Citizens’ Perceptions on the Role of Court Sentencing in Crime Control: A Survey of Mthatha High Court Juridical Area in South Africa

For over a century, the role of court sentencing on crime deterrence has generated significant debate. In this study, we explored the citizens’ perceptions on the role of court sentencing in South Africa’s Mthatha area. The findings are looked in the context of the broad theories of punishment namely: retributive theory, deterrence theory, preventive theory, reformative theory and compensation theory. A total of purposefully sampled 90 respondents were invited to participate in this study through closed-ended questionnaires. The univariate perception results of the study reveal that reformation of the offender, protection of the offender from being harmed by the victim in retaliation, and ensuring that the victims get justice are the most significant roles of court sentencing. Collectively, the reality that severe sentence scares potential criminals not to commit crime stands out and is the most correlated role of court sentencing. Court sentencing was also viewed to be having two pronged preventive effect on criminal activities. First, the criminal is incapacitated from engaging in criminal activities during the time of imprisonment; and second, the offender is removed from the environmental factors that led to offending. As part of the conclusion, the study recommends sentencing policies that mainly support reformation of offenders.

Crime and punishment in times of pandemics

How should we think about crime deterrence in times of pandemics? The economic analysis of crime tells us that potential offenders will compare the costs and the benefits from crime and from innocence and then choose whichever option is more profitable. We must therefore ask ourselves how this comparison is affected by the outbreak of a pandemic and the policy changes which may accompany it, such as governmental restrictions, social distancing, and responses to economic crises. Using insights from law and economics, this paper investigates how the various components in the cost-benefit analysis of crime might change during a pandemic, focusing on Covid-19 as a test case. Building on classical theoretical models, existing empirical evidence, and behavioral aspects, the analysis reveals that there are many potentially countervailing effects on crime deterrence. The paper thus highlights the need to carefully consider which aspects are applicable given the circumstances of the pandemic, as whether crime deterrence will increase or decrease should depend on the strength of the effects at play.

Cognitive Pervasive Service Composition Applied to Predatory Crime Deterrence

Pervasive service composition is useful in many scenarios, for instance, in urban planning or controlled harvest. Currently, there is no standard to develop solutions using pervasive service composition. However, big companies propose their frameworks to develop complex services, but their frameworks are appropriate in specific applications, such as home automation and agriculture. On the other hand, there are different very well-grounded academic proposals for pervasive service composition. However, these do not solve the problems of traditional approaches that are appropriate to specific areas of application, and adaptation is needed to deal with the dynamism of the environment. This article presents a cognitive approach for pervasive service composition where InfoCom devices and the implementation of cognitive functions interact to create pervasive composite services. Our central hypothesis is that cognitive theory can help solve actual problems requiring pervasive service composition, as it addresses the above-mentioned problems. To test our approach, in this article we present a case of urban insecurity. Specifically, in different countries, street robbery using firearms is one of the problems with a high impact because of its frequency. This article proposes to compose a pervasive service for deterring criminals from committing their crimes. The results obtained by simulating our proposal in our case study are promising. However, more research needs to be achieved before applying the proposed approach to actual problems. The research needed ought to address various problems, some of which are discussed in this article.

Forfeiting proceeds: Civil forfeiture, the right to property and the Constitution

Civil forfeiture powers are a useful tool in the fight against crime — particularly the organised kind. They deter such crime by removing the proceeds from wrongdoers, thereby diminishing the incentives for offending. However, as the courts in South Africa have long recognised, the forfeiture powers must be calibrated to ensure a fair balance between the public interest in crime deterrence and private interests such as the right to property. Achieving this balance when forfeiting proceeds is a vexed question which this article seeks to explore. It argues that while the forfeiture of proceeds will usually be justified by the legitimate aim of crime deterrence, forfeiture should nevertheless be subject to a proportionality check. This check is arguably required by the property clause in s 25(1) of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996, and is justified by the need to constrain the breadth of the powers under the Prevention of Organised Crime Act. It then explores what situations might justify refusing forfeiture of proceeds, and how the proportionality check should be applied.

Exceeding the limits of necessary defense and the right to arm

This article deals with the problem of law enforcement related to the appraisal concepts used in the Institute of Necessary Defence. In particular, it is proposed to formalize the legal limits of protection for a defender which under no circumstances would be qualified as exceeding the limits of the necessary defence. The article also considers the advantages of the free carrying of firearms by citizens as one of the condition of crime deterrence protecting against socially dangerous assaults.