Can't remember the guy's name of course, but the British doctor who writes for National Review under a pseudonym (Dr. Dalrymple, maybe?) had an article on this very phenomenon a couple of years back.
He also volunteers time as a physician at a prison, and gets to talk to the inmates - and to a man/woman/whatever they all claim that somehow whatever vileness they had committed, just wasn't their fault.
I remember the article I read almost as though it were yesterday, and it was in 1983. A weekly newspaper in Santa Cruz. After 15 years, he had met one (1) prisoner who took responsibility for his actions and was sorry, repentent. One.
Woke the guy up to reality.
I've mentioned a number of times on FR that last year I had occasion to talk to the head DA of the rural county where I live (who was retiring) and he told me off the record that the only way to get crime under control - stop the revolving door - would be public beatings (not for capital crimes). Public pain and shame.
The cops here (I don't know about other places) call the people they keep arresting over and over again "clients"; they know them all by name.
Singapore has the right idea.