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Recidivism As Omission: A Relational Account , Youngjae Lee
Recidivism As Omission: A Relational Account , Youngjae Lee
Faculty Scholarship
Are repeat offenders more culpable than first-time offenders? In the United States, the most important determinant of punishment for a crime, other than the seriousness of the crime itself, is the offender's criminal history. Despite the popularity of the view that repeat offenders deserve to be treated more harshly than first-time offenders, there is no satisfactory retributivist account of the "recidivist premium." This Article advances a retributivist defense of the recidivist premium and proposes that the recidivist premium be thought of as punishment not, as sometimes suggested, for a defiant attitude or a bad character trait, but as punishment for …