The Nature of an Environment, Essay Example

The nature of an environment such as criminal justice inherently lends itself to having problems with gender equality, other gender issues, as well as the concept of homosexuality in the prison population. This also raises many other issues with regards to public health concerns. The criminal justice system also has proven to be challenged by the concept of the geriatric prisoner–naturally needing much more attention than other prisoners.

The concept of women’s involvement in the criminal justice system raises many issues. First, it must be taken into consideration the amount of women that fall victim to the men they unfortunately got tied up with. Many women are left as single mothers because their child’s father is in prison.

As far as the female prison population, other unique challenges frequently present themselves. Generally it is common practice to use female prison guards for female inmates, but unfortunately because it is a male dominated profession this is not always possible. This can lead to the dark road of sexual abuse, or consensual relations, between inmates and guards–another problem when considering gender and criminal justice.

With regards to homosexuality and criminal justice, there are a few obvious concerns. Hate crimes are always a worry when dealing with a minority population, but it seems homosexuality in prison is rather taboo. Male on male rape is unfortunately more common than it should be within the prison system–and probably reported even less often. This can facilitate the spread of infectious diseases such as Hepatitis and even HIV.

Geriatric patients bring with them many challenges with regards to health. This presents a challenge to law enforcement when considering the conditions of some of our prisons.