Criminal Court System Research Articles

Exploring the potential for joint training between legal professionals in the criminal justice system and health and social care professionals in the mental-health services

Effective screening of mentally-ill defendants in the criminal court system requires cooperation between legal professionals in the criminal justice system (CJS), and health and social care workers in the mental-health service (MHS). This interagency working, though, can be problematic, as recognized in the Bradley inquiry that recommended joint training for MHS and CJS professionals. The aim of this study was to examine the experiences and attitudes of workers in the CJS and MHS to inform the development of relevant training. The method was a survey of mental-health workers and legal professionals in the court. The results showed that both agencies were uncertain of their ability to work with the other and there is little training that supports them in this. Both recognized the importance of mentally-ill defendants being dealt with appropriately in court proceedings but acknowledged this is not achieved. There is a shared willingness to sympathize with defendants and a common lack of willingness to give a definite, unqualified response on the relationship between culpability, mental-illness and punishment. Views differ around defendants' threat to security.Findings suggest there is scope to develop interprofessional training programs between the CJS and MHS to improve interagency working and eventually impact on the quality of defendants' lives. Recommendations are made on the type of joint training that could be provided.

Effect of Mental Health Courts on Arrests and Jail Days

Mental health courts are growing in popularity as a form of jail diversion for justice system-involved people with serious mental illness. This is the first prospective multisite study on mental health courts with treatment and control groups. To determine if participation in a mental health court is associated with more favorable criminal justice outcomes than processing through the regular criminal court system and to identify defendants for whom mental health courts produce the most favorable criminal justice outcomes. Longitudinal study. Four mental health courts in San Francisco County, CA, Santa Clara County, CA, Hennepin County (Minneapolis), MN, and Marion County (Indianapolis), IN. A total 447 persons in the mental health court (MHC) and 600 treatment-as-usual (TAU) controls. Eighteen months of pre-entry and postentry data for 4 jurisdictions. All subjects were interviewed at baseline, and 70% were interviewed at 6 months. Objective outcome data were obtained on all subjects from Federal Bureau of Investigation arrest records, jails, prisons, and community treatment providers. Annualized rearrest rates, number of rearrests, and postentry incarceration days. The MHC and TAU samples are similar on the major outcome measures in the pre-entry 18-month period. In the 18 months following treatment, defined as entry into mental health court, the MHC group has a lower annualized rearrest rate, fewer post-18-month arrests, and fewer post-18-month incarceration days than the TAU group. The MHC graduates had lower rearrest rates than participants whose participation was terminated both during MHC supervision and after supervision ended. Factors associated with better outcomes among the MHC participants include lower pre-18-month arrests and incarceration days, treatment at baseline, not using illegal substances, and a diagnosis of bipolar disorder rather than schizophrenia or depression. Mental health courts meet the public safety objectives of lowering posttreatment arrest rates and days of incarceration. Both clinical and criminal justice factors are associated with better public safety outcomes for MHC participants.

The Mysterious Mysteriousness of Complementarity

This article explores an unusual interpretive disconnect in the discourse on complementarity, and shows how that disconnect is obscuring the most important questions about the relationship between the International Criminal Court (ICC) and national systems. Several Chambers of the ICC have held that, in the absence of national proceedings, a case is admissible before the ICC. Many commentators regard this position as a ‘gloss’, an ‘invented’ prong, and a departure from the Statute. Interestingly, such critiques are rooted in a sincere, firmly-held and widely-shared belief that Article 17 contains a one-step test requiring either ‘unwillingness’ or ‘inability’. This article demonstrates that, contrary to the popular simplification of the complementarity test, Article 17 expressly provides not a one-step test, but a two-step test, the first explicit question of which is whether a State is investigating or prosecuting the case or has done so. Thus, admissibility-due-to-inaction is not a creative inference or an imaginative gloss; it arises from the literal, unambiguous text of Article 17. Yet, the complementarity discourse is curiously inverted so that text is decried as 'gloss' and gloss is exalted as 'text'. The popular simplification of complementarity exercises such a powerful grip on the interpretive community that when Court applies the actual Article 17, the Court is accused of ‘departing’ from the Statute and ‘inventing’ new requirements. For some reason, the 55 words of Article 17 that explicitly require a national investigation or prosecution persistently fall into a shared blind spot. While many commentators find it a mystery that the Court believes that a case is admissible in the absence of proceedings, the real mystery is why this proposition is controversial. Once the interpretive disconnect is exposed and misplaced recriminations about Statute violations are set aside, we discover rich ground for a much more exciting debate about the role of the Court vis-a-vis national systems. For example, how can the risk of States shirking prosecutions be managed? What are the appropriate limits on ‘burden sharing’ arrangements? Such questions are not determined by the Statute text and are as important as any questions resolved in the Rome Statute. It is hoped that this paper will help bring about and contribute to that debate.

