"they don't send innocents to prison to then be turned into criminals."
No, they don't - they put petty offenders into prison (in the States, overwhelmingly black) and release them after serving their stretch as fully qualified criminals.
As Richard said, if prison worked, either as a deterrent or as an incentive not to commit crimes, then crime would be on the decrease, instead of..... well, I'm sure you've heard it all before.
I'm afraid I'm very much with Peter Laban on this one - there's very little comfort to be had from either a mob of looters or a lynch mob.
The good news is that that (not even this present government) will bring back the birch, hanging, the thumb-screw, the stocks, the iron maiden.... Those that are caught will be, tried, serve the appropriate sentence and be released.
The bad news is, while the concentration is on "punishment" rather than cause, nobody will bother asking why a peaceful demonstration protesting the the killing of a petty criminal (not a "godfather" as some tabloidese-riddled pratt suggested) turned into nationwide looting and arson sprees, so we will probably never know and the potential for similar events in the future will remain.
Here's to the next time!
Jim Carroll