The Courts in the Uk are institutions that aim to bring justice. Magistrates court have to power to charge minor cases, whereas Crown courts deal with more serious criminal cases, less than 3% all criminal cases go to the Crown, this percentage alone tells you that only the serious and complex cases will be heard, your trial here will be dealt with by both a Judge and Jury.
I observed the Crown Court for this report; I decided this would be the best court to observe because all kinds of Criminal functions are heard here. The Judge will decide on matters of law and will manage your trial ensuring that it is run correctly and fairly, the jury then decides on matters of fact, (e.g. are you guilty?).
The CJS is made up of many different agencies that work together to collectively respond to ‘crime’, each agencies ‘output’ is another’s ‘input’, a key agency being the Police, who are required to investigate and prevent crimes and are responsible for arresting and detaining suspects.
The cases heard at crown courts are ranked in order of seriousness; the most serious heard by High Court judges, the majority of other less serious cases dealt with by either circuit judges or recorders.
The judges in the Crown Courts have no limit to what they can sentence; they can impose a fine of any amount and can impose a sentence of custody for life.
During the day I witnessed the beginning of two trials. The first case I witnessed was an act of fraud, a couple had managed to collectively steal almost one hundred thousand pound from the local newspapers, a brief overview of their case was first discussed, but before the case started it was announced that the couple failed to attend their court hearing.
Remands in custody was briefly mentioned as a suggestion of what to do with this trial meaning that the case would be sent back to the magistrates court for further action before it was decided that the hearing was going to get adjourned until later that day.
Failing to attend a court hearing is dangerous as it can carry on in your absence, if you have legal representation your lawyer may be able to stay for the trial and cross examine the witness but cannot give evidence for you so therefore you will be deprived the opportunity of giving evidence for your defence.
The second trial involved a group of over 20 men that were accused of kidnapping, raping and raping 3 girls, and were accused of substance abuse. This was an on-going trial so only three men were being tried, these three men were on trial on the accounts of possession with intent to supply, of Cat A drugs under Section 4 of the Misuse of Drugs Act 1977 and raping a minor.
When questioning the suspects, the prosecution read out the correct definition of kidnapping being ‘false imprisonment’ before then referring to the CCTV footage, which showed the victim being held against her will, which constituted as false imprisonment.
It was clear that this case followed the due process model; a part of the justice system that is “ …the principle that a citizen has some absolute rights and cannot be deprived of life, liberty, or property without appropriate legal procedures and safeguards” (Innocent until proven guilty).
This contrasts the Crime control model, a conservative approach which stresses strict and swift punishment for crimes, according to the severity of the crime.
The Judge then went to discuss the aggravating and mitigating factors for the suspects, as this will affect the sentence given. A mitigating factor in this case was two of the suspects had both financial and housing problems; this was used by their lawyer to explain that it affected the suspect’s behaviour. The final suspect already had a serious criminal record, which was an aggravating factor as he has already had convictions similar before, this could make the sentence more serious.
The Jury was addressed and read each of the defendant’s charges, one of which had already been found guilty of the possession of drugs, which meant the Jury could hold the previous convictions against them. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to see the decision the jury made as it took too long.

There could have been a recurring theme in both trials that I witnessed, as both had mitigating factors (financial and environmental problems) that was said to affect their behaviour and the first offenders had no previous convictions however because they didn’t attend, they were unable to mitigate in favour of themselves.
I found that in both trials, remands in custody were mentioned/given, the second trial the other 17 men were remanded in custody as the trials were going on, this is because they were awaiting their trial and were seen as a danger to the public so for the time being they needed to be detained.
This court visit provided me with an informative observation of the step by step process of a trial as well as the judicial interactions with the public. Using the argument of Mitigation, I found remands in custody to be a popular process amongst the trials that I observed, if the defendant is decided to be remanded in custody they will stay in a remand wing/unit of the decided prison until their court date. This is because the courts are unsure whether the defendant should be allowed back into the public yet; although this is popular with police and public it constitutes to the rising of prison populations which places unnecessary demands on the prison system. This is not always the best option, for example in case one failure to attend indicates likelihood of flight so maybe remanding in custody is the best option however in case two, yes the safety of the public may be at risk if a drug supplier was not incarcerated; but that doesn’t apply to all the defendants.
Mitigation itself leads to an interpretation of the law that is not black and white and a matter of right and wrong, it evaluates shades of grey.

References
Marsh, I., Cochrane, J. and Melville, G. (2004) Criminal justice: An introduction to philosophies, theories and practice. New York: Routledge.
Due process model law & legal definition (no date) Available at: http://definitions.uslegal.com/d/due-process-model/