A sample from tonight's reading for my Criminal Law seminar:

"... Imagine that after committing a brutal rape but before sentencing the defendant has gotten into an accident so that his sexual desires are dampened to such an extent that he presents no further danger of rape; if money is also one of his problems, suppose further that he has inherited a great deal of money, so that he no longer needs to rob. Suppose, because of both facts, we are reasonably certain that he does not present a danger of either forcible assault, rape, robbery, or related crimes in the future. Since the rapist is (by hypothesis) not dangerous, he does not need to be incapacitated, specially deterred, or reformed. Suppose further that we could successfully pretend to punish him, instead of actually punishing him, and that no one is at all likely to find out. Our pretending to punish him will thus serve the needs of general deterrence and maintain social cohesion, and the cost to the state will be less than if it actually did punish him. Is there anything... that would urge that the rapist nonetheless should really be punished? ... if one's conclusion is that people like him nonetheless should be punished, one will have to give up the mixed theory of punishment..."

The mixed theory of punishment beautifully incorporated a utilitarian belief I had in punishing offenders while taking care of the faults that come from simply aiming to help the greatest good (For example, punishing an innocent man would be acceptable if the public demanded it, for more people would be happy with the man punished than not.). The mixed theory concludes that punishment is justified if and only if it achieves a positive social gain while only geared toward an offender who deserves punishment. Under this theory I've newly discovered and appreciate, I would choose the mirage of punishment and not actually punish the rapist; I am no longer worried about what happened in the past as I am in making a better future for society. If you believe the man should be punished regardless, for the reasons that he committed the rape and every act should be consequenced, then you would follow a theory based on retribution, which focus more on amending past actions rather than promoting the strongest future. Neither view is necessarily right or wrong, with stronger or weaker arguments. The alternatives simply provide more background as to how you believe we should run our society when an evil threatens the well good of man.