Virtual Prisons and Community Punishments: A New Approach to Criminal Sentencing

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Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood is introducing plans to reshape criminal sentencing by expanding community punishments, including the concept of "virtual prisons." The idea is to allow offenders to serve their sentences at home under house arrest, monitored through advanced technology such as GPS tags, smartphones, and special wristwatches designed to encourage compliance with probation meetings, drug treatment programs, and other rehabilitation efforts.

 

This initiative is part of a broader review of sentencing, which seeks to relieve pressure on prisons while ensuring that punishment and rehabilitation are still enforced outside of jail. Mahmood’s approach is likely modeled on current home detention curfews (HDCs), which allow prisoners to serve part of their sentence under house arrest. Currently, prisoners on HDCs must remain at home during specified hours, typically from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m., in a system that mirrors traditional house arrest.

 

The Justice Secretary plans to expand the use of HDCs from six months to twelve months, meaning prisoners could serve up to a year of their remaining sentence at home. This move comes in response to projections that UK prisons will run out of space by July 2024, even with the early release of many prisoners after serving 40 percent of their sentence. As part of this initiative, over 1,200 prisoners serving more than five years will be released early under an existing scheme.

 

In Parliament, Mahmood is set to confirm that former Justice Secretary David Gauke will lead the review, which aims to ensure enough space in prisons for the most dangerous criminals while expanding community-based punishments for others. Data from the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) suggests that prisoners on HDCs are half as likely to reoffend compared to those released directly from jail, providing a solid rationale for expanding the program. Currently, around 4,000 prisoners are serving the remainder of their sentences under HDC.

 

Mahmood emphasized the potential for judges to hand down sentences of house arrest, stating, “We have an opportunity now to reshape and redesign what punishment outside of a prison looks like. I’m sure the review is going to want to look at all the different mechanisms that are out there to monitor offenders in the community, to supervise them effectively and then also to nudge their behavior towards a rehabilitation activity that we know reduces re-offending.”

 

This initiative will also explore using "nudge technology," such as wristwatches that send reminders to offenders about probation appointments or mental health treatment. These devices would not restrict movement but could help improve compliance and encourage rehabilitation. 

 

Mahmood’s review will also consider scrapping most short prison sentences, a measure supported by Gauke during his tenure as Justice Secretary. Short sentences, often less than six months, have been shown to have higher reoffending rates than community-based sentences. Gauke noted, “There is a question about whether we can have more effective community sentences, particularly in the context of new technologies... Is there more that we can do to make sure those community sentences feel like more of a genuine piece of punishment than perhaps they have been in the past?”

 

Another focus of the review will be the classification of offenses related to domestic abuse and the reintroduction of whole life orders for particularly heinous crimes, such as murder involving sexual or sadistic conduct. Rapists, under the new proposals, would serve their full sentences without the possibility of early release on license.

 

The pressure to implement these changes comes as the UK prison population continues to rise, with an annual increase of 4,500 inmates projected. Without intervention, this trend would necessitate the construction of five medium-sized prisons each year at a staggering cost of £3.2 billion annually. The expansion of virtual prisons and community-based punishments could provide a much-needed alternative to this costly approach.

 

Based on a report from the Daily Telegraph 2024-10-23