|
Indefinite Imprisonment
Indefinite imprisonment or indeterminate imprisonment is the imposition of a sentence of imprisonment with no definite period of time set during sentencing. It was imposed by certain nations in the past, before the drafting of the United Nations Convention against Torture (CAT). The length of an indefinite imprisonment was determined during imprisonment based on the inmate's conduct. The inmate could have been returned to society or be kept in prison for life. In theory, an indefinite prison sentence could be very short, or it could be a life sentence if no decision is made after sentencing to lift the term. In many cases, either a minimum term is imposed or the maximum that can be served is the maximum allowable by law in the jurisdiction for the particular offense. Rationale The main reason for imposing indefinite (as opposed to fixed) sentences is to protect the community. An offender can then be kept behind bars until it is determined the offender would not pose any da ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Sentence (law)
In criminal law, a sentence is the punishment for a crime ordered by a trial court after conviction in a criminal procedure, normally at the conclusion of a trial. A sentence may consist of imprisonment, a fine, or other sanctions. Sentences for multiple crimes may be a concurrent sentence, where sentences of imprisonment are all served together at the same time, or a consecutive sentence, in which the period of imprisonment is the sum of all sentences served one after the other. Additional sentences include intermediate, which allows an inmate to be free for about 8 hours a day for work purposes; determinate, which is fixed on a number of days, months, or years; and indeterminate or bifurcated, which mandates the minimum period be served in an institutional setting such as a prison followed by street time period of parole, supervised release or probation until the total sentence is completed. If a sentence is reduced to a less harsh punishment, then the sentence is sai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Life Imprisonment
Life imprisonment is any sentence (law), sentence of imprisonment under which the convicted individual is to remain incarcerated for the rest of their natural life (or until pardoned or commuted to a fixed term). Crimes that result in life imprisonment are considered extremely serious and usually violent. Examples of these crimes are murder, torture, terrorism, child abuse Child manslaughter, resulting in death, rape, espionage, treason, illegal drug trade, human trafficking, severe fraud and financial crimes, Aggravation (law), aggravated property damage, arson, hate crime, kidnapping, burglary, robbery, theft, piracy, aircraft hijacking, and genocide. Common law murder is a crime for which life imprisonment is mandatory in several countries, including some states of the United States and Canada. Life imprisonment (as a maximum term) can also be imposed, in certain countries, for traffic offences causing death. Life imprisonment is not used in all countries; Portugal was the fi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Involuntary Commitment
Involuntary commitment, civil commitment, or involuntary hospitalization/hospitalisation, or informally in Britain sectioning, being sectioned, commitment, or being committed, is a legal process through which an individual who is deemed by a qualified person to have symptoms of severe mental disorder is detained in a psychiatric hospital (inpatient) where they can be treated involuntarily. This treatment may involve the administration of psychoactive drugs, including involuntary administration. In many jurisdictions, people diagnosed with mental health disorders can also be forced to undergo treatment while in the community; this is sometimes referred to as outpatient commitment and shares legal processes with commitment. Criteria for civil commitment are established by laws which vary between nations. Commitment proceedings often follow a period of emergency hospitalization, during which an individual with acute psychiatric symptoms is confined for a relatively short duration ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Three-strikes Law
In the United States, habitual offender laws (commonly referred to as three-strikes laws) have been implemented since at least 1952, and are part of the United States Justice Department's Anti-Violence Strategy. These laws require a person who is convicted of an offense and who has one or two other previous serious convictions to serve a mandatory life sentence in prison, with or without parole depending on the jurisdiction. The purpose of the laws is to drastically increase the punishment of those who continue to commit offenses after being convicted of one or two serious crimes. Twenty-eight states have some form of a "three-strikes" law. A person accused under such laws is referred to in a few states (notably Connecticut and Kansas) as a "persistent offender", while Missouri uses the unique term "prior and persistent offender". In most jurisdictions, only crimes at the felony level qualify as serious offenses, with some jurisdictions further restricting qualifying offenses to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Indefinite Detention Without Trial
Indefinite detention is the incarceration of an arrested person by a national government or law enforcement agency for an indefinite amount of time without a trial. The Human Rights Watch considers this practice as violating national and international laws, particularly human rights laws, although it remains in legislation in various liberal democracies. In recent years, governments have indefinitely incarcerated individuals suspected of terrorism, often in black sites, sometimes declaring them enemy combatants – a notable example being the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. Formalized forms of indefinite detention also exist in some countries around the world in the form of government-mandated administrative detention. Views by country While laws that allow indefinite detention are present in many countries, including liberal democracies, human rights groups hold unfavorable views towards the practice. Australia In Australia, indefinite detention is unlawful and violates the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
At His Majesty's Pleasure
