Transcript Court Issues and Practices

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Due process model- this model presumes that the
defendant is or should be presumed innocent until
proven guilty, and that the courts are here to
protect the suspect’s rights. The model also
presumes that giving to much power to law
enforcement officials will result in the loss of
freedom and civil liberties for everyone.
Crime control model- is almost the direct opposite
of the due process model. This philosophy views
crime as the breakdown of individual responsibility.
This model also places a high value on repressing
criminal activity, and feel that the person who is
charged should be considered or presumed guilty.
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Perhaps you have heard of the term CSI
effect in a previous course or perhaps even
in an article that you have read on the
subject.
Quite simply the CSI effect refers to persons
that may be selected to sit on a jury that
have unrealistic expectations of the
prosecutions case based on the contents
that they have may have seen in the past on
one of the shows.
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Two types of violence:
◦ Non targeted courthouse violence involves an
individual who has no specific preexisting
intention of engaging in violence but who,
either during, at the conclusion of, or
sometime shortly after the court proceeding
become incensed and defiant at some
procedure or outcome and acts out in the
courtroom or public corridors.
◦ Targeted courthouse violence involves an
individual who expressly intends to engage in
courthouse violence.
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Drug courts have proven to be a big success, with
the only problem being that there are not enough
drug courts operating to make a large enough
impact for drug offenders.
Mental health courts have also begun to spread as
alternatives to traditional criminal court
proceedings. Since the late 1990s, more than 175
have been established and dozens more are being
planned.
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Delays in processing cases is perhaps one of the
oldest problems of the U.S. courts and it is not
unusual to hear about cases that have
languished on court dockets for years.
Delay deprives defendants of the sixth
amendment right to a speedy trial and lengthy
pretrial incarceration pressures can cause a
defendant to plead guilty.
Although the speedy trial act of 1974 provided
firm time limits of 30 days from the time of
arrest to indictment and 70 days from
indictment to trial it is not unusual for a court to
go way beyond these limits
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Individual calendar system- with this kind of
system a case is assigned to a single judge who
oversees all aspects from arrest to arraignment to
pretrial motions and finally to trial. The primary
advantage to this type of scheduling is one judge is
responsible from beginning to end for the case, it
reduces judge shopping by defense and
prosecutors, and administrative responsibility for
each case is fixed.
Master calendar system- with this system the
judges oversee (usually on a rotating basis) given
stages of a case; preliminary hearings,
arraignments, motions, bargaining, or trials. The
judge is actually first assigned a case from a
master pool of cases. Once finished with a phase of
the trail it is returned to the central pool.
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Arbitration is similar to a trial, the less
formal. An arbitrator is selected were
pointed to a case and parties are use
usually represented by counsel.
Mediation is considerably less formal and
friendlier than arbitration. Parties agree
to negotiate with the aid of an impartial
person who facilitates the settlement
negotiations.
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In the mid 1990’s the national focus shifted from
drugs to juvenile crime. This is primarily because
during the 1980’s violent crime by young adults
began to rise at an alarming rate.
Since that time many states have began what is
called a certification process for serious juvenile
crimes.
The problem with this is that many of the juveniles
that are now incarcerated with other juvenile
offenders can be locked up with adult prisoners
after conviction.
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Another controversial issue is the
exclusionary rule, which was decided in the
case of Mapp v. Ohio in 1961.
For the person following the due process
paradigm the illegal conduct by police
cannot be ignored, and any court that
admits tainted evidence tolerates the
unconstitutional conduct that produced it.
There are still arguments around the
exclusionary rule today, and will probably
remain for the foreseeable future.
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Another hot button issue is that of plea bargaining.
Some feel like it is an appropriate and needed tool
to make the jobs of the judge, prosecutor, and
defense attorney easier. Others feel like it causes
minimalization of the crimes that have been
committed by the defendant as plea bargains
usually result in less time being served by a
defendant and charges to be lowered to a lesser
crime in many of these instances.
Civil libertarians do not like plea bargaining
because they feel that the accused forfeits a long
list of due process protections afforded under the
Bill of Rights, the presumption of innocence, the
governments burden of proof, the rights of one to
face their accuser, to testify and present witnesses
in ones own defense, to have an attorney, to
appeal, etc.