Juvenile competency to stand trial in criminal court and brain function

Current estimates indicate that approximately 200,000 juveniles are transferred to the (adult) criminal court system each year and it is often required that the juvenile's ability to function in adult criminal proceedings be assessed by a mental health professional. We review the literature on the assessment of juvenile competency to stand trial in criminal court, adolescent brain development, and related cognitive skills. We conclude that integrative developmental theories are needed to guide research and provide theoretical pathways to apply neuropsychological information to juvenile competency behaviors and the assessment of these behaviors.

Offenders' Perceptions of the Sentencing Process: A Study of Deterrence and Stigmatisation in the New South Wales Children's Court

The criminal court system remains society's pre-eminent response to criminal activity, despite recent innovations such as youth justice conferences. Little is known, however, about the impact of an appearance before court and, in particular, whether subjective reactions to the court process have any impact on recidivism. The current article reports the results of a longitudinal study conducted in the New South Wales (NSW) Children's Court. Two hundred and six young offenders were interviewed immediately after the conclusion of their sentencing hearing using a questionnaire designed to measure the extent to which they perceived the court hearing to be a deterrent, and the extent to which they felt either stigmatised or reintegrated by the experience of being sentenced. Other factors measured included the developmental background of the young person, their academic record, peer influence, and licit and illicit drug use. Participants with previous convictions and who felt stigmatised by the hearing were more likely to reoffend, while participants rating their likelihood of arrest in the event of future offending as high, and who reported that the sentence they received would prevent future offending, were less likely to reoffend. Some evidence was obtained, therefore, to support both deterrence and labelling theory.

The Therapeutic Effects of Managerial Reentry Courts

Research Article| December 01 2007 The Therapeutic Effects of Managerial Reentry Courts Eric J. Miller Eric J. Miller Assistant Professor, Saint Louis University School of Law Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Federal Sentencing Reporter (2007) 20 (2): 127–135. https://doi.org/10.1525/fsr.2007.20.2.127 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Eric J. Miller; The Therapeutic Effects of Managerial Reentry Courts. Federal Sentencing Reporter 1 December 2007; 20 (2): 127–135. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/fsr.2007.20.2.127 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentFederal Sentencing Reporter Search This content is only available via PDF. ©© 2007 BY THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.2007 Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

Aparat Hukum dan Pembenaran Kekerasan

The law apparatus for instance police, attorney and judge (jurist) are not only as an important pillar in state but also become an element in the criminal court system. The running well system of formal procedure, but sometimes faces the critical condition that implies to conduct violence either individually or collectively that direct to hard and soft violence. The violence action that conducted by law apparatus can not separate from and closed relation to their professional experiences, the principles of inquisitoir, crime model control and formal decision either national or international.

Child protection and justice systems processing of serious child abuse and neglect cases

