The Work of the Magistrates Court and Magistrates Essays

The Victorian Court System was made up of many different parts, including the three different courts, the different juries, and the lawyers. There were three different courts: the Petty Court, the Assize Court and the King’s/Queen’s Bench. Each of the three courts functioned to serve a different purpose, and worked together to hold all of the trials. There were also different court sessions, which included Petty Sessions, Quarter Sessions, Borough Sessions, and City Councils, all of which served different purposes. In addition to the courts and court sessions, there were also the two different juries and the different lawyers. All of these components of the court were very important to the trials, and made the court what we know it as today.

The Magistrates’ role was to hear the evidence of distinct cases, criminal or civil matters and decide whether the accused is guilty or not guilty to an offence as charged and decide the penalty that will be given to those that are found guilty or plead guilty to an offence. Moreover, the Magistrate determined whether a case should go to a different court or to adjourn the case to another date.

To become a magistrate you must apply however not everyone can apply, you can not apply if you have a criminal record, if

The Courts and Judiciary of the victorian times were stern like today but had a poor system. The Magistrate decided what to do to the accused. If the Magistrate felt there was no case to answer, he could discharge the suspect. If the case was minor, the Magistrate could have the offence ‘summarily’ tried before two other

The criminal courts are responsible for determining the guilt or innocence of the person that is accused (Griffiths, 2015, p.147). As well as the courts are supposed to conclude the appropriate sentence while protecting their rights of the accused. The outcome that comes from the criminal courts is that the judgement is made to be fair, impartial and no political intrusion. Furthermore, the main focus of the courts is the find the fundamental problems, the interagency and interdisciplinary collaboration and the accountability to the community. (Griffiths, 2015, p.147). The court is supposing to keep the fairness and equality through the society.

All magistrates begin their magisterial career in the adult court where they deal with crimes which can have the most widespread impact on communities; for example, anti-social behaviour and alcohol-related incidents. Magistrates’ courts are also the first stage in dealing with more serious crimes such as rape and murder, which are then referred on to the Crown Court.

Magistrates because they are not paid, will have to take time off work to attend their duties. Now, in a business environment, an employer may be rather annoyed if an employee had to continuously take time off work to attend their duties and would thus be difficult for that employee-especially if they are not to be paid whilst they are away. This loss of earning may discourage a person from becoming a magistrate. Whereas, if a magistrate is an employer or a senior employee in the business, they will more easily be able to take time off work to attend court. This relates to how they will be middle-aged and middle-minded. The training process is said to have not been adequate or effective enough. They are not in trained in broader ways and therefore lacking full knowledge. A risk with the magistrates is that although they may be able to empathise with the defendant, they are prosecution minded and more likely to believe the police. They may also be heavily reliant upon the clerk when in reality, the clerk can only advise them on certain aspects and interpret difficult points of law. A major disadvantage is the fact that there are inconsistencies within the sentencing of defendants. A defendant in Leeds charged with the same offence as the defendant in Bristol may receive a more lenient sentence. Additionally, the workload of the magistrates is incredibly heavy and would be

These individuals do not have the qualifications in which other magistrates have which will require lay magistrates to receive basic training in order to process making decisions towards sentences. With their lack of knowledge this may result in

Merit –compare and contrast the role of judges ,lawyers and lay people within the English courts.

Judge Dee was considered the “Father and Mother Official.” Magistrates function as a judge, jury, prosecutor, and detective. He was the highest power in his district and was in charge of many things. He was in charge of the town, land administration, the tribunal, the bureau for the collection of taxes, the register office, and the public order in the district. Magistrates had to have great moral strength, intellectual power, and refined literati also trained on Chinese letter and arts. Without any of these skills, the magistrate would have failed his job. He would have barely gained any support since these skills were signs of a good leader. The Magistrates were almost miniature monarchs of their own lands. Even though whatever they say is not law, they are able to convict and torture people until they listen. Judge Dee took everything under his control form the detective work to sentences. He used lieutenants and constables to help out, but most work was done single-handedly. No one else I the district has more power than him. A few magistrates in the book even had their own private army for example; the magistrate in Turnip Pass had a garrison to protect the area from criminals. Magistrates are supposed to be truth-seeking men. Judge Dee is obviously truth seeking because he tries to see why the husband died in “The Strange Corpse” even though no one filed a complaint, he did this for righteousness, which is looked for in

Many years ago, before courts existed matters was handled in a privately or informally. This often led to violence and unjust treatment of innocent people. During the rise of the Greek City States and the Roman Empire law enforcement became a public affair instead of private. (Siegel, Schmalleger, & Worral, 2011). Along with this movement became formalized courts and other criminal justice institutions. This allowed for law enforcement matters to be handled in a more civilized manner for resolving human conflict.

Magistrates are volunteers who hear cases in courts in their community. Each case is usually heard by 3 magistrates, including a magistrate who is trained to act as a chairperson

On observing the District Court a number of distinctions from the Local Courts were immediately made apparent. Without going in to detail about the actual structure of the courts, they seemed to fit more closely with the traditional schema of a typical courtroom. In particular the larger courtrooms with more facilities combined with the barristers and magistrates wearing their wig and robes seemed to instantly uphold the ideology of justice. It is interesting to note how appearances can automatically provide an impression that justice will be upheld. The

The clerk otherwise known as the legal adivisor has to be qualified as a barrister or solicitor for at least five years. The clerk’s duty is to guide the magistrates on the question of law, practice and procedure. The clerk can not assist in the decision making and should not normally retire with the magistrates when they make their discisions. Clerks deal with ruotine admistrative matters such as issuing warrents for arrest, extend poilce bail, adhourn criminal procedings and deal with Early Adminisitrative Hearings. As lay magistrates perform an important role by being in charge over the vast majority of criminal cases, they enjoy the same advantage of immunity from suit as the rest of the judiciary as highlighted in Waltham Forest (1986) whereby the Court of Appeal held that

The aforementioned lack of legal expertise was felt and cased in ‘The Magistrates Tale’ where T, Grove recounts from personal experience that even after 80 sittings he still felt like a novice. T Grove is an ardent cheerleader for the use of magistrates and his passages reflect that as a magistrate is drawn from the local community there is a sense that people are being judged by their peers. John Humphreys shares this opinion and has been cited as stating that ‘if the people sitting up the on the bench are people like us…..then we may be more likely to feel that we have been fairly judged’. Not all aspects of society share this opinion; anecdotal evidence shows that defendants show mistrust in the magistracy as when faced with the option to be tried by the magistrate or a jury a favour is shown toward the jury. This mistrust can be based on the impression of the magistrate by the common man. Even though it is desired that the magistrate represent a cross section of society the majority of magistrates are middle aged, middle class, white men. The mistrust however could also be down to a misplaced view that magistrates begin to become sceptical of lines of defence, that they start to recognises defendants traits and in turn show bias to similar defendants, they become ‘case hardened’. However this can be counteracted with the fact that a magistrate is