dead wrong.

[NightOwl]

I read that prisons in Norway are like 5-star motels.
And convicts do not serve more than 21 years. Seriously??

My Gosh you were right! This article from Toledo on the Move explains it.

This monster slaughtered 77 people. It is more like a bloody reward than a punishment.



8/16/2011 Toledonthemove.com
Could Norway's 'comfy' prisons work in the U.S.?

The Norwegian right-wing extremist who killed 77 people in a shooting spree and bomb attack last month is under arrest, but thanks to the country's lax penal system, he will not face death and may only serve a few decades in one of the world’s most humane jails.

Norway has no capital punishment system and the maximum prison sentence is 21 years, give or take an indefinite five-year extension block that officials rarely use. Rather than the "crime and punishment" laws most of the world uses, Norway focuses on rehabilitating prisoners as their guiding principle, a notion Foreign Policy Magazine aptly describes as “somewhat difficult… to swallow given the gravity and callousness of his crimes.”

Norway's Halden Prison might be the country's most secure facility, but the college dorm-like private bathrooms, flat screen TVs, personal trainers and personal dentist seems more like a retirement community rather than a prison.

But Halden represents the very balance between policy and psychology: Could positive surroundings and motivators decrease (nurture) offenders from ending up back in jail? Or is it their physical nature to recommit crimes? The results of the experiment could very well inspire social change in institutions and the laws of capital punishment worldwide.

"Both society and the individual simply have to put aside their desire for revenge, and stop focusing on prisons as places of punishment and pain," a Norwegian prison guard said in an interview with the Daily Mail. "Depriving a person of their freedom for a period of time is sufficient punishment in itself without any need whatsoever for harsh prison conditions."

Norway's crime rate is far lower than that of the United States. Is their philosophy when it comes to the penal system what keeps this rate low? Should there be more of an emphasis on rehabilitation for criminals in this country? Would you approve of funding for social activities, TVs, private bathrooms and personal trainers for inmates in this country?

http://www.toledoonthemove.com/news/stor...?id=652099