Objective The aim of this study was to examine the trajectory of cases through four systems: child protection, law enforcement, the dependency courts, and the criminal courts. Method This study focused on a county selected from a 41-county telephone survey conducted for the National Incidence Study of Child Abuse and Neglect (NIS-3). For this analysis prospective samples were drawn from law enforcement ( n = 225) and the county child protection (CPS) agency ( n = 225) and followed through in-depth case tracking across all agencies and through both the dependency and criminal court systems. Results The percentage of CPS cases opened in dependency court was similar to prior studies (29%), but the acceptance and prosecution rates were much higher—92% of the cases referred from CPS, including many cases of physical abuse. Compared to referrals from CPS to law enforcement (93%), few cases were referred from law enforcement to CPS (17%). Anecdotally, case referral patterns appeared to be influenced by communication patterns and mutual positive regard, regardless of the collaborative protocols in place. One of the most instructive findings was the degree of difficulty in tracking cases across organizations and the types of obstacles that impeded success. Disorganization was not an issue, rather internal structures set up to facilitate intra-organizational processing were the same structures that actually impeded cross-organizational case finding. Conclusions It is not sufficient to rely on the existence of multi-disciplinary teams or Child Advocacy Centers to ensure collaboration. More attention to daily tasks and activities as well as the nature and quality of communication is warranted. On the technical side, use of common case identifiers on cases that are cross-referred is strongly recommended. Future studies should broaden the scope of inquiry to include the consequences of all case trajectories, rather than solely focusing on the justice system.

Participation of Victims in Pre-Trial Proceedings of the ICC

La participacion de las victimas se suele celebrar como una de las principales innovaciones del sistema de la Corte Penal Internacional (CPI). Ha sido regulado con gran detalle por los redactores del Estatuto de Roma y las Reglas de Procedimiento y Prueba de la CPI en relacion con los procedimientos judiciales. Sin embargo, se han dedicado pocas reflexiones a la cuestion de como se tratan los problemas de las victimas antes del comienzo del juicio. Esta contribucion busca cerrar esta brecha. Argumenta que las victimas tienen un papel que desempenar en el proceso de la CPI desde el comienzo mismo de los procedimientos. Ademas, busca aclarar como se pueden abordar en la practica algunos de los derechos de participacion de las victimas.

Characterising the System of the International Criminal Court: An Exploration of the Role of the Court Through the Elements of Crimes and the Crime of Genocide

AbstractThis paper examines the nature of the legislative system of the International Criminal Court, as established by the Rome Statute and the Elements of Crimes. It asks, to what extent can this system be seen as self-contained and self-sustaining or is its role better described as one of global harmonisation of existing and developing international criminal law? By examining the Elements of Crimes and their operation through the case study of the crime of genocide, the paper identifies some of the contradictions and challenges facing both the judges and parties who are obliged to work within this system, and also national jurisdictions that simultaneously seek to maintain their sovereignty and be included within the International Criminal Court system.

The End of Welfare As We Know It

A quiet revolution has been taking place within the US criminal court system. Independent of any congressional legislation, judicial reformers are advocating, and slowly implementing, a new court model broadly described as ‘problem-solving courts’.1 In policy terms, problem-solving courts aim to ‘use the authority of the court to maintain the social health of the community’ (Butts, 2001: 121), and this is achieved by ‘broaden[ing] the focus of legal proceedings, from simply adjudicating past facts and legal issues, to changing the future behavior of litigants and ensuring the future well being of communities’ (Berman and Feinblatt, 2001: 126). In theoretical terms, this goal explicitly redefines the criminal courtroom and its outcomes as more than a judicial procedure for determining guilt, innocence, and an appropriate sentence: this agenda now reconceptualizes the criminal court into an institution whose processes and outcomes affect other social spheres. While this goal is not unusual within the ideals of constitutional law, nor within academic debates emanating from the law and society movement or critical legal studies (see Silbey and Sarat, 1987), the explicit statement of these policy goals within a criminal court setting entails an unusual expansion of state power as I will show below, albeit now clothed in the language of accountability and the public good. Legal anthropology originated with the study of law as a system of norms and regulation across societies (see Nader, 1969), where order was maintained through mechanisms of formal social control as well as through ideological and cultural channels (Merry, 1992: 330). US ethnographies documented how the law is constituted through practice as opposed to existing as a set of fixed ordinances imposing social control from above (see, for example, Ewick and Silbey, 1998; Greenhouse et al., 1994; Merry, 1990). These studies rejected the idea of the law as epiphenomenal to social life, and showed how competing visions of legality engender social relations and social practice (Ewick and Silbey, 1998: 34–9). By necessity, US ethnographies primarily focus on a state-centered legal model, looking at Article

Domestic Violence

Utilizing a random sample of 455 cases, this article analyzes the impact of interracial/ethnic dyads on domestic violence case processing through the Sacramento County Criminal Court system during the period July 1, 1995, to June 30, 1996. The following five outcome measures were identified for analysis: (a) the decision to file charges, (b) the decision to file cases as felonies versus misdemeanors, (c) the decision to fully prosecute versus case dismissal, (d) whether a case was convicted on felony or misdemeanor charges, and (e) the length of sentence imposed. Logistic and linear regression analysis revealed no effect of interracial/ethnic dyads on any of these decision points. The variables (legal and extralegal) that shape each outcome are identified and discussed.

