Introduction
The criminal justice system, entrusted with ensuring public safety, delivering justice, and fostering offender rehabilitation, confronts a persistent challenge: a high rate of recidivism, particularly among violent criminals. This policy recommendation leans towards compulsory counseling and support programs for violent offenders while in prison as well as after reintegration into society. The plan elaborates on the planning and budgeting process to highlight its importance and the potential impact it can have on the criminal justice environment. This initiative aims to fight the source of violent behaviors, which is why such an attempt has proper aims and values and contributes to creating safe societies thanks to effective reintegration into society. The holistic perspective clearly shows a desire to break away from the cycle of recidivism and set up a criminal justice system based on rehabilitation rather than community protection for life.
Policy Overview
The suggested policy’s essence is that comprehensive counseling and support systems should be explicitly created for violent offenders. Such programs will be mandatory as a preventive measure aimed at the primary causes, often blamed for violent behavior. The initiative’s centerpiece is specific psychological assistance, broad-based anger management instruction, and continuing support through an offender’s move.
The psychological well-being of criminals is essential to the criminal justice system because it helps rehabilitate and reintegrate offenders into society (Pettus et al., 2021). By engaging violent offenders in these programs, they can provide crucial data on what prompted them to act so that the tendency takes responsibility. Anger management training becomes vital, and the individuals learn to do well with their emotions.
Also, ongoing support is necessary to end the vicious circle. Severe criminals are also more ready for this, with additional coping strategies and superior systems to guide them through release into communities. This approach can be considered as an inclination not only to solve immediate issues in the criminal justice system but also to create lasting positive consequences through rehabilitation and reducing violent crime offenses. In other words, the proposed policy seeks to create a comprehensive system that emphasizes the mental and emotional healing of violent criminals in order to shepherd them toward an aspirational path of reformation and community reintegration.
Importance of the Policy
Addressing Root Causes
Violence behavior is a derived phenomenon, and it is an outcome of underlying issues that are related to unresolved traumatic events, alcohol or drug problems, or insufficient anger management techniques (Karbowniczek, 2020). The counseling aspect of the suggested policy aims to mitigate some underlying causes in a systematic approach. In the provision of such tools for offenders to effectively deal with their anger and post-trauma stress, substance abuse is also managed, which leads directly to lowering reoffending significantly. Recognizing that violent behaviors are often a result of deeper problems, including trauma and substance abuse or outbursts of rage, does not receive much attention in the proposed policy. The counseling part is to be carefully designed to highlight and address these root causes appropriately. A structured impact of the policy is to equip offenders with means they can employ in controlling anger, trauma, and abusing a substance. Such strategic intervention effectively reduces recidivism, thus advocating for a more rehabilitative approach to justice.
Promoting Rehabilitation
Rehabilitation is the essence of criminal justice that strives to reform criminals into better citizens (Yankah, 2020). This target is in equal synchronization with the suggested policy as it aims to make counseling and support services available at all times. Rehabilitation often benefits the offender and generally makes a safer and healthier society. The Promotion of Rehabilitation is one of the pillars of criminal justice, and this policy perfectly fits into that. The policy’s primary purpose is to offer intensive counseling and support services in a way that converts offenders into law-abiding citizens. The rehabilitation broadens and moves beyond the behavioral characteristics of violence, showing its psychological and emotional aspects. This method recognizes that good rehabilitation promotes offenders, who get an opportunity to change positively and hence save the surrounding society from safety.
Public Safety
Reducing recidivism is closely related to increased public safety (Coupland & Olver, 2020). The intervention invests in counseling and support programs that eliminate the cycle of violence in communities where they feel safe. When reentering society, former violent offenders become law-abiding citizens, making the communities safer. The main intention is to ensure public security, while the recommended policy specifically addresses recidivism reduction. Investing in counseling and support services is an investment that protects the community. The policy goal is to break the circle of violence that results in safe territories where residents feel protected. A sense of security can be provided when violent offenders are successfully reintegrated into society as law-abiding citizens. The policy serves to mainly address the immediate safety needs of violent behavior that require support and practical tools for rehabilitation, which will later promote security among its subjects.
Planning Stage
Program Design
A crucial supporting pillar of this proposed policy is the systematic development and targeted evidence-based counseling programs. This project can be best performed with help from trained mental health professionals and counselors. Experts’ field will be essential to come up with programs aimed at addressing the underlying psychological depths behind violent behavior. The components involved in the program structure outlined above will include a comprehensive curriculum covering crucial aspects such as anger management, trauma resolution, and treatment for substance abuse. The partnership with mental health practitioners ensures that programs are applicable to violent offenders and founded on evidence-based therapeutic techniques (Sakdalan & Mitchell, 2023). By implementing evidence-based practices in counseling programs, they provide effective interventions that address the root causes of violence, a route to recovery.
Implementation Strategy
The successful implementation proves to be one of the key ingredients in making counseling and support programs successful. The program involves the step-by-step implementation of these programs in correctional facilities, where such violent offenders must attend them. This model adopts an attitude of prevention in which these ex-violent people participate or contribute to this rehabilitative operation while they are incarcerated. Creating partnerships with community organizations and mental health agencies is key (Hartley et al., 2020). These partnerships serve a dual purpose: For instance, they expand the resources used in counseling programs, leading to better intervention. Also, they lay the ground for a seamless transition from prison to postrelease care that creates continuity between cells and communities.
