LESSON 5 – MOVING FORWARD

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Re-acceptance and the Criminal Background Check

All of your deeds are recorded in a book: so declares the Rosh Hashanah liturgy, and so it is within the contemporary criminal justice system. Every year, hundreds of thousands of Americans are released from prison and seek to rejoin society, but many are stymied by the public availability of their criminal records. Is it possible to find a balance between the needs of society, prospective employers, and ex-offenders? After surveying the contemporary situation, this class looks for answers in the paradigms of Jewish law.

In Crime and Consequence we explore 3000 years of Jewish wisdom concerning criminal convictions, sentencing, crime prevention, and rehabilitation. We challenge our thinking, pondering the application of Talmudic principles to real and complex, modern-day cases, and we get to the heart of questions such as:

  • Should we consider testimonies given in exchange for a reduced sentence as reliable evidence?
  • What is the goal of punishing criminals? Is it to gain retribution for the victim, keep criminals off the streets and safeguard from future crime, set an example and instill the fear of law, or to rehabilitate the criminal and reintroduce him to society?
  • Is life-without-parole a justifiable penalty? Is it within our right to sentence a man to death? When would these be warranted? Is there a better way?

In Crime and Consequence, we learn to discover and recover the humanity within criminals, we question practices that seem unethical and unfair, and we explore ways to prevent crime from ever taking place.

Crime and Consequence is for people who care deeply about humanity, are enraged at injustice, are fascinated by difficult-to-solve real-life scenarios, and are committed to seeing a system that is just and fair to all.