...Research Question: Wrongful convictions have been a concern especially with the high rates of exonerations raising the question of how exactly does the criminal justice system work and is it ineffective in serving justice? The government through the criminal justice system is charged with the duty to uphold law and order, by discouraging and alleviating crime as well as punishing and assimilating the law breakers. The criminal justice system therefore, has for long been part and parcel of the society and a huge area of concern for many. The system consists of all the organizations as well as procedures put in place by the government to regulate crime rates. It is hard to think of a society without the system, what it would be like and the levels of crime that would be present. However, with all the positivity’s that come with the system, then so are the questions raised. The criminal justice system and its operations is a key area of concern and with it the topic on the wrongful convictions whose number rises every waking dawn. A lot has been claimed about the criminal justice system ranging from the fact that race and class are the determinants of the kind of justice served (Cole, 1999), the fact that the dispensers of justice are hugely involved in the crimes taking place to the fact that some...
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...Canada has had its share of victims of miscarriages of justice in the past fifty years. In the Oxford dictionary, miscarriage of justice is defined as, “a failure of a court or judicial system to attain the ends of justice, especially one which results in the conviction of an innocent person.” (Oxford Dictionary). Currently in Canada, there is no legal obligation to compensate the victims of wrongful conviction. (“Entitlement to Compensation”). This is something that needs to change. Canada should compensate the victims of wrongful conviction with money based on however many years they spent waiting for trial, as well as the time they spent in jail. These victims need to be compensated because these convictions can ruin their reputation and...
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...Wrongful Convictions Benny Maize Pro Seminar in Criminal Justice AIU Whilst the speed of DNA exemptions has developed in the United States lately, unjust convictions have unmasked troubling fractures and tendencies within our criminal justice system. Collectively, these instances display all people and how our criminal justice process is faulty. This system must be fixed immediately. We must focus on the system's failures. In each event wherever DNA has established virtue beyond uncertainty, there’s a covering variety of triggers has surfaced from mishaps to misconduct to facets of nationality and social standing. Individuals absolved by DNA screening are not the only people who have been wrongly sentenced in latest decades. For each situation that requires DNA, you will find thousands of cases in which it was never used. Just a portion of criminal cases require scientific evidence which can be exposed through DNA screening, and even though such proof exists, it's usually missing or damaged after following a conviction. Because they do not have the use of a conclusive check like DNA, several wrongly convicted individuals have a thin possibility of actually showing that they are innocent. There is also the problem of Eyewitness misidentification, which could be the more likely reason behind wrongful convictions nationally, vying a position in more than 70% of convictions invalidated utilizing a DNA test. Whilst eyewitness testimony may be persuasive...
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...Post-Conviction DNA Policy in Criminal Investigations In most legal systems around the world, the courts have convicted many innocent people due to their legal procedure and laws. Wrongful conviction refers to a miscarriage of justice by convicting or punishing individuals for crimes they did not commit. Similarly, the application of the term may be useful in another direction; civil cases and errors of impunity. Many criminal justice systems have set ways to quash or overturn, a wrongful conviction. However, it is difficult for the criminal justice systems to overturn the decisions of wrongful convictions. In certain instances, overturning a wrongful conviction may take several years, or until the courts have already convicted the innocent person or the person has died. This paper examines the causes of wrongful convictions and focuses on the DNA exoneration policy. Causes of Wrongful Convictions The first clinic to work on non-DNA exonerations was the Michigan Innocence Clinic. It revealed particular circumstances that people have always deemed as the wrongful conviction. The scenarios reveal that the criminal justice needs amendments and change how the Michigan Innocence clinic should deal with the system’s trends. The following are among the causes of wrongful convictions: Eyewitness Misidentification: sometimes the eyewitnesses could misidentify a person and cause wrongful conviction on the...
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...Wrongful convictions can be described as a miscarriage of justice or an unfair decision in a court of law or as a conviction of a person accused of a crime which, in the result of a subsequent investigation, proves erroneous. Police misconduct refers to ill-appropriated conduct and illegal action taken by police regarding their official duties or any action performed by a law enforcement officer that is unethical, against established employment guidelines, unconstitutional, or criminal in nature. Official misconduct is more commonly caused by law enforcement officials and prosecutors in a number of ways. The knowledge we have about wrongful convictions and official misconduct comes mainly from studies of cases ending in exonerations. According...
