173 Reflective Journal. Week 1: Aims of the criminal Justice system This week was essentially an introductory topic and provided me with a basic understanding of the aims and operations of the criminal justice system. I learned that there is a number of different steps within the criminal justice system and the involvement of all the parties involved such as police, judge and jury and the defence. According to John Champion the main purpose of the criminal justice system is to process and prosecute individuals who commit crimes against society and to deal out suitable punishments for these individuals. This is a pivotal part in terms of maintain the functioning of society and to ensure that people don’t go around breaking laws wherever and whenever they want.
This type of legal system exercises the ideal that the supposed offender is considered innocent until proven guilty. This systems premise exercises the idea that both the defense and prosecuting attorneys will work at extreme lengths to make sure that guilty are convicted, and the innocent are set free. Both the prosecutor and the defense have rules of procedure, statute, and case laws that they must fallow. The Constitution also has certain powers and rights that both sides must implement and promote for fair administration of justice. In the adversarial system the defense attorney has the duty to act faithfully and enthusiastically on behalf of the defendant.
Both models start with a person who commits a crime and needs to have some form of punishment put upon them. The next similarity is that the person would have committed a crime that was illegal according to the law, and that it was illegal at the time of the crime, not after. Lastly, these two models are similar because the defendant has the right to choose how they would like their case handled, according to their legal rights. A defendant can choose to use the Due Process Model if they would like to go to trial and use a jury to decide on their charges, or to use the Crime Control Model and get a plea bargain, to get their punishment over with, rather than drawing it
One once said,” That it was better to have ten criminals escape punishment than to have one innocent person imprisoned.” To achieve this it will be ideal to keep the government honest; doing so without convictions by false statements, planted evidence or lying witnesses. Even if the accused person of the crime, is in fact guilty of the crime. It will be completely impossible to figure out the difference if the government to cheat in order to imprison one. The defense attorney’s job does not change regardless of whether the accused is guilty of the crime. The obligations of the criminal defense attorney are to advice their client of all the possible outcomes if they were to testify or not; the client has the right to testify on their behalf.
One of the features the Crime Control Model considers to be most important is the prevention of crime. While this model proclaims it is permissible to make mistakes in the entire criminal justice system, it assumes guilt by fact and the person is guilt unless proven innocent. This is one of the downfalls of the Crime Control Model. The concern with this model is a quick and speedy conviction despite the innocence of the alleged criminal. Many wrongful convictions have been overturned because of the proponents of the Crime Control
This has been developed in a variety of ways, in part of efforts to abolish parole, to adopt certain kinds of determinate sentencing guidelines and to put into practice other sentencing reforms. "www.thefreelibrary.com" (2011). I believe truth in sentencing is a deterrence of recidivism when using good time and work time credits. I believe every person deserves the opportunity to pay off their debt to society and prove that they will not be a repeat offender. Once a criminal has been convicted and has been sentenced to do their time, this is where they are able to show society and the criminal justice system that they have learned their lesson from their mistake.
Functionalist define crime and deviance as functional and necessary to society as a whole, with just the right amount of crime to avoid anomie; normlessness. Durkheim (cited in Haralambos and Holborn: 179) suggests that “societies need both crime and punishment to highlight society’s norms and define moral boundaries” (Haralambos and Holborn 2009). Functionalism strive for what is best for society so as not to strain the current system in place. If too much or too little change was to occur, society would be in a state of anomie, were common values are no longer understood and accepted. Merton (1968) in the study of his ‘American Dream’ theory
I feel like the most common model is due process and crime control model. Due process meaning is the fair treatment through justice system, as a citizen of the nation. Due process is used when someone commit a crime and get arrested by the law enforcement officer, in which they have to determine if the person is guilty or not by doing a fair trial and letting the person say what happen. If this system was not in place any person committing something illegal or got caught are wrong place wrong time would just be thrown to jail without any chance to say something or by going through a court system and this is why we have due process to distinguish who innocent and guilty. Crime control model refers to a theory of criminal justice which places
Conclusion Prosecutors, defense attorneys, criminals, and victims are placed together to deal with a given crime. Victimization concerns each position in different ways and must be individually considered. The goals of sentencing differ somewhat between each position. Alternative sanctions are often recognized when a criminal offender is sentenced. Ongoing assessments of victims' rights and the continousl improvement of such are imperative.
In order to make it aware to the community that offenders have been punished, sentencing makes it clear that punishment is occurring. It has been recognized by the courts that deterrence is considered one of the main purposes of criminal punishment. Corporate crime is taken seriously because it is not only hard to detect as well as it causes harm or loss in some way to the public. The main purpose of creating deterrence was to ensure that the criminal realizing the crime they committed, prevents other people from committed that crime as well as it gives a sense of satisfaction to society that someone is being punished for their crime. The overall goal of retribution is to reduce