Administration of Justice

I agree with the speaker that the criminal justice system in America treats you better if you’re rich and guilty than if you’re poor and innocent. I believe that in not only in American society but also around world, wealth has a major roll in the outcome of a situation. Money does what money does best, it buys. Unfortunately, money can buy you your freedom and a judge. With money people look up to you, but without money people look down on you.

Has the criminal justice system always been unfair to minorities? Lauryn Hill, a famous songwriter talks about several things that opened the eyes of citizens everywhere across this nation in her album MTV Unplugged No. 2.0. In her song, “Mystery of Iniquity” she exposes the unjust court system and how everyone plays a part. The word iniquity means immoral unfair behavior. In the song Lauryn is trying to understand the meaning of the unfair behavior by the criminal justice system. She released this album in 2001, and she was not wrong for publicizing her views on this masterpiece of an album. We tend to forget that under President Clinton’s term, he enforced the 3 strikes and you're out policy, which placed more African American men in person for using crack cocaine than ever before. In the early 2000s, African Americans made up nearly 80% of a prison's population due to the federal crack cocaine laws and they also served more time in prison for drug offenses than their white counterparts. However, during this time period more than 67% (⅔) of crack cocaine users were either white or Hispanic.

Wealth also plays a huge role on the mass incarceration of minorities. Many of the inmates since kids have lived a life full of poverty. In the article, “From a Tangle of Pathology To a Race-Fair America”, Alan Aja, a professor at Brooklyn College, mentions that “Prior to the Great Recession, white households had a median net worth of approximately $135,000 and black households a median net worth of little over $12,000” (Aja). Such drastic gap in wealth enables white people to hire the best lawyers to represent them while black people can barely afford their everyday lives. African Americans don’t count with the necessary money to hire quality lawyers who can represent them. Most of the times they turn for help to the public defense or in

The criminal justice system is made for two groups of people: the poor and the wealthy.

This insinuates that the court system prioritizes getting through cases as quickly as possible to give the community a sense of reassurance that a criminal is off the streets. Poor people accused of crimes typically cannot afford a lawyer who will put their time and effort into proving their innocence, which results in them not receiving the justice they deserve. A

Throughout the riveting and eye-opening memoir, Just Mercy, by influential lawyer Bryan Stevenson readers are given a real insight on the predominance of racial minorities on crime sentencings. He opens up on the taboo topics of prejudice and sentencing the poor and weak simply because it’s convenient. This is re-affirmed through New York Times article by Shaila Dewan, “Court by Court, Lawyers Fight Policies that Fall Heavily on the Poor,” where she point blank states “[the justice system] is waging a guerilla campaign to reserve what they consider unconstitutional practices that penalize the poor.” In addition to both of these sources, the video “Keeping the Poor Out of Jail” by Kassie Bracken and Jessica Naudziunas, two Harvard law school students, upholds the same beliefs about inequality as they take on local justice systems and current policies targeting the poor. Although the fourteenth amendment states no state shall deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws poverty remains to be an exception to some degree. Those living in poverty lack the same equality as the rest of the US, not being given fair chances in trials or overly punished for their lack of resources. There needs to be an improvement in our justice system so we can eliminate the injustice on the impoverished, whether it be a more involved state-provided lawyer or an adequate, unbiased, and

In this examination of economic inequality and the experience of punishment, I express how the American justice system fails to accommodate lower class criminals with the standards it equally guarantees to all citizens. Assessing each level of the correction process will allow me to shed light on the struggles that poor convicts face and apply theories which support my analyses. Highlighting the unsuccessful employment of equal due process, I

Almost every day, we hear about justice being served upon criminals and we, as a society, feel a sense of relief that another threat to the public has been sentenced to a term in prison, where they will no longer pose a risk to the world at large. However, there are very rare occasions where the integrity of the justice system gets skewed and people who should not have been convicted are made to serve heavy prison sentences. When word of this judicial misstep reaches the public, there is social outcry, and we begin to question the judicial system for committing such a serious faux pas.

In the book Just Mercy: A story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson, there are several topics discussed regarding the American Justice system. One of those many topics discussed is regarding how a person’s race, social status and income, may influence the outcome of a court trail. In present day America, many years after the era of Jim crow and segregation the Justice system still seems to be more lenient towards white Americans, especially those with high income and a good standing in society. The American justice system has become unjust in the trials deemed to be fair, due to an evident prejudice against minorities, their social status and whether or not they receive a well off or poor income.

