Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners • Hacker News Board

Re: Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners

#141

Post by artimaeis » Thu, Nov 10, 2016, 4:23 PM UTC

vivekd wrote: post #118

awjr wrote: post #22

The counter argument as to why there seem to be a lack of prisoners is under-resourcing the police. However the whole judicial system within the Netherlands appears to take a holistic approach to people, trying to help people get their lives back on track. Yes some people do need locking up, but there seems to be a recognition that locking up an addict for theft doesn't solve the long-term issue. Teaching them to man…

I used to think this way before I started practicing Criminal law. But after interacting with criminals, I'm starting to realize that these are not just otherwise innocent and good people who fell onto hard times or had trouble with an addiction. There are genuinely bad people out there, who just want to get what they want and are perfectly willing to hurt others to get it. It seems to me that, absent a desire to cha…

> "There are underlying mental issues [...]"

So in what way is incarceration going to help what you've identified as the likely root cause of the problem?

Incarceration only works if prisoners are given adequate care in all ways - especially mental. Rehabilitation should be the purpose. The Dutch system seems to believe that works best outside the walls of a prison cell.

Re: Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners

#142

Post by Retric » Thu, Nov 10, 2016, 4:25 PM UTC

vivekd wrote: post #118

awjr wrote: post #22

The counter argument as to why there seem to be a lack of prisoners is under-resourcing the police. However the whole judicial system within the Netherlands appears to take a holistic approach to people, trying to help people get their lives back on track. Yes some people do need locking up, but there seems to be a recognition that locking up an addict for theft doesn't solve the long-term issue. Teaching them to man…

I used to think this way before I started practicing Criminal law. But after interacting with criminals, I'm starting to realize that these are not just otherwise innocent and good people who fell onto hard times or had trouble with an addiction. There are genuinely bad people out there, who just want to get what they want and are perfectly willing to hurt others to get it. It seems to me that, absent a desire to cha…

There are plenty of 'Evil' CEO's, Doctors, and DBA's, that does not prevent them from functioning in society.

Addiction is very common on wall street, with enough money the external effects of addiction on society are less noticeable than you might think.

Re: Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners

#143

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Nov 10, 2016, 4:28 PM UTC

thecynh wrote: post #133

humbleMouse wrote: post #130

Anecdotally, I have been in jail in the netherlands before, and it's honestly not that bad of a place to be. Delicious food, thick mattresses, private cells. Also, all the surfaces are painted pink/yellow/white because those colors have been shown to calm people who are locked up.

Mind sharing what for? I assume it is quite a different experience depending on what you are "in" for?

[deleted]

Re: Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners

#144

Post by eric_the_read » Thu, Nov 10, 2016, 4:37 PM UTC

lisivka wrote: post #135

ordinary wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prison sentences in the Netherlands for aren't imposed as punishment alone, not even mostly. They are primarily tools of prevention (including the prevention of recidivism). If a convicted criminal is no longer considered to be a threat to society what's the point of keeping them locked up? If longer sentences (longer than whatever they are) have not shown to reduce the crime rate through deterrent, why impose them?…

If I have proposition to kill someone else for money, e.g. $10M, for exchange of 7 years in comfortable Dutch prison, I will grab the money.

If the only reason you haven't murdered anyone is that you haven't been offered enough money, I'm genuinely concerned.

Re: Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners

#145

Post by jlebrech » Thu, Nov 10, 2016, 4:43 PM UTC

67726e wrote: post #131

deadbunny wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure being sent to a (disused) prison would be a wonderful welcome to a country. I mean I'm all for helping newcomers but sending them into a prison might send the wrong message ;)

Might not sound great on a newspaper headline, "refugees being housed in prison" similar to how I saw something about refugees in Germany being housed in some former concentration camp or SS barrack or something like that. Assuming it's a re-purposed, former prison that might not be a terrible idea. If you're fleeing possible death, imprisonment, war, etc. I don't see why it would be terrible to have some sort of "Re…

this is the kind of thing I was thinking of. it might be the best solution, except for the connotations. but just letting them learn about the culture and knowing their whereabouts and figuring out if they have any criminal tendencies in a controlled environment should be beneficial for everyone.

