''Finnish criminal policy is exceptionally expert-oriented,'' said Tapio Lappi-Seppala, director of the National Research Institute of Legal Policy. ''We believe in the moral-creating and value-shaping effect of punishment instead of punishment as retribution.''

He asserted that over the last two decades, more than 40,000 Finns had been spared prison, $20 million in costs had been saved, and the crime rate had gone down to relatively low Scandinavian levels.

Mr. Salminen, the prison service director, pulled out a piece of paper and drew three horizontal lines. ''This first level is self-control, the second is social control and the third is officer control. In Finland,'' he explained, ''we try to intervene at this first level so people won't get to the other two.''

The men and women who work in the prisons also back the softer approach. ''There are officers who were here 20 and 30 years ago, and they say it was much tougher to work then, with more people trying to escape and more prison violence,'' said Kaisa Tammi-Moilanen, 32, governor of the open ward at Hameenlinna.

She conceded that there were people who took advantage of the leniency. Risto Nikunen, 41, a grizzled drifter who has never held a job and has been in prison 11 times, was asked outside his drug rehabilitation unit if he might be one of them. ''Well,'' he shrugged, ''many people do come to prison to take a break and try to get better again.''

Prison officials can give up to 20 days solitary confinement to inmates as punishment for infractions like fighting or possessing drugs, though the usual term is from three to five days. Mr. Aaltonen said he tried to avoid even that by first talking out the problem with the offending inmate.

Finnish courts mete out four general punishments -- a fine, a conditional sentence, which amounts to probation, community service and an unconditional sentence. Even this last category is made less harsh by a practice of letting prisoners out after only half their term is served. Like the rest of the countries of the European Union, Finland has no death penalty.