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Content: The problem, of course, is that these expectations are often contradictory since it is hard to punish and rehabilitate prisoners simultaneously. Warehousing function
Another more immediate purpose not often discussed in polite society is the warehousing function of prisons. A criminal justice system overwhelmed with arrests, court cases, and rising crime rates increasingly looks to the prison as a place to stockpile those who are poor risks for probation or other community-based solutions. Very few people working in the system view our maximum security prisons as places which can either effectively punish or rehabilitate. Indeed, the rate of prisoners returning to state prisons for repeat offenses (35 to 45 per cent according to one accounting method) has long since led to the conventional wisdom that prisons are most effective at preparing first offenders for lives of crime. With police, courts and probation systems overwhelmed by numbers, prison authorities have been desperately looking for alternatives. Ironically, the work-release and furlough concepts were partly the result of the recognition that continued stockpiling of society's felons was in itself dangerous. The odds favored their return to criminal behavior once released. In Sielaffs words, "Furloughs help reduce, recidivism. Offenders are less likely to return to crime after release from, prison if they have a decent job, residence and family situation.