Mandatory prison sentences for carrying knives

SCCJR’s Neil Hutton (Centre for Sentencing Research, Strathclyde University) and Fergus McNeill (University of Glasgow) recently submitted evidence to the Scottish Parliament Justice Committee. Their comments below concern amendments 10 and 10A to the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Bill, which propose mandatory prison sentences for carrying knives.

1. The assumption underpinning both of these amendments is presumably that the proposed minimum sentences will act as a deterrent to those who might consider carrying knives. If this assumption is correct, then the incidence of knife crime would decrease. However, while many people believe that criminal sentences have a deterrent effect, there is no evidence to support this. A recent authoritative review of the international research literature by the former Director of the Cambridge Institute of Criminology, Professor Michael Tonry, concludes that there is little credible evidence that changes in sanctions affect crime rates. For example, neither the Californian three strikes legislation nor the zero tolerance policing project in New York, both of which were claimed to demonstrate reductions in crime, had no significant impact on criminal behaviour. In New York, the decline in crime rates which occurred had begun four years previously (1990-91) and continued through the process of the zero tolerance policing project and did so across the USA (where quite different policing policies were being pursued) and not just in New York.
2. Though it may seem counter-intuitive to suggest that the threat of sanctions does not exercise much influence on criminal behaviour, it is in fact relatively easy to see why this is the case. For punishment to have a deterrent effect on behaviour, certain conditions need to be met. The first of these is certainty: the prospective offender needs to believe that there is a very high chance of being apprehended. The second is celerity: the punishment needs to be immediate. The third is severity: the offender must experience the punishment as a significant ‘pain’ to be avoided. The fourth is intelligibility: the offender has to see the pain of the punishment as flowing (more or less automatically and immediately) from the behaviour. It is for all of these reasons that, for example, human beings learn very quickly not to place their hands in a fire. However, The reality is that none of these conditions can be applied in relation to sentencing for knife crime. Offenders know that there is a low chance of being apprehended; proper punishment can only occur after arrest, prosecution and trial have taken place; and so the link between the pains of imprisonment and the knife-carrying behaviour is both contingent and remote. Knife carrying is better understood as part of a problematic culture amongst certain young males, not simply an individual rational decision – and the measures that we use to address it must recognise this.
3. Judges already have the power to sentence offenders to a prison sentence for carrying a knife and do so regularly. These amendments are therefore unnecessary.
4. The culture of knife carrying is dangerous and undesirable, but the imposition of minimum sentences will do nothing to change this culture. It is misleading or misconceived to expect that it could. The Violence Reduction Unit promotes a public health approach to dealing with violence which is more likely to have a real impact on behaviour.