International crime witness

Posted by Winnie Melda on March 6th, 2019

In the UK, the criminal justice system usually works together including the courts, prisons, prosecution service, and the police to deliver criminal justice. In this paper, it provides an analysis of the criminal justice system in the UK.

Court system view of accused rights

In the UK, the common assault does not usually entail actual physical assault; hence, a witnessed offense may be considered as aggravated assault or assault. With regards to the accused rights, the court system ensured that it did not violate the rights of the individual (Hauck, 2008). During the trial proceedings, the judge is normally in charge of the trail, and it is the responsibility of the judge to ensure that the trial is fair and also decide the sentence when the defendant is found guilty. During the trial proceedings, I observed that the court system ensured proper treatment of the defendant. The defense team included the lawyers from both sides. Since the accused pleaded guilty of the crime commented, the defendant lawyer worked in helping ensure that the defendants got a fair sentence. After the defendant had pleaded guilty of the crimes, the judge decided on how the offender would be sentenced (Shahidullak, 2012). From the decision by the judge on how to punish the offender, the judge considered getting the offender to make up for the crime committed through serving one year in jail. Based on my analysis of the sentence offered to the criminal, I considered the judgment by the offender as being fair.

Experience in prison system

As the defendant is sentenced to a term of imprisonment, the defendants will have a very different experience in the prison when compared to the outside life. In UK prison systems, the officers have to ensure disciplinary approaches. Thus, the offender will be subjected to disciplinary measures so as to ensure that they can adjust to the rules and regulations of the prison (Kingsbury et al. 2014). The defendants may also experience culture shock because of the changes as a result of the different living environment in prison. While in the real world, the defendant might have been enjoying certain freedom such as doing what they want or even going anywhere. However, when in the prison facility, the defendant will have to operate and live based on the rules that have been established (Travis 2011). That means that they have to follow the timetable including when to wake up, what to eat, where to be, and also complete their duties in prison. The defendant will also experience certain restrictions on money, movement, and leisure activities. The defendant might also experience depression because of their social life being affected (Shahidullak, 2012). When in prison, the defendant will not have the freedom of being visited whenever he or she wants. Thus, as the defendant may find it difficult in adjusting to the prison life, he may be depressed or even stressed while they are in confinement.

Ethical concerns

The ethical concerns that I witnessed regarding the country’s court system related to the lack of the defense attorney fully representing the defendant. I realized that there were several people who were complaining that their lawyers were not providing effective assistance of counsel. There was a deficient performance by the lawyers, which was something many people complained. Another ethical issue related to racial discrimination whereby the judges would provide unfair ruling for the people of color when compared to white people (Hirschel et al. 2008).  With relation to ethical issues in the correctional system, I realized that the low ranking correctional officers did have an inappropriate relationship with the inmates. There were claims that one female officer was having sexual relations with the prison inmates. There were also officers who would be warning the inmates when there were random checks in the cells so that they may eliminate any illegal materials. The issue of brutality by the officers was also an ethical problem that I witnessed in prison. When inmates would not act as expected, the officers would brutally beat up the inmates. I realized that most of the visits that the inmates made to the prison hospital were as a result of injuries caused by the prison officers.

Recommendation

A recommendation that can help to avoid racial discrimination in the court is through developing a committee in the court that will ensure it oversees all the court rulings and then evaluate whether the rulings by the judges were fair to the defendants. The committee will also ensure that those judges who make unfair rules on racial basis will receive punishment because of their actions. A recommendation that can work to help change the correctional system where officers are having a relationship with inmates is through creating a work policy. The policy will ensure that officers identified having relationships with inmates will be permanently dismissed from their jobs. That means that they will immediately stop working in the correctional system without any warning of their behavior.

Reference

Harr, S., Hess, M., Orthmann, H., & Kingsbury, J. (2014). Constitutional law and the criminal justice system. Cengage Learning.

Hauck, P. (2008) Judicial decisions in the pre-trial phase of criminal proceedings in France,

Germany, and England. Baden-Baden, Nomos

Wakefield, W Hirschel, D & Hirschel, D (2008) Criminal Justice in England and the United States. Jones & Bartlett Learning

Shahidullak, S (2012). Comparative criminal justice system. Jones & Bartlett Learning

Travis F. (2011) Introduction to criminal justice. Routledge

Carolyn Morgan is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in research paper writing services if you need a similar paper you can place your order from Top American Writing Services.