Q6Comprehension2 Marks1 Sep 2024
Passage
More Criminals Spared Jail Owing to Crowded Prisons Growing numbers of criminals in England and Wales are being spared jail sentences because of prison overcrowding amid warnings that the problem will get worse. Judges and magistrates are giving people suspended sentences instead of jail terms on the back of guidance that they should take into account the "high prison population". Criminals who were given suspended sentences because of prison conditions include an inmate who poured boiling water over a prison guard, but had his six-month custodial sentence suspended, and a drug driver without a licence who had led the police on a high-speed chase. Mark Beatties, the national chair of the Magistrates Association, said: "The high population is now a factor to be considered when the court is deciding between an immediate custodial sentence or a suspended sentence." Andrea Coomber KC, the chief executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform, said: "I do think that judges need to be thinking more about where they're sentencing when they sentence somebody, where they're sending them to, and what conditions they're going to be in and whether that actually meets the various goals of sentencing, which do include rehabilitation, at a time when you have such an overcrowded system. It would be fantastic if the incoming lady Chief Justice [Sue Carr] would prioritise that as something in her inbox." Coomber said that the real culprit for prison overcrowding was sentencing inflation, as the judiciary has limited discretion when it comes to sentencing. "Government needs to take greater responsibility for the fact that sentences are getting longer and that they're the ones doing that," she said. "We've got many more people in that kind of bracket of four to 10 years than we used to have." (Source: Siddique, Haroon. "More Criminals Spared Jail Owing to Crowded Prisons." The Guardian, 29 Sep, 2023.)
Based on your reading of the quote given below, answer the following question. "I do think that judges need to be thinking more about where they're sentencing when they sentence somebody, where they're sending them to, and what conditions they're going to be in and whether that actually meets the various goals of sentencing, which do include rehabilitation, at a time when you have such an overcrowded system. It would be fantastic if the incoming lady Chief Justice [Sue Carr] would prioritise that as something in her inbox." At a time when the system is overcrowded, judges need to think more about where they are sending a sentenced prisoner, in order that the order should the sentences from [i] to [iv] be arranged to form a coherent and unified paragraph? Note that "they" is used as a plural pronoun in these options. [i] At a time when the system is overcrowded, judges need to think more about where they are sending a sentenced prisoner. [ii] The various goals of sentencing do include rehabilitation. [iii] The overcrowding of the prisons and its consequences should be a matter of priority for the incoming lady Chief Justice, Sue Carr. [iv] They need to reflect on whether the conditions of the place to which they are sentencing would meet these goals.