Courtroom Workgroup Paper

The courtroom work group consists of the defense attorney, the state attorney, prosecutor and the judicial officer. And the purpose of this work group is to hold meetings prior to official court room trail hearings for a case, in which they assume that the defendant is guilty and negotiate and discuss potential pre trial plea bargains for the defendant. The purpose of these meetings is to save time in closing the case, because all of these procedures are done before the trial and court hearings, so that whatever is decided in the meeting can be negotiated with the defendant to see if the dispute can be settled without there being a need for a full fledged trial. But unlike most people think these work groups are not like they are depicted in the movies or in television, these work groups are actually very familiarized with each other and are not necessarily mortal enemies. Courtroom work groups actually interact with each other daily since there role in the criminal justice system is actually the same; to make sure that justice is served and that the defendants rights are not violated and/or ignored. Me personally, I wouldn't change anything in the way the courtroom work group system works right now. And this is because, to my perspective it is great that all the people involved in solving criminal cases in a specific jurisdiction have such a close relationship with each other, since it most likely help create a better flowing dynamic between all of the people that make up the work group at the time of the actual trial or in the courtroom work group meetings prior to the case being tried. The prosecutor has many roles and duties when it comes to the criminal justice proceedings but the most important role that the prosecutor serves is that of being the “minister of justice”. The main purpose of the prosecutor is to help the court arrive to a punishment to the defendant that goes accordingly to the crime or offense committed, in other words his role/function is to assist the court in serving fair justice to the community and society. Prosecutors like other members of the law system in the United Stated constantly receive numerous criminal cases each day, and must decide on which cases to pursue and which one to discard so that some else can take care of them. So they must be very wise in selecting cases they will take on, since they are supposed to take on cases that the public will benefit the most of. But prosecutors like other individuals in the field of law enforcement and justice have to be careful in what they choose to pursue since after all this is a political field, and every case they lose goes to show on their professional profile for the rest of their careers. If the criteria for taking cases became less stringent probably prosecutors would take on more cases since there would be more liberty for them to choose on what direction they would head them. But if the criteria became more stringent probably prosecutors would take on less cases since most likely their reputation and/or license could be in jeopardy. The effects of justice funnels and backlogs in cases is the United States is that daily judges receive so many cases that it is humanly impossible to pay really close attention to them and celebrating trials that last for months at a time. This is because if a each chase took months to solve a new case could easily take between five to fifteen years to get tried and a first view of the case. This is why in major states like New York judges sometimes take around one to two minutes to revise a case , so that he or she can get through the daily workload in a normal work day of eight hours. In my personal opinion to reduce backlogs of cases, there should be a way of creating a new branch of the system in which all minor offenses do not have to reach a judge and by creating a simple set of punishments for minor offenses a criminal can be sentenced in the police station where he or she is detained and walk out to serve their punishment, whether it be a month in jail, probation, fines, etc.. I truly believe that this would help the judge since he would have more time to though roughly examine more complex cases that may sometimes not be completely analyzed due to the time restrictions and workload amount.

References; Cji inreactive media modules found on the student website.