The Criminal Justice Process

Mark Telford

Crime Control and Due Process

Herbert Packer, The Limits of the Criminal Sanction, 1968, Stanford University Press.

Crime Control

Due Process

Crime Control Model Aims & objectives

The purpose of criminal justice is to ensure security and freedom for citizens Through the repression of criminal conduct By efficiently producing a high rate of detection, conviction and punishment of offenders

Efficient exoneration of the factually innocent (though accepts that tolerable levels of efficiency will mean that some mistakes happen)
5

Crime Control Model Mechanisms

Trust in police to reliably determine factual innocence or guilt

Trust in pre-trial informal administrative procedures and decision making rather than courts
No necessary exclusion of evidence obtained through improper means Speedy, uniform and routine procedures Minimal opportunity for challenge

Mass production of guilty pleas

Resembles assembly-line conveyor belt in operation
6

Crime Control

Due Process

Crime Control Model

Dirty Harry - Do you feel lucky?
Jude Dredd I am the law

24s Jack Bauer

Due Process Model Aims and Objectives

Maintaining a scepticism about the efficacy of the criminal sanction
The aim of the process is at least as much to protect the factually innocent as it is to convict the factually guilty Upholding the primacy of the individual Giving high priority to the protection of civil liberties as an end in itself Placing limits upon the use (and abuse) of official power
9

Due Process Model Mechanisms

Distrust of reliability of police adjudication Demands finding of formalised legal guilt Presumption of innocence Exclusion of evidence obtained through improper means A right to legal advice and representation Many opportunities for appeal and redress

Resembles an obstacle course in operation

10

Crime Control

Due Process

11

Due Process Model

Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mocking Bird I want the truth! A Few Good Men

12

Police Stop and Search

Stop and Search

Background The Confait Affair
Royal Commission on Criminal Procedure, 1981 (The Phillips Commission)

Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) 1984

Associated Codes of Practice

14

PACE 1984, section 1 (+Code A)

Stop and search powers
reasonable suspicion any person carrying stolen items or other prohibited items (e.g. an offensive weapon) requires objective basis for reasonable suspicion

not personal factors alone

15

Objective Criteria for reasonable suspicion

information received on someone
someone acting covertly or warily someone carrying a certain type of article at an unusual time or place where there have been relevant crimes recently Contrast the legal position with policing working practices Terrorism Act 2000, section 44 (Gillan & Quinton v. UK)

16

Detention and interrogation in the police station

PACE 1984 Detention only:

Authorised by specialist custody officer

in order to charge the suspect

where there is insufficient evidence to charge the suspect, in order to secure that extra evidence but only where necessary anyone at a police station should either be free to leave at will, or be under arrest.

Time Limits (24, 36 or, with court order, 96 hours)

Contrast law in books with law in action
18

Access to Legal Advice- PACE 1984

S. 58(1) A person arrestedshall be entitled, if he so requests, to consult a solicitor privately at any time
S.58 (4) If a person makes such a request, he must be permitted to consult a solicitor as soon as is practicable suspect must be informed (and given written notice) by the custody officer of his right to see a lawyer and that this will be free of charge

Contrast law in books with law in action

19

Right to legal advice?

some suspects are simply not informed of their rights

some suspects requests are denied, ignored, or simply not acted upon the police use various tactics to attempt to dissuade suspects from seeking advice and to persuade them to cancel their requests Many suspects have negative attitudes towards defence solicitors

20