Role Of Crime And Punishment In The Victorian Era

Victorian Era Research Paper

Monet Lambert

In every society and community, everyone had a role to play which made their life work and made the economy go around. Although these roles were not pre-set, a person’s life can influence where in the community they fit. This is also true from criminals. Criminals weren’t just born to break the law, no one would chose to lead a life of a criminal, but instead, most were pushed to a certain point to take steps against the law. A life as a criminal was tough and hard, although their ethics were off and moral were low, most were just trying to survive. These certain things are true today, crime is still committed out of necessity. This can be caused because of poverty, when a person is too poor to provide themselves with the basic necessities of life they might turn to crime in order to get these certain things, such as food. This was especially true during the Victorian Era. One of the main differences though is the punishment

In the beginning of the Victorian Era, many people saw criminals as the people of the lowest working class. These people were believed to have “incorrect morals” (Crime and Punishment in the Victorian Era). Nearing the middle years, people began to view criminals almost like a social class of their own. This was the “class” that was clearly at the very bottom of society. At the end of the Victorian Era, the view of criminals had changed into that criminals as a whole, had mental illnesses or that their actions could be blamed on the parenting to the criminal. All of these views changed how criminals were treated in court. And the courtroom was very different that today’s courtroom. The judge, jury, and prosecutor had much more power than they do today in deciding the outcome of the trial. Often the defendant and even sometimes the prosecutor would not have any legal aid due to how expensive legal aid