On Fri, 30 Dec 2011 20:44:25 -0500, Bruce
wrote:

"Peter Masson" wrote:
What is the point of long prison sentences? Right, there is a small
number
of criminals who are so dangerous that they have to be locked up
for many
years, perhaps life, for public protection. But for most, if the
sentence
involved intensive education, training, and therapy to address
criminal
behaviour, nothing more will be achieved after about three years,
so it's a
waste of taxpayers' money to lock them up for longer. It's no use
arguing
that long sentences are a deterrent - criminals aren't deterred by
prison,
and the people who are deterred by prison wouldn't dream of
committing
crimes anyway.


Long sentences might be a deterrent if more offenders were caught and
prosecuted. Police clear-up rates are pathetically low - the
Metropolitan Police managed only 16% in recent figures, down from the
low 20s several years ago.

That figure possibly makes insufficient sense when not subdivided by
offences. Many more minor offences will be doomed to non-clearance for
a number of practical reasons, possibly mostly a lack of usable
evidence (or any evidence at all sometimes, know what I mean [TM).
Some will also have unrecorded clearups by the offenders being nicked
for something else later. I suspect the same applies to some extent
with other metropolitan areas.

When 84% get off scot-free, the length of the sentence for the 16%
who get caught and prosecuted is almost irrelevant.