Criminal Laws And The Cruel Treatment Of Alleged Criminals

Criminal Law was essentially set up by the legislative and Congress, and includes the sentences by which individuals who violate the laws will be punished. A case will begin when an offense has occurred. Law enforcement will begin their process of investigation and gather evidence against the person who had committed the offense. Offenses are categorized as a summary of crimes, misdemeanors, and felonies. There are five categories of the violations of criminal law that can be categorized as either: felonies, misdemeanors, offenses, treason and espionage, and inchoate offenses (Schmalleger, 2015).

The criminal justice system in the United States has traditionally operated under two fundamentally different theories. One theory is the Crime Control Model. This theory is characterized by the idea that criminals should be aggressively pursued and crimes aggressively punished. The other theory is the Due Process Model. This theory is characterized by the idea that the rights of the accused need to be carefully protected in any criminal justice investigation. (Levy, 1999)

Myths are stories telling a part of the world view of a society or give an explanation of a practice, belief, or natural phenomenon. It is a popular viewpoint, embodying the ideals and institutions of a society or segment of society. Although myths are regarded as fictional representations, they often reveal underlying ideals. Myths often tell us more about our social and cultural values than they do about any particular circumstance. While myths seem to explain events, often times they instruct us on integrating an event an individual’s belief system and worldviews. The phrase crime myths does not stray too far from these definitions. These types of myths are usually created in nonscientific forums through the telling of sensational stories. These crime fictions often take on new meanings as they are told and retold, eventually evolving into truth for many people (Kappeler and Potter, 2005). The commonly held belief of the United States’ leniency within the criminal justice system is a crime myth, unfounded, and false.

A felony is a violent crime, it is considered to be more serious than a misdemeanor. When committing a felony it would be punishable to more than a year in prison. Felonies tend to be crimes such as assault, theft, and indecent exposure, depending on how many times committed.

There are thus many misconceptions about misdemeanors primarily because of this belief that these crimes are not considered serious by the legal system. Nothing can be further from the truth though.

Most time people don’t think about what crimes they are committing like motor vehicle theft, larceny and theft and robbery. Each of the crimes is serious, but some people don’t understand the consequence of what they could be up against. Automobile theft is a felony which you could face up to one or more years in prison. Robbery is a crime that happens every day and usually deals with someone intentionally taking something from a store or a person.

sentencing is more than six months. When someone is arrested for a crime, the court

The two models that we have encountered in this class are the due process model and the law-and-order, or the crime control model. The due process model can be observed, most famously, during the Warren Court in the 1960s, during Warren’s time as Chief Justice the court was most concerned with protecting and extending the rights of the accused. The due process model puts more strain on the prosecution to prove that the criminal’s rights were not infringed upon and that he actually committed the crime. In contrast, the crime control model is most concerned with lowering crime and deterring future criminals by prosecuting and processing criminals and cases as fast as possible. In some ways, this model resembles an assembly line, in the sense that it attempts to process cases as quickly and efficiently as possible. This model is much more concerned with convictions rather than upholding the rights of the accused. It is most prevalent starting in the late 1960s when Nixon appointed Warren Burger as Chief Justice, this model continued on with Chief Justice Rehnquist in the 1980s and continues on today under the current Chief Justice, John Roberts. However, the crime control model finds some opposition in the Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan who were appointed by President Obama, these two Justices tend to lean more towards the due process model.

In the United States, the criminal justice system is a combination of laws and institutions. Laws are to be enforced in order for society to work appropriately as a whole. The many institutions of the criminal justice system include law enforcement, juvenile and adult courts, and correctional facilities. It is a unique system that has developed a specific process to serve justice. It is however, a process that is not without its faults. In order to protect and serve the many different faces of society, the process is structured to ensure the justice system continues to flow in the proper direction. Throughout this paper, I will summarize all the steps between arrest, pre-trial, trial, and appeals. I will explain the contingencies for each stage

A felony can be defined as a crime, typically one involving violence, regarded as more serious than a misdemeanor, and usually punishable by imprisonment for more than one year or by death. Types of felonies include assaults that cause serious bodily injury; murder, rape, sexual abuse in the

Crime is defined as any behavior that is punishable by a fine, a prison or jail sentence or in some cases both. There are two types of crime. The first type is a felony; the standard definition of a felony is any crime that is punishable by more than one year in prison or by death. The most common felonies are murder, robbery, treason, rape and kidnapping. The second type of crime is known as a misdemeanor. A misdemeanor is usually a less serious crime and is generally punishable by a fine and/ or incarceration in a county jail for up to one year. The most common misdemeanor crimes

There are several different categories in which certain crimes are placed to classify them. They are categorized on the intensity of the actions committed, for example if it involves the injury of a fellow citizen at fault of the one who committed the action. The crime range from the simplest of Class C, B, and A Misdemeanor, State Jail Felony, Third- Degree felony, second-degree felony first degree felony, and the most severe capital punishment.

Classical criminology emerged during a time of social, economic and political change and the cruel criminal justice system in Europe during the eighteenth-century (Valasik 2014, 1). This theory did not aim to explain why people commit crime but rather was based on the assumption and expectation that all people are rational thinkers (Hunter and Dantzker 2012, 46-47). This theory is based on the notion of “individual rights, the rule of law and the human capacity to reason” (White and Haines 2008, 22). Classical criminology introduced equal rights under the law and thus believed that all people were the same and that individuals were solely responsible for their actions (White and Haines 2008, 24). Unfortunately, this theory fails to acknowledge

The general classification of misdemeanors are crimes that are punishable by jail holding a sentence of less than a year, while felonies on the other hand are crimes that hold a prison sentence for more than a year (Chamelin & Thomas, 2012). However, each state has its own classification of felonies and misdemeanors. According to the South Carolina Criminal Law and Motor Vehicle Handbook, a misdemeanor is a charge given to someone who partakes in class A, B, or C of Section §16-1-10 (B); a felony charge is given to someone who participates in class A, B, C, D, E, or F of Section §16-1-10(A) (Beder & Company, Inc,

However, the polarity of the two models is not absolute. Although it would be possible to construct models that exist in an institutional vacuum, it would not serve our purposes to do so. We are postulating, not a criminal process that operates in any kind of society at all, but rather one that operates within the framework of contemporary American society. This leaves plenty of room for polarization, but it does require the observance of some limits. A model of the criminal process that left out of account relatively stable and enduring features of the American legal system would not have much relevance to our central inquiry. For convenience, these elements of stability and continuity can be roughly equated with minimal agreed limits expressed in the Constitution of the United States and, more importantly, with unarticulated assumptions that can be perceived to underlie those limits. Of course, it is true that the Constitution is constantly appealed to by proponents and opponents of many measures that affect the criminal process. And only the naive would deny that there are few conclusive positions that can be reached by appeal to the Constitution. Yet there are assumptions about the criminal process that are widely shared and that may be viewed as common ground for the operation of any model of the criminal process. Our first task is to clarify these assumptions.