execution, but after studying up on the issue I realized that the number of innocent people executed by the legal system was unacceptable. There will probably never be a perfect legal system, but if capital punishment is allowed, there should be a very high standard of evidence.

I agree with that. the evidence must be greater then beyond a reasonable doubt. There must be absolute certainty and actual living trustworthy witnesses. Forensic evidence can be very compelling, but no matter how compelling it is, there can be other explanations, although not likely, but possible.