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...Wrongfully Convictions Introduction: Each year, many people that are innocent are dished out short or long term prison term for crimes that they did not commit. These innocent people have been “wrongfully convicted”. Sometimes these wrongfully convicted charges are unbeknownst to the judge and or jury; other times, they are just wrongfully convicted due to corrupt law enforcement officers. This corrupt issue is very wrong and should be done away with immediately, which is my reason my choosing this topic. In this research paper, I plan to find reasons for wrongful convictions, the actual number, statistics, of individuals that have been wrongful convicted, and those individuals who have stepped up to make a difference in this dilemma. Although there aren’t any statistics kept by the Criminal Justice Department on the number of crimes that were recorded as wrongful convictions, research has estimated about 5% of the cases that are tried annual result in a false conviction. Since 1989, 1,241 people have been wrongfully convicted and later cleared of all charges based on evidence that they were innocent, according to the National Registry of Exonerations, a project of the law schools at the University of Michigan and Northwestern University (Clark 2013). The Michigan Innocence Clinic was the first clinic of its kind to work on non-DNA exonerations. Their work has revealed particular circumstances far too often seen in cases of wrongful conviction. These cases show us how...
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...Wrongful Convictions A man who was caught in a crime scene at the wrong time, is now serving 25 years to life, for a crime he did not commit, this is an example of a wrongful conviction. Wrongful convictions occur when innocent defendants are found guilty in criminal trials, or when defendants feel forced to plead guilty to crimes they did not commit in order to avoid the death penalty or very long prison sentences. In some instances, the law runs into convictions before getting complete facts, which is very unfair in the criminal justice system. Also, in the United States about 10,000 people may be wrongfully convicted of serious crimes each year according to Ohio states. This shows that it’s a major issue that needs to be solved; therefore,...
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...in Sunderland University. Racial Profiling Component of Article The article that I will review and is related to this topic on racial profiling is named “Race and Justice: Wrongful Convictions of African American Men” is written by Feagin Joe. Precisely, this article mainly talks about how the African Americans tend to be wrongly convicted due to racial prejudice and discrimination (Feagin, 2013). In order to gather adequate...
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...Commission The criminal justice system is best described as a search for the truth, however the more precise definition of it states that it is the system of law enforcement, the bar, the judiciary, corrections, and probation that is directly involved in the apprehension, prosecution, defense, sentencing, incarceration, and supervision of those suspected of or charged with criminal offences. As the justice system is handled by humans, it is bound to make mistakes and such errors lead to circumstances in which an innocent is found guilty; this is called a miscarriage of justice. Miscarriage of justice means the failure of a judicial system or court in the administration of justice, especially when an innocent is convicted in a crime (Dictionary.com, 2007). Miscarriage of justice is also known as wrongful conviction. If someone is wrongfully convicted, that person is punished for an offence he or she did not commit and the actual perpetrator of the crime goes free. As well, public confidence in the system declines when wrongful convictions are identified. There are several elements that cause a miscarriage of justice, such as non-disclosure of evidence by police or prosecution, confirmation bias on the part of investigators, fabrication of evidence, poor identification, and unreliable confessions due to police pressure or psychological instability. They are all considered unjust as they violate the principle of justice. The three major causes for wrongful conviction are false...
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...Project). Using the works of Loftus’s (2015) and Rattner’s (1983), I will examine how the primarily causes for cases of wrongful convictions consist of faulty eyewitness testimony and the exposure of the false memories. To begin, Loftus suggested that the identification of defendants from criminal cases were predominantly determined by witnesses (2015). In fact, studies have established that the possibility of misidentifying an individual tends to be increasingly high due to...
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...[Type the company name] | What You Can Do With A Degree in Criminal Justice | Help Prevent Wrongful Convictions | | Shamone Salter | Kaplan University | 11/6/2014 | This paper which is a letter to my fellow criminal justice students will inform potential criminal justice graduates of what type of employment opportunities that are available to them after graduation that will aide in the effort of preventing American citizens from being wrongfully convicted. | As your Criminal Justice Club Vice President, I have been informed that many of you who are studying criminal justice have been question what you can do after graduation with a degree in criminal justice. Many of you think that the only possible jobs available for you are as corrections officers or police officers. However that is not true, you can become a forensic science technician, a police officer, a private detective, and a crime scene investigator and even a paralegal. More importantly, due to the recent discoveries of many people having been falsely arrested and convicted reinforces my belief that these field or should I say career paths are very important one’s that need to be filled by my fellow graduates recent graduates who have I know have the drive and want to become successful individuals within the criminal justice field. Did you know that between 1972 and 2007 nearly one hundred and twenty inmates have been released from prison because it was found that they had been wrongfully...