Jimmy Santiago Baca is a winner of the International Prize for his work in, A Place to Stand. The making of a poet. He writes, “I had no money. There is no way I’m going to make bail” (Baca, 187). In some cases, prisoners are only locked up because they had to get appointed a defense attorney who convinced them to plead to the charges so they would not have to go to trial and risk getting an extended amount of time. District attorneys are elected by the citizens and those people want someone who is tough on crime. If the district attorney is not tough on crime, the people will not reelect him. This can lead to many innocent lives being wasted; For instance, some criminals will sit in a cell for decades for the smallest offense. However, if a prisoner attempts to plead not guilty and the case goes to a trial by jury and they do find him or her guilty, they will be sentenced to an even longer term. It is obvious that our justice system is unfair and against human morals and ethics. They are somehow “innocent until proven guilty” yet they cannot afford to prove themselves innocent. Not only is poverty a reason for the rising increase in the population of inmates, many lack the education needed to understand the law or what they are being accused of.

The book "The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison" by Jeffrey H. Reiman provides a very interesting account of how the rich are being treated by the criminal justice system in a more favorable than the poorer and nonviolent criminals who are generally mistreated. Reiman started his book by stating that the recently noted decline in crime rate is skewed. This is clear in the 12th page of his book when he stated that After more than 20 years of telling us that crime was growing out of control and proposing more cops and tougher laws and more prisons, crime rates are now coming down and politicians are jumping to claim credit for the reductions" (Reiman ,p. 12).The book is a well written text that effectively examines the various harmful acts that are committed by the rich in our society. These harmful acts include bribery, medical crimes, and embezzlement of public funds, crime against consumers as well as environmental crimes such as unsafe workplaces as well as pollution among many others. Reiman's book, in its thorough analysis of the various harmful acts noted that there is a particular bias against the poor people within the American criminal justice system.He demonstrated that acts like murder, assault and theft that are committed by the poor people are treated by the criminal justice system as very serious crimes while on the other hand, other harmful acts like bribery, medical crimes, embezzlement of public funds, crime against consumers as well as

In the electronic world that we live in, every aspect of life can be broadcast across the country in seconds. This aspect is even more realistic when cameras are front and center in American courtrooms. Each morning and afternoon we turn on the television, reality television takes over and civil lawsuits or divorces are being broadcast on shows such as the Judge Judy Show, Judge Brown Show, Judge Greg Mathis Show or Divorce Court. Many people, young and old, are exposed to these reality shows believing what they see is the “real” criminal justice system at

I never realized how money affects the level of justice people receive. As perfectly exemplified through the OJ Simpson, the richer a person is, the better chance they have at getting the verdict they desire. Although not all for hire defense lawyers are better than public defenders, but good defense lawyers are able to charge so much money because they are extremely good at their job and help get their client acquitted. In any other circumstance other than OJ Simpson, a black male accused of double homicide would never have been able to get acquitted. OJ could afford a legal team made up of experts and his legal team costed him $50,000 a day, more than some people make in a whole year. If he wasn’t rich, he would currently be in jail and there for the rest of his life. This is true most cases; money, which gets someone a better lawyer, gives them a better chance at a better sentence. To me, this says that having money and being rich means the law works more in their favor, or is able to argue better in their favor, and that is a fundamental error in our justice system.

Criminal justice is another area of social inequality for minorities in the U.S. Getting a fair trial is difficult is one is accused of a crime that is a stereotype. If a minority is accused of rape, murder, theft, assault, or many other crimes, it may be hard to get a fair trial if the jury basis the evidence against stereotypes. Another aspect to this is that minorities are not given as many options as others. If they are in lower income areas, have less education or just less options general their chances of living a life of crime is high. Our human instincts

In many cases we are forced to believe that the prison system is fair and equal to all, although that may not be the case. The prison system at first glance seems fair and equal but after looking closer you will find many times it’s not fair at all. For example, “an African American male could spend more time in jail for possession of crack than a white man with the same amount of powder cocaine” (Harmon 372). This is just one example of how society has been taken advantage of in the prison system. Some people are subject to years in prison although they should not be while others enjoy life even though they should be in prison. The injustice in the sentencing of prisoners is an ongoing problem in society, as some criminals get of easy for horrible crimes others criminals suffer unfairly all because of color of their skin.