Recorded Offending Trajectories Preceding Different Sanction Types: A Register-Based Study on the Ladder of Punishments

Abstract This study examines officially recorded offending trajectories leading to different types of criminal sanctions in the Finnish justice system. We focus on the most common sanctions in terms of quantity, with emphasis on suspended imprisonment, community service, and imprisonment. The choice of sanction type is not solely based on the severity of the crime committed, but also on the offender’s criminal history and assessed capability to comply with the requirements of non-custodial sanctions. Individual sentences and their justifications are always the result of judges’ discretion, but a large-scale analysis of the sanction trajectories and recorded offenses preceding different sanction types provides important information about the functioning of the criminal justice system. By using detailed, whole population register data from birth cohorts 1980–1990 ( N = 714,607), we analyze recorded offending trajectories preceding the offenders’ first sanction type of each kind, that is, the entry to different stages of the punishment ladder. The results show that while first suspended imprisonments are not preceded by extensive criminal histories, they are rarely the first criminal justice contact. Individuals sentenced to community service or imprisonment for the first time have accumulated a large number of prior criminal convictions and crimes before receiving these sanction types, with a median of 9 and 13 prior sanctions, respectively.