Please select the following topics, and give your opinion about the impact it had on criminal justice policy. Submit a substantive main post that enables student colleagues to continue the discussion

Please select the following topics, and give your opinion about the impact it had on criminal justice policy. Submit a substantive main post that enables student colleagues to continue the discussion throughout the unit.

1) Tapia v. United States (2011)

REPLY TO MY CLASSMATE’S RESPONSE TO THE ABOVE QUESTIONS AND EXPLAIN WHY YOU AGREE? (A MINIMUM OF 125 WORDS or MORE)

CLASSMATE’S POST

“Alejandra Tapia was convicted of bringing illegal aliens into the United States and of jumping bail after being charged with immigration crimes” (Tapia v. United States, 2011). The trail judge sentenced the to an excessively long sentence which included time to participant in a 500-hour drug rehabilitation program. The sentence was appealed by the petitioner due to the program being a plain error. Even though the judge sentenced Tapia based on a moral act, the Supreme Court had to examine if a judge could issue a longer sentence to encourage rehab. The Supreme Court reversed the ruling. “Section 3582(a) does not permit a sentencing court to impose or lengthen a prison term in order to foster a defendant's rehabilitation”. This also brought up, even though it was under skepticism, that the District Judge could have a financial gain from the rehab program by pushing defendants to longer sentencing.

References

Tapia v. United States. (2011, April 18). Retrieved from Oyez.ord: https://www.oyez.org/cases/2010/10-5400