[Retra]

I don't have an opinion on this particular issue, but I do think it's kind of sad that people think it's ok to punish person A in order to influence the behavior of some other unknown group of people. It seems to me like your punishment should fit the crime under the sole consideration of those actually being punished. Otherwise, you're just making people pay for crimes they didn't commit.

[randyrand]

The threat of jailtime has always been used to deter crime. It's a large part of the reason people don't commit crime all the time.

People would have no reason not to commit crime if the stakes were "give back what you stole". "Fitting the crime" includes deterrence up to a sane amount. In general the punishment needs to be more than the crime. Say ~5x. Steal $1,000. Pay $5,000 "worth" of your time in jail.