Medical Parole Essay

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Medical parole is a process by which inmates who are in a criminal justice system may qualify for early release on grounds of particularly strange or convincing circumstances which weren’t foreseen by the court at the time at which this inmate was sentenced.

Previously in South Africa, medical parole was rendered to offenders who were terminally ill. The legislation was phrased as an inmate being in his or her “final phase of a terminal illness”. Parole was thus granted not to obtain better or more efficient medical care than the state could deliver, but for the offender to die a dignified death in the presence of family, essentially giving the family a chance to come to terms with the death of their relative as this would occur in any usual …show more content…

There are many factors to consider when assessing the criteria for medical parole. These factors include the cost of keeping inmates in prison when they are terminally ill, whether the prisoner will get better quality care inside prison than in their community and whether this inmate is a threat to the outside community.

A terminal illness is a disease that can’t be cured or sufficiently treated and that is expected to result in the death of the patient within a short period of time. This term is used for progressive diseases such as cancer or advanced heart diseases. An inmate should not be realised from prisoner on medical parole under no other circumstances but for having a terminal illness unless the individual is on his or her “last leg” of life. Shabir Shaik was realised on medical parole because of him being hypertensive, this is not a terminal illness and could’ve been treated within the prison. There should be equal rules and regulations in prison no matter how much money you have or how high up in government you

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