Research Paper on "Senate Bill 123 of Kansas"

Research Paper 9 pages (2957 words) Sources: 6

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Senate Bill 123 Kansas

Kansas' Senate Bill 123 (SB 123) had created an obligatory community-based drug treatment that is for individuals that have been sentenced of first- or second-offense drug possession. This essay will examined the impact of SB 123 on condemning practices, administration, and treatment services that are all across Kansas. The paper will indicate that SB 123 has in some instances has been able to divert drug possessors not just from prison, as envisioned, but from one form of community supervision to another, which was exposing more criminals to greater shadowing and longer verdicts.

In November 2003, the Kansas implemented Senate Bill 123 (SB 123), making an obligatory sentence of community-based drug abuse treatment and community supervision in lieu of imprisonment for non-violent criminals that have been convicted of a first- or second-offense drug proprietorship. Under the provisions, those that are considered to be eligible offenders are supposed to get a community corrections sentence of that goes all the way up to at least 18 months with any treatment that also will comprise any mixture of purification, drug education, out-patient treatment, in-patient treatment, and degeneration deterrence.

Under the requirements of SB 123, the Kansas Sentencing Commission (KSC) had been directed to be able to conduct an assessment of the lawmaking after 18 months of program operation. The KSC constricted the Vera Organization of Justice to perform an application and process assessment of SB 123, inspecting the functioning of the program and its influence on institutional processes.

Introduction

As talked about earlier, underneath the requirements of SB 123, the Kansas Condemning Commission (KSC) has decided to go in the direction in order to conduct an assessment of the lawmaking which will only take place around 18 months of program procedure. The KSC had contracted the Vera Institute of Justice to accomplish an execution and method appraisal of SB 123, which will hopefully be successful in observing the running of the program and the impact that it is having on the offenders.

Research shows us that by the beginning of 2000, Kansas was facing a mounting prison population. Around the years of 1990 and 2000, the state's prison population was increasing very rapidly to about 54%, from 5,500 inmates to around 8,600 inmates (Johnson). By constitutional order, the Kansas Sentencing Commission (KSC) was requisite to start exploring different types of alternatives that could be used for reducing or reducing the proportion of prison population development every time population forecasts were starting to show that capacity was going to start exceeding within the next three years. And in the summer of 2000, the state's prison populace was at 97% of volume and increasing, anticipated to surpass volume in the near upcoming years. Analyses had started to show that the upsurge in the imprisoned population that is during the 1990s which was really driven chiefly by the increase that was going on in the drug offenders that were entering into the criminal justice system constantly. With that said, this essay will discuss an overview of the entire bill.

Participants: Sentences and Offenders

As intended, SB 123 is requiring start making the decision for judges to give a sentence that will eligible for offenders to community-based drug treatment for up to about 18 months. Qualified offenders are described as men and women that have been convicted of a first- or second-offense that involves drug possession with no previous persuasions for a person crime or for a drug sale or production crime. Previous to the way of the legislation, the Kansas Sentencing Commission had made an estimation that 1,400 people per year would start being directed to community-based drug treatment programs as an outcome of the SB 123, unevenly 445 of whom would have more than likely have been put into some prison which was absent of the new legislation (Johnson). This segment delivers material on the number of SB 123 eligible circumstances, the features of offenders that are being sentenced to management that is up under the program, and the distances of sentences that are being forced under SB 123.

The criminal history background of SB 123 criminals has also been altering over periods of time. While a lot of the criminals can still be put in a category that has been marked as having a minor criminal record, development data for some studies that have already done assessments over a period advocates that there were several significant changes that have happened over time (Stidwell). According to research the quantity of SB 123 cases are involving lawbreakers with less thoughtful criminal times past (Criminal History Category H. To I) had went down for the duration of the first 18 months of the package. For the duration of the first four months of SB 123 operation, unevenly 80% of criminals that are receiving verdicts to SB 123 had criminal histories in these groups; equally, by the start of 2005, only 50% of cases complicated such wrongdoers. Criminals with reasonable illegal pasts (Criminal History Category F. Or G) enlarged as an amount of the SB 123 population, realizing about 30% of the total amount of cases that are sentenced under this establishment by 2005.

Effectiveness of Program

In order to see the effectiveness of the program, officers and counselors were used to evaluate it efficiency. The insights of community improvements officers and drug treatment counselors are significant to the appropriate operational of SB 123 in the state. The involvements of these groups are able to highlight a certain amount of potential issues with the execution and procedure of SB 123 across the state -- difficulties, possibly, not obvious when inspecting organizational data alone. When it was asked about SB 123 criminals and verdicts, community corrections officers and counselors all observed that the issues that are because of three most important factors: a flawed meaning of "eligible" criminals under SB 123, an apparent lack of accepting of the program by judges and prosecutors, and the absence of obtainability of drug treatment in some areas of the state.

Officers and counselors believe that these suitability difficulties were compounded by difficulties of judicial clarification of SB 123 (Johnson). Officers had made the argument that judges were understanding SB 123 otherwise across the state, predominantly in footings of offenses and preceding criminal history qualified for condemning under the establishment. For instance, one officer had made the argument that in his county the judges were placing every one of the offenders who decided to the circumstances of SB 123 in the program, irrespective of the responsibility, conviction offense, or previous criminal history. Another officer had been maintaining that this happened in his county but it was just in the early months after SB 123 operation ( with judges that are sentencing offenders being convicted of custody with the intention to sell to the program), but had since made a change. Other officers have not made the notification that judges have often been made a "special deliberation" for numerous unentitled offenders and sentenced them to SB 123, even if the offender was not convicted of a qualifying wrongdoing nor had a prohibiting criminal history. This perception seems to appear to be long-established by the managerial statistics; as talked about above, an important amount of those that are offenders with excluding criminal histories are, nevertheless, getting SB 123 sentences.

Accordingly of these perceived issues, officers and counselors were all feeling that the judges had great pleasure over admission into SB 123. Officers usually decided that SB 123 was being mistreated and being utilized for offenders who were not agreeable to get treatment; they generally came to the conclusion that SB 123 was not continuously being utilized for otherwise prison-bound lawbreakers. A common theme that was throughout the discussions with society corrections officers and counselors was, therefore, a need to instruct judges and prosecutors on the eligibility necessities for SB 123 and the element of all of the drug treatment programs. As officers had debated, every one of the community corrections officers and counselors were being required to get training on SB 123; nevertheless, there was awareness among officers and counselors that judges and prosecutors were not receiving any such training. Extra research may be necessary in order to find out the level of familiarity that is going on with the knowledge of the eligibility instructions for SB 123 amongst judges and prosecuting attorney that are in the state.

Officers from about several counties were also taking notice to a slightly different issue -- that all offenders that happened to have been sentenced of any drug offense were being referred to community corrections for a valuation; officers that are maintained that judges and court services were then depending on community corrections to regulate those criminals that were not being eligible for SB 123. Consequently of many recommendations for non-qualifying offenders, community corrections officials had made notation that, in numerous examples, community corrections regions had to do and pay for valuations that should not be done for unentitled offenders.

In one specific county, the… READ MORE

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