Friday, June 29, 2007
Criminal Justice – Question 7
Question for Warren K and Sarah L. Describe the various kinds of local detention facilities, what determines whom they house, and how have their operations been affected by federal intervention? (Write separate paragraphs on each point with an extra line separating the paragraphs!)
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
There are three types of local detention facilities. The first and smallest is the overnight lockup. The next facility is the jail. The overnight lockup is a simple holding cell that is located inside the police department. The third facility is the county prison.
The lockup holds inmates for no more than 48 hours. The people locked up in these holding cells are mostly people who have just been arrested. After a hearing, the inmates are either released or moved to a larger facility. The jail is operated by the county or some other large municipality. The majority are operated by sheriffs. Larger jails can hold 100+ inmates while some smaller jails can hold fewer than 10. The larger jails are called “designated facilities” by SCDC. Being called a “designated facility” allows the jail to take trustees (low-risk inmates from the State prison system) as maintenance staff, janitors, etc. The main distinctions between jails and lockups the security level, size, and services available. County prisons hold inmates who have sentences of 90 days or less, inmates from SCDC who are near release or low-risk. Officials in county prisons can assign inmates to public works jobs. County prisons are mostly minimum security.
Before the mid-1980’s, South Carolina did not have a good record when it came to inmate’s rights. In 1985 the federal courts placed the SC correctional system into receivership with Nelson v. Locke. The case put prisons under federal control with regard to the inmate’s right to be protected from cruel and unusual punishment. All correctional operations must follow the standards set forth by the SCDC. These standards include housing limits, fire safety, and prisoner handling.
-Sarah Luckey
We have the overnight lock up, which only houses you overnight in the local police station. Then we have the common jail, and lastly is the prison.
In the overnight lockup you are not housed longr that 48 hours. They are plaed in holding cells and they are people who have recently been arrested and once they have been to their hearing then they are moved to another, larger faclity, or they are releaded.
Jails tend to be operated by the county, and usually are run by the sheriffs. In some areas larger jails are needed and in some areas smaller once do just fine.
County prisons are for inmates who are in for at least 90 days. They also have a system that allows them to work in the jails as trustees doing maintenance, and other low risk of escaping jobs.
The biggest difference in the lock ups, jails, and county prisons are the number of inmates it can hold, the time that a person is allowed to stay in a particular facility, and the size of a faclity, and lastly the services that are avalible to them.
Both answers wre adequate, but Sarah's was particularly good, covering the pressure that the SCDC has been under since the Nelson lawsuit.
The most recent flap is over whether the SCDC can withhold food for prisoners who do not follow rules. The SCDC will probably lose this fight and have to use other means to punish those who violate dress codes and other similar rules. Withholding food as punishment is considered "cruel and unusual punishment" by federal courts.
Bob B
Post a Comment