Criminology

The role of the private security has in its functions of criminal justice dramatically changed over time. One of the major areas in which the private security has changed is the correction functions. Traditionally, this function was primarily carried out by the public security, with private security carrying out very minimal role if any in correction of the offenders. Over the past few decades, the private security has greatly increased its role in this field of criminal justice thus complementing the roles carried out by the public security. In fact, in some nations, the private security has been given mandate of carrying all the correctional functions, but has to be closely monitored by the public security.

Development of correctional functions of the private security
The correctional functions were not taken with a lot of seriousness in the early days and there were fewer efforts which were employed by both the private and public security agencies in ensuring that offenders were properly corrected so that they could not repeat similar crimes in future. By then, the main objective of the security agencies was reacting to the crimes that have already been committed and ensuring that criminals were removed from the society so that they could not commit other crimes. However, this reactive mode of dealing with criminals was less effective as criminals could commit similar or worse crimes once they went back into their societies. This led to the need of the private security to develop mechanisms through which offenders could be corrected and be made better people who can be productive to their societies.

The private securities adopted the rehabilitation techniques where the offenders or potential offenders could be corrected and their attitudes changed so that they could be prevented from committing crimes in future. Such rehabilitation did not necessarily involve punishing the offenders physically as it was the case before, but altering their attitudes in life. Rehabilitation included counseling sessions where various professionals could be engaged to correct the behavior and attitudes of such criminals. In order for the private security to make the rehabilitation process of correcting individuals sustainable, they applied several techniques of reintegrating such offenders with their societies and the rehabilitation process could continue for the offenders who have been taken back into the society.

The profile of inmates is also used by the private security agencies in encouraging the inmates to be well behaved not only when they are behind bars but also when they are finally released. A profile is kept for all the inmates and those who demonstrate remarkable change in their conduct can be released on an earlier date before serving their full sentence. There are however, strict conditions for such offenders as they are to be monitored by their societies and if they are reported to be continuing with their old habits then they can be taken back to the correctional facilities. This practice acts as a motivator for the offenders to permanently change their conducts and attitudes so that they can continue living a free life in their societies. The private security agencies have proved to be more efficient in correcting the offenders through this method as compared to the public security agencies since their management is more efficient.

Unlike in the past where private securities hardly worked together with the public in correcting the offenders, they now have employed several techniques through which they can reach out to the public in order to ensure that they increase their efficiency in correcting offenders. They are therefore in a position of not only correcting the offenders who are present in the correctional facilities, but also the potential offenders who are still in the society and if the private security agencies fail in correcting them early enough, then they can be a nuisance to the society in future. Through this method of correcting criminals, the private security agencies have ensured that the public are active and major partners in the fight against crime in their societies.

Deterring offenders from committing crimes is one of the main objectives of private security agencies as opposed from the objective of reacting fast to incidents of crime. The private security has realized that one of the ways through which they can achieve this objective is by correcting offenders as well as potential offenders early enough. By correcting them, they are barred from committing various crimes in the future and thus the society is spared from the menace that is usually brought about by the criminal acts that are committed by individuals who could not have committed them if they were properly corrected in good time.

The corrected offenders are also empowered with certain skills if the private security feels that the main factor that made a certain offender to commit a certain crime was lack of source of income. The private security agencies in empowering such offenders hopes that in doing so, the offenders will be deterred from committing crimes since the main force behind such actions has been eliminated. Such skills also assist in occupying the mind of the offenders leaving them with less time of thinking how and when to commit crimes. However, this method is only applicable to offenders whose main objective of committing crime was to make some financial gain and thus if provided with a source of income, he or she is likely to quit the habit. There are other types of offenders who are driven by other factors and they therefore need more special means of assisting them so that their chances of committing similar crimes in future are reduced as much as possible.

Conclusion
The role of private security in correction of offenders have increased substantially and they now have a very crucial role to play in ensuring that offenders are well corrected and that they are deterred as much as possible from committing various crimes. Through the correctional of offenders by private security, the communities are spared from the agony that is usually accompanied by criminal acts. Correcting offenders is probably the greatest achievement that can be achieved by the criminal justice system around the world, since the corrected individual have lesser probability of committing crimes at any given time as compared to the individuals who are just separated from the society and later taken back upon completion of their sentences without being corrected properly. Such individuals still have a very high probability of committing similar crimes and landing back to the correctional facilities. However, despite the much progress private security have achieved over time, there is still a lot more that needs to be done as societies from all over the world continue to face insecurity issues every now and then.