Media use and public confidence in democratic institutions

Content analyses have documented media negativity toward democratic institutions, and survey data have confirmed increasingly negative perceptions of these institutions. This study examines the impact of various media on confidence in democratic institutions — the Office of the Presidency, Congress, the criminal court system, the news media, the police, and the public school system. After accounting for the impact of respondent demographics, knowledge (expertise), and political partisanship, the results revealed limited influence of media use on perceptions of these institutions. Contrary to expectations, television news viewing predicted positively to perceptions of the news media and public schools, and newspaper reading was associated with favorable evaluations of the criminal court system and schools. Significant interaction effects were found for the news media and public schools, with listening to political talk radio eliciting lower levels of confidence among stronger Republican partisans. The only negative main effect found was that of non‐traditional news sources (television tabloids, television entertainment talk shows and television political talk shows) on perceptions of the police.

Is the O.J. Simpson verdict an example of jury nullification? Jury verdicts, legal concepts, and jury performance in a racially sensitive criminal case

In criminal cases involving minority defendants, some minority legal scholars argue that despite the overwhelming evidence of guilt, racial minority jurors should possess the moral obligation to acquit ‘'guilty'’ defendants as a protest against racial discrimination in the criminal justice and court systems. While the rate of racial acquittals is on the rise in criminal courts in large metropolitan jurisdictions, the present analysis shows that in the O.J Simpson trial involving a number of racial and ethnic minorities, minority jurors are more likely to adhere to the strict application of criminal legal standards —presumed innocence, burden of proof, and reasonable doubt — in their deliberative process. Our empirical analysis reveals that while the presence of biases in law enforcement raised the ‘'reasonable doubt'’ and ‘'proof beyond a reasonable doubt'’ standards among white jurors, none of the three legal standards had statistically significant relations with their determination of the trial outcome. For racial minorities, however, all three legal concepts and racial biases in the criminal justice system show statistically significant impacts on their determination of the Simpson verdict. While there is the greater scrutiny of both presumed innocence and reasonable doubt among racial minority jurors, the concept of the government's burden of proof negatively affected minorities’ views in the Simpson acquittal. This suggests that the government's superior positions and prosecutorial resources may be too much to overcome in order to win an acquittal. Thus the burden of proof standard may measure racial minorities’ sense of powerlessness in obtaining a fair trial and securing an acquittal. Similarly our findings show that racial minorities who believe there are racial biases and prejudices held and used by law enforcement authorities also feel that O.J. Simpson would be adjudicated guilty of murder, suggesting that the government which relies on evidence collected by discriminatory law enforcement agencies might still be too powerful to enable Simpson to win an acquittal verdict. While advocates for racially based jury nullification reinforce the image of lawlessness of minority jurors in America's criminal courts, the present analysis show that, at least in a highly publicized criminal trial involving a prominent minority defendant, minority jurors show the opposite, suggesting that racial minority jurors are indeed law abiding participants in the administration of justice.

In reply to: The interests of justice? The cross‐examination of child complainants of sexual abuse in criminal proceedings

The criminal court system in New Zealand is adversarial. Despite recent changes to the law allowing children's evidence‐in‐chief to be presented on videotape, children are usually cross‐examined in court or via closed‐circuit television. A theme analysis was conducted on the questions asked in 26 transcripts of cross‐examinations of child witnesses who allege sexual abuse in criminal proceedings. In a parallel study, 14 lawyers were interviewed on the strategies they employ when cross‐examining child complainants of sexual abuse. It is argued that current cross‐examination practices in the criminal courts may often breach the New Zealand Law Society Rules of Professional Conduct for Barristers and Solicitors (Rules 8.1, 8.5 and 10.5), and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (Articles 3(1) and 39). As a result of the studies, five steps are identified which have the potential to ensure that cross‐examinations are consistent with the legal code of ethics and which will produce trials that are fair to all while minimising potential damage to child witnesses.