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...that are law breaking citizens will get punished for the crimes they commit. They have faith in America’s criminal justice system that those individuals will get arrested, arraigned, provided a fair trial, and found guilty. They believe that if that individual is found guilty, then they must have committed the crime. However, the reality is sometimes the law abiding citizen is found guilty. An error occurs at some point in the criminal justice process from arrest to the verdict, which puts an innocent individual behind bars. It is a serious injustice towards that individual whether the error was an oversight, mistake, or just plain malicious. It raises questions whether our society can have faith in America’s criminal justice system. In Tested: How Twelve Wrongly Imprisoned Men Held Onto Hope, Dorothy Budd writes about twelve men that were wrongly convicted. Billy Smith and Johnnie Lindsey have stories to tell and what they have to say is important for everyone to hear. Billy Smith and Johnnie Lindsey were falsely imprisoned for around 20 years. They were both convicted of a sexual assault offense. What amazed me the most is although two decades or more of their lives were taken away from them, they were both content with what happened to them. Neither of them had hatred or anger towards the criminal justice system. Smith says, “America has the best justice system in the world.” I applaud them on keeping their faith and hope alive, even though the worst had happened to them...
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...the jury a direct connection between the suspect and the crime scene, such as an eye witness. Eye witnesses do help convict guilty suspects but there are many instances where testimonies are altered to have a bias in order to receive an incentive or for some reason the testimony is recanted. This kind of incentivized lie is often referred to as a jailhouse informant, or a snitch. The jailhouse informant is used mostly in drug and murder cases and has been one of the largest contributions to a wrongful conviction and most judicial systems do not place proper policy to prevent this manipulation. This essay will highlight the history of the use and abuse of jailhouse informants, laws that prevent the misuse of snitches, and the many sides around the controversial issue. Historical Background As long as eye-witness testimonies have been regarded as a reliable source, they have been potentially unreliable. Rob Warden for The Northwestern University School of Law Center of Wrongful Convictions (2004) states that the history of the snitch dates back to our most rudimentary sense of law, predating the Pilgrims arriving to the New World. Although, the first documented case in the United States isn’t until 1819. This case involved two brothers, Jesse and Stephen Boorn, who were suspects of their brother-in-law’s murder. One of their cellmates, Silas Merrill, testified Jesse confessed to the murder and Merrill was rewarded with freedom. Both brothers were sentenced to death but saved when...
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...The aim of this investigation was to examine the psychological factors contributing to the wrongful conviction of Martin Conmey. Comney was found guilty of the manslaughter of Úna Lynskey in Ireland in 1972 but has asserted that the police coerced him into his confession. An analysis of the interviewing techniques used by police in different countries may illuminate how wrongful convictions occur. Due to the interrogative nature of the US police-interviewing system, there is no safeguard against the occurrence of false confessions during investigations. Studies indicate that the US police-interviewing strategy, the Reid Technique, is psychologically manipulative, aiming to weaken the suspect’s ability to make decisions and retain successful...
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...in the investigation together with her boyfriend. Once all her roommate had left the scene she was left assisting the police. Innocence is a state of the mind as indicated in the case study, this led Knox to believe and trust in the criminal and justice system. It is important to note that Knox was convicted following the false confessions of other witnesses. The confessions we later found to be false after a DNA test was done and found Amanda innocent. A false confession corrupts evidence which in turn distorts the fact finding process. This eventually leads to the loss of integrity in the criminal and justice system. Corroboration inflation which is a tendency of confessions to find support from other evidence has the risk of spiking up the rate of wrongful conviction. Confessions of suspects in most case lead to cases being closed almost immediately by the police. This leads to ignorance of empirical evidence that may exonerate the suspect. The consequence of false confessions of a suspect is wrongful conviction. Prosecutors are also victims of false confessions, where they will see that the evidence and the confessions are not in cohesion but still pursue to have the victim convicted. False confessions interrupt the process of finding justice and finding the...
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