NEW YORK: The young man came to Britain with parents at a very early age. His grand-parents, uncles-aunts have been living here from long ago. 

Although three generations of his family lived in Britain for last 29 year, the Bangladesh youth has to leave the country on allegation of a crime that he did not committed. 

His father was such patriotic that he, till his death, denied about getting UK citizenship for him and his children.

Wishing anonymity his mother told this reporter: “My son was not involved in the crime for what he has been ordered to be extradited. A Pakistani boy beat up a Bangladeshi boy once. Later the Bangladeshi boy another day forcibly brought that Pakistani boy at his home and beat him up. My son was friend of that Bangladeshi boy. He called my son and another friend over phone requesting him to go his house. Police raided the house soon after my son reached there.”

“That Bangladeshi boy managed to flee the scene, but my son and the other boy was blamed for the abduction. Earlier my son served one year in jail after being used by some bad friends. Then court ordered my son not to keep friendship with those boys,” she added.

Lamenting to the order to extradite his son, the woman said, “Involved persons are roaming freely, but my innocent boy has to serve in jail and now to be extradited.”

“I repeatedly call his name, but it would seem I can't get God to listen,” were among some of the final words that left a young man's mouth before a final verdict was made to extradite him from the UK. 

The young man has spent almost his entire life in the UK but will now, as a result of his parents' lack of motivation to obtain a British passport for him, be spending his remaining days in Bangladesh. 

It's definitely unfortunate that an individual who committed small-scale crimes can be banished to an alien world within a matter of minutes whilst worldwide terrorists like Abu-Qatada are able to put up a worthy fight against our legal system and our Home Secretary when it comes to going home.

This young man has repeatedly acknowledged his mistakes and whilst his family continues to cry for him, this isn't enough. This story has been particularly interesting as it has stimulated some thought about certain models of punishment within political theory. Since a punishment is a penalty for a particular crime, not an act of revenge, it has certain moral components as it is used to right a wrong. Punishment, ideally, shouldn't be cruel or unjust which explains the three standard justifications: retribution, deterrence and rehabilitation.

When retribution is concerned, punishment is all about vengeance. Therefore, 'the punishment should fit the crime'. This form of punishment is often associated to traditional societies under major religious influence. 

The most well-known expression of this principle can be found in the Old Testament of the Bible which states, 'an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth.' This particular form of punishment would justify the death penalty as someone who has committed murder surrenders their own right to life. As enticing as this principle of punishment may sound for some people, there have been many complexities associated with this justification in the secularized and pluralistic societies of the industrialized West. Retribution takes into account the phenomenon of 'personal evil' but fails to consider social and other external influences on the individual which make it difficult to associate with the modern world.

Whereas retribution is based upon fixed moral principles, the next model of punishment, deterrence, is widely thought of as simply a form of social engineering. Crime in this context is not an expression of personal evil, but rather a form of anti-social behaviour which must be discouraged. 

This for instance would be used to justify cutting off the hands of a thief, as recommended in Islamic Shari'a law, in the hope of preventing future thieving. Deterrence is a way of scaring other potential criminals from making the same mistakes which essentially means one or a few people are sacrificed in order to achieve the best for society as a whole hence the reason Utilitarians are so fond of this particular principle. 

Jeremy Bentham, the boy who went to Oxford University at the age of twelve and then went on to play a pivotal part in creating University College London, is often seen as a founding father of utilitarianism. The philosophy of utilitarianism can in short be described as "the greatest happiness for the greatest number. "A problem associated with this model is that when a crime is committed, it is often as a result of irrational thinking. If the perpetrators of crime were not under severe psychological and emotional strain, it is likely that they wouldn't commit the crime entirely.

Kantians, followers of Immanuel Kant are perhaps the polar opposites of the Utilitarians. Kantians strongly oppose using anyone "as a means to an end," which explains their discontent with sacrificing one person to assist a larger number of people. Kantians are therefore more likely to subscribe to the final model of punishment, rehabilitation. This policy adopts an idea of reform and essentially blames the causes of the crime on society. This means the criminal in not seen as morally evil but rather someone who needs to be helped, supported and educated. 

One question I continually ask about this model of punishment is why would anyone wish to rehabilitate a 'criminal' to fit back into a society that has caused them to commit 'wrong' in the first place? Despite the perplexing logic involved in this principle, it's the most prominent model of punishment in Liberal Democracies and pretty much the world today.

After looking at the models of punishment, I admit to have found some difficulty in establishing which model best fits the case of the extradition of the aforementioned young man. I can't imagine retribution being the case as surely by committing crimes your 'just desserts' aren't being sent to a different part of the world. Rehabilitation can't be involved in any way either as the young man, whether he's been 'fixed' or not, hasn't even been given the opportunity to reintegrate himself with British society as he's sent abroad. This only leaves one more model. Can extraditing this young man be seen as a form of deterrence? 

BDST: 2200 HRS, May 1, 2014