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A new deal on character

11/16/2008

“It is essential that justice be done, and it is equally vital that justice not be confused with revenge, for the two are wholly different.”
– Costa Rican Nobel Laureate, Oscar Arias Sanchez.

THE Attorney-General wants to see a more humane Barbados, one in which those who go astray are given a second chance. In that context, he intends to do something about criminal records that block access to new opportunities by remaining permanent obstacles to ex-prisoners’ proper re-entry into society.

Addressing the launch of “Angel Tree”, a humanitarian project organised by Prison Fellowship Barbados, Mr. Freundel Stuart, who is also Minister of Home Affairs, urged Barbadians to be tolerant towards former inmates who seek lawful employment and want to lead productive, law-abiding lives.

In many progressive societies a stain on a person’s character, depending on the nature of the wrongdoing and whether that person is a repeat offender
(recidivist), does not always lead to a virtual extension of punishment outside the prison walls.

Debt paid to society
Unlike individuals who live by the philosophy “once a criminal, always as criminal”, Mr. Stuart does not believe that after paying their debt to society through serving time behind bars, the ex-convicts should be made to suffer by being denied privileges that are available to the majority of fellow citizens.
Everywhere there are stories about extremely insensitive, indeed, almost vengeful treatment of former inmates, even those who committed only minor offences. It is as though what the courts dictate and the penal institutions enforce is insufficient to satisfy the general populace that justice has been served.
We support his approach to this issue.

There should be broad agreement with his firm opposition to a system in which a simple document like a police certificate of character – often required by prospective employers – can condemn an ex-prisoner to a marginal existence and, coincidentally, inflict undeserved punishment on members of his or her family.

Surely this routine invites criticism where, as the Mr. Stuart, suggests, a more progressive law would benefit people whose lives were impacted by circumstances of a kind that they did not necessarily deserve.

A humane reaction
What the Attorney-General contemplates is a new legal framework to encourage society’s more humane reaction to those unfortunate members. It involves an amendment to the 12-year-old Criminal Records Rehabilitation of Offenders Act which won wide approval when it was instituted. It would now be
expanded to accommodate a larger category of ex-prisoners who want to have their records expunged after an approved period.

A fundamental function of imprisonment is the rehabilitation of inmates.

However, the desired change in an offender’s behaviour largely depends on his or her ability to obtain meaningful work after being released. We have no data on the extent to which this occurs during the post-prison period in Barbados, but research in other countries shows that those whom business communities employ are less likely to return to lives of crime.

Obviously the Attorney-General recognises that society would be benefit from the proposed changes.

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