The Co-Existence Of Public Order And Individual Rights

The Co-Existence of Public Order and Individual Rights

Each election year, we must prepare ourselves for another shift in government, which usually is cause for certain items to come up for debate. One issue that seems to surface during local elections is the response to crime and those responsible for perpetrating criminal offenses. Those who advocate individual rights argue that we, as a society, have given government officials unrestrained power and control that is eroding the fundamental freedoms and rights afforded to all individuals under the U.S. Constitution. Public order advocates believe “that under certain circumstances involving criminal threat to public safety,” it is essential that “the interests of society should take precedence over individual rights.” (Schmalleger, p11) There is a fine balance between protecting individual civil liberties and establishing a safe and secure environment for the general public. I believe that it is possible to balance the precautionary actions required to protect society against crime and it’s perpetrators, while maintaining the individual rights and freedoms that allow us to maintain democracy.

If society would have more faith in their government and the criminal justice system, I believe they would see that the crime rate is manageable as long as there is support and cooperation within the community. Increased police presence in high crime areas have proven to be both beneficial in solving crime as well as a deterrent. Rand Corporation study of

Investigations found that patrol officers, on routine patrol, clear more crimes than investigators who work off of written reports. In the high crime areas of San Diego, where there was a deliberate increase in police presence, suspicious contacts were frequently stopped and

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questioned as part of routine patrol. This aggressive interrogation strategy led to large drops in robbery, burglary, theft, auto theft, assault, sex crimes, malicious mischief, and disturbances

reported by the San Diego Police Department. (CliffsNotes.com. 2008). Let the police do their job and they will make your neighborhood a safer place to live.

Maryland residents are very supportive of Police DUI checkpoints. 2005 proved to be the highest year ever in alcohol related deaths on Maryland’s highways. Checkpoint Strikeforce was developed in response to those statistics and provided more aggressive DUI checkpoints throughout the state. There was a dramatic 18 percent decrease in 2006 and although there are some that may feel the checkpoints are too severe, a 2007 survey showed that 89 percent of Maryland drivers supported the sobriety checkpoints. (www.mdsp.org). DUI checkpoints are not a matter of exerting unnecessary control but a matter of protecting the rest of us law-abiding drivers. In Maryland, they applaud the strategies used by local law enforcement to detain and prosecute drunk drivers and the statistics show it’s working.

Many different strategies have been implemented over the past few years in order to respond to soaring crime rates in America. Life imprisonment without the possibility of parole was the sentence given to “Hip Hop Drug Lord Kenneth вЂ?Supreme’ McGriff” in February 2007 Associated Press article. (USA Today s.A, p.2 ). McGriff was reported to have been a manager to Hip Hop artists in the music industry. Although McGriff did not have an extensive history of criminal convictions, his 20year reign of a brutal drug gang resulted in numerous crimes of violence that came to an end when a jury convicted him for his involvement in

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orchestrating the murder of two associates in the Hip Hop community. The expense of life imprisonment is cause for concern, and a fact that is often argued with respect to harsher prison

sentences for habitual offenders. Isn’t it worth the costs involved to protect society against predators like Kenneth McGriff?

Habitual offenders are by far the most difficult for state and local criminal justice systems to manage. The law of “Three Strikes” has been enacted in 26 states in the U.S. to date. The three strike laws were meant for habitual offenders of three or more serious felony convictions that were usually violent in nature and in a response to community outrage in 1994 over of the early release of violent offenders who were in turn committing new crimes. Recent studies have shown that in California the three strike laws seemed to have “reduced criminal activity by 20 percent for