Re: Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners

#146

Post by ars » Thu, Nov 10, 2016, 4:46 PM UTC

wnevets wrote: post #126

Aaargh20318 wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In NL and Finland and the like, prison is more like forced rehabilitation - it recognises that committing crimes have a reason, and by solving the reason you solve the criminal behaviour. As a Dutch guy, I agree with this in general. However, what the system does not take into account is that some people are just broken beyond any hope of ever being fixed. For example, there was a news story a while back about some…

> It was the 163rd time he got arrested. are you suggesting he should be locked up for a very long time for committing a lot of petty crimes?

No, lock him up to prevent him committing more crimes.

You might call them "petty" crimes as if they are nothing, but to the person involved they are a very big deal.

Re: Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners

#147

Post by mistermann » Thu, Nov 10, 2016, 4:50 PM UTC

CreRecombinase wrote: post #124

vivekd wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think this way before I started practicing Criminal law. But after interacting with criminals, I'm starting to realize that these are not just otherwise innocent and good people who fell onto hard times or had trouble with an addiction. There are genuinely bad people out there, who just want to get what they want and are perfectly willing to hurt others to get it. It seems to me that, absent a desire to cha…

If that's true, then there are lots of genuinely bad people wandering the streets of the Netherlands. If that's true then either 1) they're doing terrible things all the time and the state just isn't doing anything about it (this doesn't seem to be the case), or 2) these "bad" people, bad as they may be, aren't causing much trouble by being amongst the general public.

Could it not also mean, at least in part, that Dutch people are different? We have this word "culture" in our language, but people seem to think it is a mythical word.

Re: Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners

#148

Post by john_reel » Thu, Nov 10, 2016, 4:51 PM UTC

Waterluvian wrote: post #3

Maybe some prisons can fundamentally change to becoming some sort of YMCA-like environment. I imagine a lot of the prisoners are non violent. If so, I wonder if you could co-mingle those who live at the "prison" with those who go for the social activities and whatnot.

That would be interesting. AA and NA meetings have undeniably helped a lot of people break addictions and turn their lives around. If a criminal justice system is to improve people's lives and many of these prisoners are in for drug and alcohol related reasons, it only feels logical to me that at the very least, these meetings should be an option.

Come to think of it, if it worked out, I could see non-prisoners that feel they need help or could help others out going. While NA and AA meetings have the appeal of almost always being done in private, inconspicuous locations, I'm sure that at least a few people might still attend meetings held in a hypothetical YMCA-prison. It could help with situations like these where there is a lot of extra room in the prison. This might be best suited to drug rehab facilities, but I think that the idea could work anywhere with a receptive environment. It would probably be hard to give a prison of a good image though.

According to comments here, it seems like similar systems already exist in some countries. If this is true, how effective have they been?

Re: Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners

#149

Post by vivekd » Thu, Nov 10, 2016, 4:56 PM UTC

CreRecombinase wrote: post #124

vivekd wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think this way before I started practicing Criminal law. But after interacting with criminals, I'm starting to realize that these are not just otherwise innocent and good people who fell onto hard times or had trouble with an addiction. There are genuinely bad people out there, who just want to get what they want and are perfectly willing to hurt others to get it. It seems to me that, absent a desire to cha…

If that's true, then there are lots of genuinely bad people wandering the streets of the Netherlands. If that's true then either 1) they're doing terrible things all the time and the state just isn't doing anything about it (this doesn't seem to be the case), or 2) these "bad" people, bad as they may be, aren't causing much trouble by being amongst the general public.

There are dutch people in this comments section saying that laws are too lenient and that harsher prison sentences are needed. That should count for something. There was one commentor talking about how someone had assassinated a front-running political candidate and gotten off after a measly 12 years. That suggests to me that something is wrong.

Re: Dutch prison crisis: A shortage of prisoners

#150

Post by kaared » Thu, Nov 10, 2016, 5:03 PM UTC

messo wrote: post #86

The Netherlands is actually renting out prisons to Norway (and others). Norwegian prisons are famously comfortable and aimed at rehabilitation ( https://youtu.be/01mTKDaKa6Q?t=4m18s ) but we still have draconian drug laws (thanks to the US) that keep filling up the few prisons we do have. Half of our prison population is in for drug-related crimes. Luckily this is about to change, as our minister of health recently p…

According to https://www.ssb.no/fengsling/, for 2014 only 25% of inmates were incarcerated due to drug crimes. Of new incarcerations in 2014, drug crimes represented about 18% (because of other shorter sentences, e.g. traffic or financial crimes).