The legal rights of inmates are one among the recognized universal human rights. The essence for incarcerating criminals in jail is to provide them rehabilitation. Most of the time, the dilemma is between how correctional management applies control and ethics in treating inmates (Roesch, Zapf and Hart, 2010). The ethical exercise of control is to protect public safety and retribution for the inmates while the ethics of care involve how to help rehabilitate them. The application of ethics involves the determination of the accepted standards on what is right and wrong. It cannot be overstated how essential it is for correction and prison employees to recognize the rights of inmates, as well as to observe the highest ethical standards in treating them. The duty in providing care for the inmates is among the mandate of an ethical prison management. The specialty guidelines provided for in Forensic Psychology include the requirements for competence among forensic practitioners to become knowledgeable of the legal system and the legal rights of individuals (American Psychological Association, 2014). This requires practitioners to exercise the highest professional conduct in a manner as not to impair human rights of the inmates. Inmates deserve to be treated with compassion and proper care as one of their legal rights. The American Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology (AACFP) recognizes the fact that offenders are submitted for rehabilitation in prison and they deserve to receive the proper mental health services they need. This approach in ethical standards of care in correctional facilities can reduce the number of mood disorders, depression and anxiety that commonly occur among inmates. The AACFP guidelines are persuasive codification of standards for the minimum acceptable levels of psychological services that should be given to inmates. Prisoners are still human beings. Letting them serve their sentence without the proper rehabilitation program will defeat the purpose why they are incarcerated in the first place. Although they are prisoners, the responsibility of the state to uphold their legal rights attaches to its reformation and rehabilitation programs for inmates. It is also the right of prisons to be protected from developing psychological disturbances while serving sentence and make them more productive citizens the moment they are released as prisoners and become a more responsible member of the community.
References:
American Psychological Association (2014). Specialty Guidelines for Forensic Psychology. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/practice/guidelines/forensic-psychology.aspx#.
Roesch, R., Zapf , P.A. and Hart, S.T. (2010). Forensic Psychology and Law. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons.
