I think a while back I had a discussion with gwajnberg which led to a deep topic in regards to whether criminals deserve a second chance at life. He got it to the idea section for Hive Learners and the community has voted for the topic so in this post, I will give my stance.
Personally, I believe criminals can be rehabilitated and that is to a certain degree. I wouldn't say all of them because some are just mentally ill or have some sort of problem in their genes that just can't be fixed. It's a part of their DNA. If I'm not mistaken, there are certain genes that can cause a person to have some risk of psychopathic tendencies. These people may be a serial killer like Ted Bundy. These types of people I feel can't be rehabilitated and honestly, they don't even deserve to have a second chance once they have committed a huge crime. These types of people should just straight get a death sentence in my opinion.
Then there's the other side of the story. There are some people that might have committed a crime due to a lapse of judgement. I guess in certain situations sometimes people act on their instinct to survive and not really in logic. Take robbing for example. Most of these people I think usually rob because they are in a bad situation and it's out of desperation. These kind of people need help and I believe that's where the government has to take action to see what they can do to make the standard of living more affordable etc. In other situations, it's sometimes just poor choices like drunk driving which can lead to accidental man slaughter. Even though they might have killed someone it was not intentional and mostly due to their intoxication and their poor choice of choosing to drive while drunk. I feel in this situation they should serve their time in prison but these types of criminals can be rehabilitated.
So how can we ensure the best way to stop them from committing crimes again. I think the best way is to analyze the problem for the criminal whether it be psychological, social or educational and focus on that as part of their rehabilitation. After they have finished the rehabilitation, they should also have some checkups maybe monthly on how they are doing and have the necessary support. This support may include things like counseling or even helping to get a job since many jobs wouldn't want to hire a convict. Lastly, I think for those that may have committed more extreme crimes, I think they need to be on watch. This is something most countries have been doing I think and that's to put them on parole. They will have a gps tracker on their body and somebody watching them every now and then.
The rehabilitation is worth the tax payer money in the long run in my opinion. If there was no rehabilitation program, there would be a permanent cost to have them in jail and feed them. At least after they recovered, then they wouldn't need to use taxpayer's money anymore so I feel it's a lot better to have them get reintegrated back into society if possible. In conclusion, most criminals deserve a second chance and we should give it to them should they show remorse and a willingness to change and be better moving forward.