GHANA'S PUBLIC TRIBUNALS: AN EXPERIMENT IN REVOLUTIONARY JUSTICE

IN A RADIO BROADCAST to the nation on Tuesday, 5 January 19 8 2, the Chairman of Ghana's Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC), Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings, announced that his revolutionary government was about to establish what he described as 'People's Tribunals'. They were to 'act on the basis of investigations scrupulously conducted and [with] evidence properly assembled', but were 'not [to be] fettered by technical rules that in the past have perverted the course of justice and enabled criminals to go free'. Nevertheless, this new system was not to 'replace [the] regular courts', but neither were the latter to 'superintend [their] operations'. Instead, what the Chairman envisaged was a dualistic criminal court system that would 'respect the boundaries of one another', and it would be left 'for the people to decide the correctness or otherwise of the judgment of the two systems'.l The Public Tribunals were to be a powerful instrument for pursuing the 'revolutionary' goals of what the Chairman described was a 'Holy War'.2 Almost eleven years later, on the 7 July 1993, as part of the new constitutional arrangements of Ghana's Fourth Republic, this dualistic criminal court system came to an end.3 According to the Courts Act of 6 July 1993, all courts in Ghana were to be incorporated into one system under the control of the country's Supreme Court and the experiment with popular justice 'not fettered by technical rules' came to an end. By the middle of 1995, with little fanfare, Regional, Circuit and Community Tribunals were indeed made part of the Fourth Republic's judicial system.4 Much of their personnel came from the ranks of former Public Tribunal officials, and as a further important concession to 'popular justice' many of these panel members were community members without specific

The Court's Effectiveness in Protecting the Rights of Juveniles in Delinquency Cases

During the 1960s and 1970s, the Supreme Court issued a number of decisions guaranteeing certain procedural rights to juveniles. This article assesses the impact of these decisions on the actual practices of the delinquency jurisdiction of the juvenile court. Studies show that, by and large, the procedural mandates have not been met. A key example is the fact that a significant percentage of juveniles still do not receive effective legal representation. This article also explores the potential disadvantages to juveniles of no constitutional right to a jury trial in juvenile court, waivers into the adult criminal court system, and diversion programs. Because of the juvenile court's resistance to reform, a number of juvenile justice scholars are advocating the abolition of its jurisdiction over delinquency cases. The article concludes with various viewpoints on this current controversy.

Jury Reform: An Analysis of Juror Perceptions of the Criminal Court System

Little empirical evidence exists to suggest that jurors may develop negative perceptions of the court system which may affect an objective finding of guilt or innocence. This present study examined a number of attributes of jurors, including juror demographic characteristics, time expended in jury selection and deliberation, and juror perceptions of the defense attorney and the prosecuting attorney. A questionnaire was mailed to 462 randomly selected individuals who had served as criminal court jurors during 1983 and 1984. The questionnaire elicited demographic information (e.g., age, sex, race, etc.); general details about the court case the juror had served; and attitudinal responses about the court system; the defense attorney, and the prosecuting attorney. These attributes were then examined with respect to the extent they affected jury decision outcomes.

Administration and Justice

AbstractAlthough the existence of plea negotiation as an operative mode of disposition in most criminal court systems has been firmly established, its role in the administration of justice remains a topic of considerable debate. It has been claimed that plea negotiation subverts ideal principles of justice while attending to administrative needs for speedy case settlement. More recent research indicates that disposition by guilty plea is a complex process that incorporates system needs as well as principles of justice. Findings from an exploratory study of the felony disposition guilty plea is a complex process that incorporates system needs as well as principles of justice. Findings from an exploratory study of the felony disposition process in the Multnomah County court system in Portland, Oregon suggest that, under certain conditions, plea negotiation can effect a balance between competing but interdependent domains of action in the criminal disposition process.

Efficiency in the Higher Criminal Court System

Efficiency in the Higher Criminal Court System