Why The Aboriginal People Are Not Be Sentencing Policies Or Are These Citizens More Harmful?

1192 Words Mar 14th, 2016 null Page
In 2011, Aboriginal people were reported as imprisoned at a rate of 756 per 100,000 in contrast to non-aboriginal Canadians at a rate of only 76 per 100,000 (Jeffries, 2014). However, why are Aboriginal People in Canada overrepresented in prison? Could it be sentencing policies or are these citizens more harmful to society? Many factors are involved in this presumption, including high rates of poverty, substance abuse, and a large percentage of judges will decide jail for their sentence even when there are laws against jail being the first option. Even with laws put into place to consider other alternatives, judges have the final say and most of these Aboriginal people are still sent to jail over rehabilitation (Jeffries, 2014).
Firstly, the poverty rates in First Nations communities are unexceptionally high compared to non-Aboriginal Canadians in similar cities. With a median income of about $13,500 – $16,500 in Aboriginal families compared to around $30,000 for non-Aboriginals, they are suffering, hardly getting by on the money they make but treated as equals to people in urban areas that consider $30k less than enough for necessities (Palmater, 2011). There seems to be link between poverty and incarceration rates, after surveying Aboriginal inmates, 28% said they were raised on the welfare system; in contrast to the non-aboriginals at a rate of about 8% (Palmater, 2011).
Secondly, the amount of substance abuse that is prevalent in Aboriginals far outweighs the amount of…

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