You seem to think that the only alternative to Pollsmoor is freedom. We DO have other prisons which are far better suited to non-violent convict, sending a non-violent convict to Pollsmoor can turn them into a violent criminal whether they want it or not. That makes them close to impossible to reintegrate into society, so we now have one of four possible outcomes:
- They get released after their sentence and we have a violent criminal free in public.
- They end up dead due to violent crimes they were forced to commit in prison - is death an appropriate punishment for a non-violent convict? I think not.
- They end up getting sentenced again and again and something that carried a fairly short sentence ends up being life in prison. Is life in prison fair for a non-violent convict?
- They successfully reform and reintegrate into public... As someone capable of and with a history of being violent.
Better options would be a prison better suited for non-violent convicts, but it still doesn't help the people that were stolen from and neither do any of the possible outcomes of a visit to Pollsmoor. How about something along the lines of community service?
Here's an idea, I've put next to no thought into it but it will both punish the thief without turning them into a violent criminal as well as slowly repay the victim of the theft. The thief can work a desk at Home Affairs or something similar for the females, the males can do construction work/mining/something along those lines or a desk job if their physical condition doesn't allow manual labour. Pay them at a rate of R 20/hour with ALL of the money paid back to the victims. R 80,000 at R 20/hour is 4,000 hours of work, with a 9:00 to 17:00 job that's 500 days (around 16 months) working for free. Annual and sick leave kept to an absolute minimum - sick leave can be restricted to a few days per year and annual leave can be scrapped. They can be required to check in at their local police station on every public holiday, Saturday and Sunday, or even be kept in a jail/holding cell on those days.
That way you have punished them, they have to work for free and lose their public holidays/weekends without the possibility of going on holiday. You have also compensated the victim of the theft. Someone with a criminal record is close to unemployable, so maybe even give them the option of keeping the job as a normal employee once they've proven themselves by completing their sentence - if they choose not to stop going to work/get themselves fired/resign, it's off to prison (but not Pollsmoor) and they do NOT have the option of returning to the job upon completion of their sentence.
Someone unemployable still needs to feed themselves, stealing might be their only option and this could negate that possibility. You have now punished them, reformed them, paid back the victim AND given them some sort of job security. Sending them to Pollsmoor only solves the first of the four - you have not reformed them, you've made them worse; you have no paid back the money; you have now got an unemployable person on the streets.
Of course, if they've stolen millions there's no possible way of them paying it back with a R 20/hour job, so you could even limit this to amounts which can be paid back within 2/3/5 years.
jails in SA are bad, but that places takes the cake by a long stretch. Our whole jail system needs to be re worked completely. It's a hell hole that only breeds more criminals instead of correcting behaviour. 