Monitoring and Evaluation
The monitoring system will be robust in correcting to ensure counseling programs work. This system will determine the efficiency of these programs by assessing their reduction of violence numbers and delivering real-time solutions. Periodic reviews, as conducted by competent authorities, will ensure the programs adapt based on their ability to address the offender population’s changing requirements.
The postrelease results will also be entirely followed up with offender rates and the general performance of program participants returning to everyday life. This two-dimensional approach, assessing both in-facility impacts and postrelease results, presents a holistic view of the program’s efficacy. The continued monitoring and assessment allow the corrections to make adjustments or change their counseling support based on what is happening in offender rehabilitation.
Budgeting Stage
Initial Setup Costs
At the start of this proposed policy, proper planning that involves adequate allocation necessary to cater for initial setup costs is crucial. Financing is focused on the development of counseling curriculums, materials, and training programs aimed at correction officers. Given the importance of mental health professionals, budget considerations relate to hiring professionals who will facilitate counseling sessions in correctional facilities. This strategic investment creates a good base for the counseling programs, ensuring that an appropriate foundation is established for implementation. Consequently, the evolution of counseling programs is a complicated issue that requires time to incorporate evidence-based practices (Elliot et al., 2020). Counseling materials such as educational resources, therapeutic tools, and program manuals shall be produced to enhance the quality of treatment strategies. Moreover, the funds allocated for training correctional staff ensure they are well-prepared with programs and an appropriate rehabilitation environment.
Ongoing Operational Costs
These continuing operational costs are significant in sustaining these counseling and support programs. These include salaries of staff to materials used for programs and administrative support. Allocation of resources for the program is necessary to ensure counseling interventions’ sustained quality and relevance (Ogbe et al., 2020). Revisions in the materials or resources likewise enhance these programs and change therapeutic practices. The administrative support ensures that counseling organizations are well organized and managed efficiently while running proper correction centers.
Cost-Benefit Analysis
To determine the long-term financial benefits of such a policy, there is an absolute need to research the cost-and-benefit ratio. This cost analysis further focuses on the savings created by fewer offenders. The immediate benefits of good rehabilitation include reducing costs since the agent reduces incarceration costs (Ward et al., 2022). Additionally, higher personal efficiency among successfully treated persons gets to communities, generating further positive economic and social implications. The cost associated with the policy is also reasonable, and how counseling in support programs could enhance social benefits by preventing victims from being violent offenders.
Conclusion
Counseling and support programs for violent offenders are designed to be a proactive model of prevention, which folds rehabilitation into the fabric of the justice system itself. As this policy eliminates the causes of violent conditions and provides sustainable continuous support, it can make safer communities and enhance efficiency in criminal justice. This proposed plan and budget are complete implementation guides for such vital projects. It is, therefore, necessary to focus on the strategic planning and financial dimensions for long-term favorable influence. This policy offers a practical solution not only in disrupting the cycles of violence but also in building rehabilitation as an alternative and ensuring public safety and reintegration.
References
Coupland, R., & Olver, M. E. (2020). Assessing protective factors in treated violent offenders: Associations with recidivism reduction and positive community outcomes. Psychological Assessment, 32(5), 493. https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/pas0000807
Elliott, D. S., Buckley, P. R., Gottfredson, D. C., Hawkins, J. D., & Tolan, P. H. (2020). Evidence‐based juvenile justice programs and practices: A critical review. Criminology & Public Policy, 19(4), 1305–1328. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9133.12520
Hartley, S., Raphael, J., Lovell, K., & Berry, K. (2020). Effective nurse–patient relationships in mental health care: A systematic review of interventions to improve the therapeutic alliance. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 102, 103490. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijnurstu.2019.103490
Karbowniczek, J. (2020). Teenagers towards parents: manifestations of aggressive and violent behaviour. In Forum Pedagogiczne (Vol. 10, No. 2, pp. 225-242). Uniwersytet Kardynała Stefana Wyszyńskiego w Warszawie.
Ogbe, E., Harmon, S., Van den Bergh, R., & Degomme, O. (2020). A systematic review of intimate partner violence interventions focused on improving social support and/or mental health outcomes of survivors. PLoS one, 15(6), e0235177. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0235177
Pettus, C., Veeh, C. A., Renn, T. R., & Kennedy, S. C. (2021). The well-being development model: A theoretical model to improve outcomes among criminal justice system–involved individuals. Social Service Review, 95(3), 413-468.
Sakdalan, J., & Mitchell, B. (2023). Development of an evidence-based violence rehabilitation program for offenders with intellectual disability. International journal of offender therapy and comparative criminology, 0306624X231176005. https://doi.org/10.1177/0306624X231176005
Ward, T., Arrigo, B., Barnao, M., Beech, A., Brown, D. A., Cording, J., … & Taxman, F. (2022). Urgent issues and prospects in correctional rehabilitation practice and research. Legal and Criminological Psychology, 27(2), 103–128. https://doi.org/10.1111/lcrp.12211
Yankah, E. N. (2020). The right to reintegration. New Criminal Law Review, 23(1), 74-112. https://doi.org/10.1525/nclr.2020.23.1.74
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