This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Is the job of the criminal justice system to keep us safe? Or to lower the boom on bad guys?

And are people in positions of authority starting to see that the two are not only not the same thing, but can often be in outright opposition to one another?

A long period of tough-on-crime, mass-incarceration thinking on the part of legislators, prosecutors and judges is slowly but surely giving way to a realization that just warehousing large numbers of human beings who just happen to have fallen short of society's expectations is really no benefit to anyone.

At the state level, Utah lawmakers last year passed a set of reforms that place less emphasis on long prison terms and put more money and effort into rehabilitation and reform, especially in cases where drug abuse is involved. It is part and parcel of the state's plan to build — and program — a new prison in a way that won't require the constant, expensive addition of more and more cells.

In Congress, Utah Sen. Mike Lee is leading a bipartisan push to reform federal sentencing laws in a way that gives judges more discretion to avoid draconian sentences and pay attention to individual circumstances.

In between, federal agencies who handle justice hereabouts are joining to form a program called the Utah Alternative Conviction Track. It will select criminal defendants who either don't have much of a criminal history — and so are thought to be more easily reclaimed — or whose misbehavior can be blamed on substance abuse problems.

Those defendants who successfully complete the intensive supervision program can have charges dismissed or sentences reduces to probation.

The new approach stands to benefit all concerned — the defendant and the taxpayer — by cutting down not only expensive incarceration but also giving those who might make the best use of it a chance to rebuild their lives, get and stay employed, offer and receive the support of friends and family members and stay in the world instead of having to go through the difficult process of rejoining it.

Nobody is saying such offers of (relatively) easy redemption should be made to violent criminals, sexual predators or criminals who should be deported.

But a prison term for a great many of those accused of federal crimes would only cost the government money and turn someone with a life into an ex-con with so little in the way of support and prospects that they stand to either return to crime or otherwise become a burden on the state.

Thus does diversion not only mean a way for an individual to avoid prison, but for the rest of us to avoid creating another lost soul.