THE HAGUE, 05/05/07 - Most criminals in the Netherlands should be able to serve their sentence at home in the future. Justice Minister Hirsch Ballin is to introduce house arrest as a new main punishment. Criminals can then also visit friends or a mosque for two hours a day.
Judges will have the option of imposing house arrest as the main penalty, with a maximum duration of four months. Because sentences are relatively short in the Netherlands, the majority of criminals will be eligible for this. Hirsch Ballin expects house arrest to offer a solution for cases where a fine or community service is experienced as too light and "a stay in prison is not seen as necessary" or is seen as too severe a sentence, according to Trouw newspaper. Expectations are that judges will impose fewer jail sentences.
Those under house arrest will receive welfare payments. Only if they run a company from their living-room or do other work that yields sufficient money will they receive no financial support from the minister. They can also do a home course.
"House arrest is experienced as a real punishment," according to a spokesman for Hirsch Ballin. "At the same time, social networks remain in place."
The measure is primarily intended to relieve the prisons. The Netherlands has been struggling for years with a shortage of cells, even though the number of people in prison per head of population is about six times lower than in the US. |