A Top Down Approach to Dealing with Crime...

Of all the obstacles to progress where the enforcement of law and order in our society is concerned, none have as great an impact as the current failings in the courts, the Judiciary and the Magistracy. Far and away the most effective means of ensuring discipline is the fast and efficient application of consequences where crime is concerned, but due to the size of the backlog clogging the courts all we appear to be doing is layering one new mess on top of another every day, despite the best efforts of our law enforcement officers. 

We continue to blame the police for the failure to 'put the bad guys away,' but the truth of the matter is this same problem is affecting the morale of our boys in grey and is contributing in no small measure to the ease with which our security forces are being corrupted. Lawyers and criminals alike are using this log jam to their own advantage and making a mockery of the very system that is supposed to enforce the law and one wonders when will this be dealt with as the urgent matter that it is. I had suggested to an Appeal Court Judge almost twenty years ago that one of the solutions to this problem lay in the creation of a special 'Backlog' Court, set up to deal with every case pending prior to a determined cut off date. This would have the effect of freeing up the existing system to deal only with matters that come before it from that day on, and where there are matters that overlap, the current cases court should get precedence and the sitting Judge freed to focus on the most serious of offenses in the interest of the pursuance of justice. The newly formed backlog court would deal with all matters prior, and ought to be staffed to effectively dispose of them in a timely manner. 

Dealt with scientifically utilizing approaches such as these, one may well find a noticeable drop in crime as career criminals (held and prosecuted for their most recent crimes), would spend the 'waiting time' for appearance at their previous matters at the president's pleasure and not free to inflict their indiscipline on the law abiding. Gone would be the days of crime sprees by the emboldened offenders out on perpetual bail, and gang members would then be encouraged to find different careers and social clubs to join as the underworld path would clearly be seen to be a one way street to nowhere fast.

As a follow on in this same vein as this suggestion and in keeping with the idea of making our courts more effective, I have also suggested (as I am sure others have as well) the creation of a Capital Crimes Court to deal with matters such as murder, drug trafficking and treason. I have also suggested (for reasons of national security) that this Court should be constructed complete with remand facilities in the army base at Tetron as, besides being a much more secure location, would also save much time between locations saving the taxpayers the cost of transport to and from the courthouse and the jail. In fact, if the space is available there should be a special jail built there that could be secured by the army, again solving many problems, saving money and taking crime out of the public eyes. 

At some point we must come to realize that not every problem that exists should continue, and there are few man made problems that do not have man made solutions available to the willing. If we were to treat with this matter effectively we may well find that instead of longer custodial sentences we would be then able to utilize retraining methods to transform hard core criminals and petty thieves alike into contributing members of society. Our penal system does not HAVE to be a jail for those on the beginning of their descent into the criminal lifestyle, and the powers that be should be encouraged to look into redevelopment as a means to reducing recidivism and send functional, able men and women back into the society from which a lawless, antisocial criminal was taken.