Title 42
State Affairs and Government

Chapter 56
Corrections Department

§ 42-56-1. Declaration of policy.

(a) The general assembly finds and declares that:

(1) The state has a basic obligation to protect the public by providing institutional confinement and care of offenders and evidence-based probation and parole supervision and, where appropriate, treatment in the community;

(2) Efforts to rehabilitate and restore criminal offenders as law-abiding and productive members of society are essential to the reduction of crime;

(3) Maintaining the quality and effectiveness of correctional institutions and rehabilitative services, both inside and outside correctional institutions, deserves priority consideration as a means of lowering crime rates and of preventing offenders, particularly youths, first-offenders, and misdemeanants, from becoming trapped in careers of crime; and

(4) Correctional institutions, supervision, and services should be so diversified in program and personnel as to facilitate individualized treatment.

(b) The purpose of this chapter is to establish a department of state government to provide for the supervision, custody, care, discipline, training, and treatment of persons committed to state correctional institutions or on probation or parole, so that those persons may be prepared for release, aftercare, and supervision in the community.