COPENHAGEN (AP) — Nearly 30 years after they killed their parents, Erik and Lyle Menendez launched a beautification project in the California prison where they're serving life sentences. Their project was inspired by the Norwegian approach to incarceration that believes rehabilitation in humane prisons surrounded by nature leads to successful reintegration into society, even for those who have committed terrible crimes. Norway is a long, narrow country in northern Europe, running 1,100 miles (1,750 kilometers) from north to south.
It has set up small prisons across the country, which allows people to serve their sentences close to home, said Kristian Mjåland, a Norwegian associate professor of sociology at the University of Agder in Kristiansand. The entire country has about 3,000 people in prison, he said, putting Norway’s per-capita incarceration rate at roughly one-tenth that of the United States. Norway has some of the world’ lowest levels of recidivism.
Government statistics give the proportion of people reconvicted within two years of release in 2020 as 16%, with the figure falling each year. Meanwhile, a U.S.
Department of Justice survey carried out over a decade found that 66% of people released from state prisons in 24 states were rearrested within three years, and most of those were incarcerated again. Mjåland said Norway's incarceration system is based on the principles that people should be “treated decently by well-trained and decent staff” and have.
