"With the cooperation of Marianne Breijer, Erasmus University Rotterdam."

Describes 2 applications of the concept of 3day fines2 - one in New York City and one in Milwaukee. Research has shown that determining what should be paid, what can be paid, and what will be paid is chancy. Research has been toward greater attention to a method of imposing fines that is now well established in several European countries. These penalties known as 3day fines2 provide a more logical method of determining the amount of financial punishment of be imposed. Contains 15 tables.

Day fines, as a pecuniary sanction, have a great potential to reduce inequality in the criminal sentencing system, as they impose the same relative punishment on all offenders irrespective of their income. Furthermore, with correct implementation, they can constitute an alternative sanction to the more repressive and not always efficient short-term prison sentences. Finally, by independently expressing in the sentence the severity and the income of the offender, day fines can increase uniformity and transparency of sentencing. Having this in mind, almost half of the European Union countries have adopted day fines in their criminal justice system. For the first time, this book makes their findings accessible to a wider international audience. Aimed at scholars, policy makers and criminal law practitioners, it provides an opportunity to learn about the theoretical advantages, the practical challenges, the successes and failures, and ways to improve.

Presents guidelines for those who are considering using structured fines as part of their overall sentencing system. Offers planning and operation instructions applicable to every jurisdiction, such as how to set goals and priorities, develop a unit scale that ranks offenses by severity, calculate fine amounts, and impose the structured fine sentence. Collection methods and techniques, critical to the success of a structured fine program, are also discussed. Contains demonstration projects and sources for further information, examples of a day fine unit scale, fine unit evaluation tables, offender financial data forms, and notices sent to offenders.

Fines have numerous advantages as a criminal sanction. They impose minor costs on the society and compliance leads to an increase of the state revenue. Furthermore, fines have no criminogenic effect as prisons do. However, the potential of this sanction is not fully exploited due to income variation among offenders. Sanctions must impose an equal burden on offenders who commit similar crimes. Yet in practice, low fines are insufficiently punitive to deter and punish wealthy offenders. And high fines are unaffordable for low-income offenders. As a result, fines are imposed only for minor offenses. On the contrary, day-fines allow imposing an equal relative burden of punishment, while assuring the offender is capable of complying with the pecuniary sanction. This is possible due to the special structure of day-fines, which separates the decision on the severity of the crime and the financial state of the offender. Such structure enables expanding the categories of offenses that can be dealt with pecuniary sanctions. Day-fines can offer a partial solution for the American prison-overcrowding problem. Therefore, the aim of this article is twofold. First, to provide a comparative analysis of day-fines in Europe. This analysis includes an exhaustive depiction of all the day-fine models that are currently implemented in Europe. Second, this article examines for the first time some of the challenges in transplanting day-fines into the U.S. criminal justice system, i.e. the constitutional restriction on Excessive Fines and the suitability of this model of fines to the American 'uniformity revolution in sentencing'