The argument depends on which unstated assumption?
Short prison sentences are the worst of both worlds. They are too brief to allow any serious rehabilitation, yet long enough to cost an offender a job, a tenancy and sometimes custody of a child. A person leaves prison after eight weeks with nothing to return to, and is then more likely, not less, to offend again. Advocates of short sentences answer that they deliver a clear message and protect the public while the offender is inside. The message is real, but it is a message that community sentences with strict conditions can also deliver, at far lower cost, and without the damage to the offender's family. The public is protected for eight weeks; it is exposed for years if the sentence makes reoffending likelier.
Answer and explanation
Correct answer: A. That offenders who serve short sentences reoffend more often than similar offenders given community sentences
- Step 1: The author claims short sentences make reoffending likelier.
- Step 2: To be a reason to prefer community sentences, they must do better on reoffending than short prison terms.
Answer
That offenders who serve short sentences reoffend more often than similar offenders given community sentences.
Why not the others: The author's case for community sentences does not depend on cost comparisons, on the seriousness of crimes, on what victims prefer or on public attitudes; it needs only that short sentences make reoffending likelier than the alternative.
Practise more Punishment.
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