Australian Criminal Justice System : Australia Essay

The criminal justice system is composed of three parts – Police, Courts and Corrections – and all three work together to protect an individual’s rights and the rights of society to live without fear of being a victim of crime. According to merriam-webster.com, crime is defined as “an act that is forbidden or omission of a duty that is commanded by public law and that makes the offender liable to punishment by that law.” When all the three parts work together, it makes the criminal justice system function like a well tuned machine.

Justice is the concept of moral rightness that is based on equality, access and fairness. This means that the law is applied equally, understood by all people and does not have a particularly harsh effect on an individual. In Australia, the adversary system is used as a means to achieve justice by proving the accused, beyond reasonable doubt, committed the crime. The criminal trial process has many features which aim to fulfill the requirements of achieving justice. These elements, though considers equality, fairness and access, are flawed in practice. Flaws such as the handling of evidence, jurors not understanding instructions, inadequate funds for legal

The NSW Police Force as the first responders of the justice system was an effective mechanism for achieving justice through its process of

The criminal justice system within Australia is the means through which those who break rules stipulated within legislation and legal regulations are brought to justice in the form of punishment. The legal and non-legal measures implemented are applied across all aspects of crime. The legal measures include all institutions and processes enabled by law to deal with aspects of the criminal justice system. Non-legal measures include diversionary programs such as restorative justice. The use of non-legal measure in achieving justice is generally seen when dealing with young offenders. It is used in an attempt to allow the

The Oxford Learner’s Dictionary defines fairness to be ‘the quality of treating people equally or in a way that is reasonable’ and justice as ‘the quality of being fair or reasonable’ (Oald8.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com, 2014). Investigation of the characteristics of the Australian Legal System (ALS) including its adoption, structure and operational rules, reveal that for the most part the system is based on these two attributes. This inference is further evidenced by the legally binding operational framework assigned to the financial services industry and reflected in the codes of practice that also guide it.

There are three significant issues concerning law enforcement, namely enacting the law, police discretion, and assessment of criminal behavior. Different entities create and enact laws that are specific for the societies those laws represent.

The Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody (RCIADIC) in 1991 provided documentation on the death of indigenous Australians in prison or police custody. In doing so the report highlighted the substantial over representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in the Criminal Justice system and provided detailed analysis of underlying factors. The reports findings were believed to be the foundation of change. However, regardless of a range of policy changes and crime prevention programs in repose to the report, over representation in the criminal justice system remains. The issue is one of the most significant social justice and public policy issue in the contemporary Australian criminal justice system. The RCIADIC made 339 recommendations, most of which have been implemented into the criminal justice system over the past two decades. Never the less the systematic over representation remains prevalent. The purpose of this essay is to understand over representation as it exists in the contemporary criminal justice system. Particular emphasise will be placed on the levels of women and youths in the criminal justice system, their contact with the system and empirically based risk factors pertaining to over representation. An evaluation of alternative programs in the pre and post sentencing stage and the impact such programs would have on the over representation will be conducted.

The criminal psychologist occupies an important role in the current justice system not only in Australian society, but in contemporary society on a global scale. To understand what a criminal psychologist is, the principles of criminological psychology must be divided into individual definitions in order to frame the conventional interpretation of 'criminal psychology'. Criminals are often identified as senseless archetypes that commit crime usually through a disorderly offence. A criminal psychologist will usually look at the 'why' to determine the reason they are senseless. Although, most of the time it is due to the psychological aspects of a particular individual. This can vary from their upbringing to the use of harmful substances that affect their

The Canadian Criminal Justice System is, for the most part, reflective of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and various Supreme Court of Canada case-law. Everyone who finds themselves on the opposing end of the Criminal Justice System is entitled to certain protections every step of the way, beginning even before the arrest; laws protect us from unreasonable investigative techniques, guarantee certain rights at point of arrest, and provide us with the right to counsel. The bail court departs from the ‘beyond reasonable doubt’ standard in that the crown only needs to prove on a balance of probabilities (Kellough, 1996, p. 175) in order to take away a person’s freedom. It is for this reason I decided to limit the scope of my

Canada’s Criminal Justice system offers youth justice courts which have exclusive jurisdiction over cases involving young persons. They are specialized so that they only handle cases involving young persons. Youth cases are also held in their own courtrooms in local courthouses. These youth courts are open to the public like all Canadian courts, but due to the Youth Criminal Justice Act, youth still have privacy rights the identifies of youth cannot be publicized, unlike in adult court.

The perception of the Australian criminal justice system’s legitimacy is determined by the actions of three institutions, and the manner in which they address issues of justice within society. For the criminal justice system to be seen with integrity and valued for its role, it is vital that all members of the community see the appropriate rectification of injustices through the police, courts and corrections. However, particular groups within society encounter the illegitimacy and social inequity embedded within these institutions, diminishing the effectiveness to which they fulfill their role. For women in particular, the institutions of the criminal justice system are notably unethical in their treatment of both victims and perpetrators of crime. Despite many reforms and recommendations for change, the criminal justice system ultimately fails in achieving justice for women, with the courts demonstrating the most significant attempt to eliminate social inequality and victimisation.

The criminal justice system is the system the Australian public look to for protection and justice against those that disregard the law but there are mixed opinions from the general public that the justice system is too lenient and that the public opinion isn’t taken into consideration when assessing crime and punishment. In this essay, I will argue that the Australian criminal justice system is in fact shaped largely by our society because if it doesn’t reflect social conscience, the justice system would fail. I will discuss this firstly by explaining how the criminal justice system works in Australia, how the justice system reflects community values and how it relates to today’s society, the budget and staffing levels of agencies of the

Provision [SCRGSP], 2005; Jeffries and Bond, 2012). It is also widely discussed that there is an overrepresentation of Indigenous Australians in the criminal justice system itself (Jeffries and Bond, 2009), representing up to one quarter of prisoners in Australia (Makkai and Payne, 2003; Payne, 2005). This essay will address the current issues that Indigenous Australians face within the criminal justice system, particularly, with courts. The aim of this essay besides addressing these issues will also be to provide suggestions or alternatives that may help resolve the presented issues and improve the experience for Indigenous Australians in court.

This research paper discusses the issues of people who suffer from mental illness being placed in jails instead of receiving the necessary treatment they need. The number of inmates serving time in jail or prison who suffer from mental illness continues to rise. In 2015 the Bureau of Justice reported that sixty five percent of state prisoners and fourth five percent of federal prisoners suffered from mental conditions such as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Individuals who suffer from these problems require special mental health treatment for their needs to be met. Many of our prisons and jails lack the necessary resources to care for these inmates and because of that inmates who do not receive the treatment they need are at a higher risk of becoming a repeat offender. Despite the research and findings that show that the criminal justice system is unable to deal with issues dealing with the mentally ill there has been limited solutions put in place. Given the challenges the criminal justice system faces it is important to address the problem and come up with better solutions. This research paper will discuss the various techniques and solutions that scholars have propped and their effect on the issue of mentally ill criminals and how the criminal justice system should approach the problem.

The Criminal Justice System, a system the British government set up to deal with the treatment of law-breakers, has three main goals to achieve social order, these are, (1) enforcing criminal law, (2) maintaining law and order in the society, and (3) helping victims. This may seem to be a well thought of system, but like any other organisation, there are flaws, and one of the major flaws is discrimination, and the bias that stems from discrimination.