At His Majesty's pleasure (when the reigning monarch is female, at Her Majesty's pleasure), sometimes abbreviated to the King's pleasure (or the Queen's pleasure), is a term of art in public law and in penal law. In public law, it refers to the indeterminate or undetermined length of service of certain appointed officials. This is based on the proposition that certain government officials are appointed by the Crown and can be removed for policy reasons, unlike employees. Originating in the United Kingdom, the phrase is now used throughout the Commonwealth realms, Lesotho, Eswatini, Brunei, and other monarchies, such as Spain, the Netherlands, and Oman. In realms where the monarch is represented by a governor-general, governor, lieutenant governor, or Administrator of the Government, administrator, the phrase may be modified to be ''at the governor's pleasure'' or variations thereof, since the governor-general, governor, lieutenant governor, or administrator is the monarch's person ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Federal Supervised Release
United States federal probation and supervised release are imposed at sentencing. The difference between probation and supervised release is that the former is imposed as a substitute for imprisonment, or in addition to home detention, while the latter is imposed in addition to imprisonment. Probation and supervised release are both administered by the U.S. Probation and Pretrial Services System. Federal probation has existed since 1909, while supervised release has only existed since 1987, when it replaced federal parole as a means for imposing supervision following release from prison. More than 8 in 10 offenders sentenced to federal prison also undergo court-ordered supervised release. In 2015, approximately 115,000 offenders were serving supervised release, with these offenders spending an average of four years under supervision. Some conditions of probation and supervised release, such as compliance with drug tests, are made mandatory by statute, while others are optional. S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Good Conduct Time
Good conduct time, good time credit, good time, or time off for good behavior is a sentence reduction given to prisoners who maintain good behavior while imprisoned. In Florida, it is known as gain time. Good conduct time can be forfeited if a prisoner is determined to have committed disciplinary infractions and/or crimes while incarcerated. In the United States, the earliest versions of "good time" or "gain time" were in place by 1850 as an alternative "to corporal punishment to motivate offenders who were not willing to work as expected". The concept was in use by 38 states by 1890 and 46 states by 1910. Good conduct time is intended to incentivize prisoners to comply with prison rules and refrain from committing additional crimes behind bars—especially acts of violence towards other inmates and correctional officers—thereby ensuring that a prison can be run in a cost-effective manner with a higher ratio of inmates to correctional officers. Prisoners known to be uncontr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Retributive Justice
Retributive justice is a legal concept whereby the criminal offender receives punishment proportional or similar to the crime. As opposed to revenge, retribution—and thus retributive justice—is not personal, is directed only at wrongdoing, has inherent limits, involves no pleasure at the suffering of others (i.e., '' schadenfreude'', sadism), and employs procedural standards. Retributive justice contrasts with other purposes of punishment such as deterrence (prevention of future crimes), exile (prevention of opportunity) and rehabilitation of the offender. The concept is found in most world cultures and in many ancient texts. Classical texts advocating the retributive view include Cicero's '' De Legibus'' (1st century BC), Immanuel Kant's ''Science of Right'' (1790), and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel's '' Elements of the Philosophy of Right'' (1821). The presence of retributive justice in ancient Jewish culture is shown by its mention in the law of Moses, which refers ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Model Penal Code
The Model Penal Code (MPC) is a model act designed to stimulate and assist U.S. state legislatures to update and standardize the penal law of the United States.MPC (Foreword). The MPC was a project of the American Law Institute (ALI), and was published in 1962 after a ten-year drafting period. The chief reporter on the project was Herbert Wechsler, and contributors included Sanford Kadish and numerous other noted criminal law scholars, prosecutors, and defense lawyers.Wechsler (1952)Dubber (2015, pp. 7-10). The ALI performed an examination of the penal system in the U.S. and the prohibitions, sanctions, excuses, and authority used throughout in order to arrive at a cohesive synthesis to the extent possible, and the best rules for the penal system in the United States. Primary responsibility for criminal law lies with the individual states, which over the years led to great inconsistency among the various state penal codes. The MPC was meant to be a comprehensive criminal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Parole
Parole, also known as provisional release, supervised release, or being on paper, is a form of early release of a prisoner, prison inmate where the prisoner agrees to abide by behavioral conditions, including checking-in with their designated parole officers, or else they may be rearrested and returned to prison. Originating from the French word ('speech, spoken words' but also 'promise'), the term became associated during the Middle Ages with the release of prisoners who gave their word. This differs greatly from pardon, amnesty or commutation of sentence in that parolees are still considered to be serving their sentences, and may be returned to prison if they violate the conditions of their parole. It is similar to probation, the key difference being that parole takes place after a prison sentence, while probation can be granted in lieu of a prison sentence. Modern development Alexander Maconochie (penal reformer), Alexander Maconochie, a Scottish geographer and captain i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
Prison
A prison, also known as a jail, gaol, penitentiary, detention center, correction center, correctional facility, or remand center, is a facility where Prisoner, people are Imprisonment, imprisoned under the authority of the State (polity), state, usually as punishment for various crimes. They may also be used to house those awaiting trial (pre-trial detention). Prisons are most commonly used within a criminal justice, criminal-justice system by authorities: people charged with crimes may be Remand (detention), imprisoned until their trial; and those who have pleaded or been found Guilt (law), guilty of crimes at trial may be Sentence (law), sentenced to a specified period of imprisonment. Prisons can also be used as a tool for political repression by authoritarianism, authoritarian regimes who Political prisoner, detain perceived opponents for political crimes, often without a fair trial or due process; this use is illegal under most forms of international law governing fair admi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] [Amazon] |
