I've had some experience with the criminal justice system, as a victim, as an accused, and as a juror.
As a victim, I was robbed at gunpoint in a parking lot. They caught the two kids (one was a juvenile) who had been on a bit of a crime spree that day. After robbing me, they stole a delivery van. I offered them my car (an Infiniti) but like everyone else, they didn't want it, just cash.
I testified in court against one guy, who, after my stunning testimony, took a plea. The other was in juvie court, and the judge was going to give him supervised release. At this point I asked the D.A. if I could speak, and I did, and I told the judge that it was b.s.; that the kid robbed me at gunpoint and this certainly was no deterrent to him. So the judge orders the social worker person to produce a report and submit it in two weeks. I spoke with the social worker afterwards, and she said "I don't want to deal with that kid, he scares me." Long story short, he was sent to juvie detention where he later was on work duty cleaning county offices, and he broke into the Sheriff's office. LOL. Incorrigible, I think is the term.
As an accused, I've (allegedly) exceeded the posted legal speed on several occasions on our nation's highways. All it took to get me off was a couple of hundred dollars. That's not justice. It did slow me down, for a while, though.
As a juror, I got to witness and pass judgement on a man accused of selling and conspiring to sell a pound
of meth. He had already pled to selling cocaine, but for some reason decided to fight the meth charge. Even though they had him on video. He was found guilty of all three charges, but I don't know what his sentence was. Hopefully he was deported afterwards, because he was also an illegal immigrant. But that's another thread.
Some of these folks, I don't think anything is going to deter them from being criminals. It's easier than getting a job. We already have (I think) the largest percentage of our adult male population in prison than any other country. Putting another 10 million people in prisons that don't have room for them is going to be very expensive, in many regards. Stronger laws, stronger enforcement and all that are surely needed, but there are more ramifications to the results of that. It's a failure of society that we have so many criminals, which I am, unfortunately, unable to solve at this moment.
I am fortunate that I live in a very safe community, and so I'm largely sheltered from most crime (although my workshop did get robbed a few years ago) and it's not an overriding daily concern for me. Many people don't have that luxury.
We need to solve the problems of drug addiction, homelessness, lack of opportunity for many, and other "social ills" before we can even hope to reduce crime. Yeah, yeah, I know I sound like a bleeding heart liberal, and of course some people don't want to be helped and don't want opportunity and I don't know what to do about them.
Hey, did you all see that
news report about the Delaware state trooper who was a victim when some neighborhood kids were performing "mischief" where they ring the doorbell and run away? "Ding, dong, ditch". Apparently (according to the ring camera) this one kid kicked the door and then ran away. Trooper boy chases him down and beats the shit out of him. And arrests him. Some of it is on body cam. Oops, I just read the story I linked to, apparently I got it wrong, another police department caught the kid, then he beat him when he was already in custody.
That was out of hand, he's going to lose his job and probably serve time, and the kid has had two surgeries and will probably resent LEOs for the rest of his life. But I'll bet he never does any more pranking.