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The Dutch Prison Crisis: a Shortage of Prisoners

posted by martyb on Saturday November 12 2016, @12:01AM   Printer-friendly
from the saving-more-than-just-money dept.

Phoenix666 writes:

While the UK and much of the world struggles with overcrowded prisons, the Netherlands has the opposite problem. It is actually short of people to lock up. In the past few years 19 prisons have closed down and more are slated for closure next year. How has this happened - and why do some people think it's a problem?
...
"In the Dutch service we look at the individual," says Van der Spoel.

"If somebody has a drug problem we treat their addiction, if they are aggressive we provide anger management, if they have got money problems we give them debt counselling. So we try to remove whatever it was that caused the crime. The inmate himself or herself must be willing to change but our method has been very effective. Over the last 10 years, our work has improved more and more."

He adds that some persistent offenders - known in the trade as "revolving-door criminals" - are eventually given two-year sentences and tailor-made rehabilitation programmes. Fewer than 10% then return to prison after their release. In England and Wales, and in the United States, roughly half of those serving short sentences reoffend within two years, and the figure is often higher for young adults.

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  • (Score: 2, Informative) by kc on Saturday November 12 2016, @05:18PM

    by kc (5066) on Saturday November 12 2016, @05:18PM (#426078)

    This idea has already been tried. It is literally slavery as punishment for a crime. And it is still for-profit and therefore it would be abused to provide cheap labor for either public property or for private companies.

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  • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday November 13 2016, @12:37AM

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Sunday November 13 2016, @12:37AM (#426163) Journal

    First - define "slavery". No, this is NOT slavery. This is more like bond servitude. Bond servitude and slavery are remotely related, for sure, in that a person is deprived of some freedoms in either case. But, a bond servant has a lot more freedoms than either a slave, OR a person in prison. A bond servant gets to go home at night, see his family, go to a movie, enjoy social and/or sexual intercourse - the list goes on.

    Bond servitude is vastly preferable to our current prison system. Vastly.

    And, the whole pupose of this exercise, is to ensure that people learn to WANT TO WORK, and WANT TO STAY OUT OF TROUBLE!!