explain how magistrates are chosen and appointed
Explain how magistrates are chosen and appointed - 15 marks Explain There are around 1500 new lay magistrates a year and they are recruited by the local advisory committee. The candidates that apply for being a lay magistrate are members of the public, this can be good for the courts as it is not paid work and they have local knowledge of the social situation, this is shown in the case of DPP -v- Bowman. However some of the limitations of the lay magistrates are that they are not trained in law and just use common sense, also, because of this, they tend to believe the prosecution team more than the defendants team. To qualify to be a lay magistrate, a person needs to be 18-65. They will need to have good judgement, social awareness, commitment and reliability, mature and have good communication. The candidate is expected to live in the local area to which they are allocated. They are expected to be able to serve 26 half days a year and these are not paid. There are some certain factors that may dissuade the local advisory committee from picking some candidates, these include serious criminal convictions, members of the forces, seriously hearing impaired or too infirm to carry out duties. The appointment of a new lay magistrate can take upto six to twelve months. This is because the appointment process starts with an application form that the candidate must fill in.
The Crucible
English Coursework: The Crucible Dear John, Before you discard this letter in disgust, hear what I have to say. It may benefit you, and all those near you greatly. You have but one week to make up your mind about this matter and tell court that you did indeed sign in Lucifer's book. To spend your last days in a cell would not befit a man of your standing among the community. Help them see that the court is not here to harm them, but here to help them. By showing me, if not the court, the powerful and undeniably accurate beliefs you have, you have made a marked change in me. I came to this town full of conviction and authority, thinking I "knew" about witches and was determined to pursue them with vigour. Yet, as I look upon those times, I realise that I have less sympathy for the way the witch-hunt has been conducted. I have discovered that my real sympathies lie with the accused and not with the accusers. Even tonight I have heard rumour that Abigail has decided to run away, showing only that she fear the judgement of the town. Only you, in your wisdom and with your unclouded judgement saw that sometimes even the best courts could be wrong. To mix religion and law has brought great grief upon this village, and only you can turn it around by staying alive and showing people that the whole trial is a joke dictated by a few girls and a silly sport that
Mens rea
Question Describe the mens rea element of a crime and its role in establishing criminal liability, using cases to identify different kinds of mens rea. Answer In order for an individual to be found guilty of a crime it is necessary for the prosecution in the majority of crimes to prove beyond reasonable doubt two important elements: Actus Reus - The physical act performed by the defendant Mens Rea - The guilty mind or mental act of the crime. Mens Rea means a guilty mind and refers to the intention element of the crime. Each offence has its own mens rea e.g. the mens res for murder is the 'unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought, this means that contrary to common law the defendant must intend to kill or cause grievous bodily harm whilst the mens rea for theft is dishonesty with the intention of permanently depriving as cited in s1 Theft Act 1968. There are three different levels of mens rea, which may form the basis of criminal liability, these are:- * Intention * Recklessness * Transferred Malice Intention is the highest level of mens rea. It is usually concerned with whether a person intends a particular result or consequence following their actions. In law there are two types of intent, Direct and Oblique. Direct Intent is where the defendant has a certain aim or result in mind and intends to achieve that result as in Matthews and Alleyne
What is the Copyright Act? How does the Copyright Act affect you?
Copyright What is the Copyright Act? Copyright act means when you copy someone else's work of the internet. It is act against the law to copy other people work on the internet you are not allowed to do this always make copy write the information in your own words and never ever make other peoples work as yours. You are not allowed to change business work or copy it always protect your work so nobody else could copy right your work as there work. It is illegal to copy peoples work copy DVD'S, songs or artwork. What does it try and do? Copy right try's to copy your work and people will make it as there work and they will say it is their wok instead of yours. For example: if you upload a picture o an website and someone takes it and copies and win the entry of your work that is wrong you should always have proof for your work along with all the files you used to make the picture like paint or photo shot. So you should save all files of your work for evidence. It also works to defend people's information. If you copyright someone's work you will get charged for I by the law because you have one a wrong act. How does the Copyright Act affect you when you try to: Download music: copyright stops people from coping music of the internet but on the other hand people still copy from the internet. You have to buy the music of the internet like for £1.10 or 80p it depends if your
America’s Driving Laws.
America's Driving Laws. Suburbia is more inconvenient for teenagers now. The New Jersey State Senate passed a graduated license program that raises the age for a full license. Currently, 17-year olds will receive a provisional license that forbids them from having more than one passenger in the car unless the passenger is over the age of 21 or lives with the driver. The driver also cannot drive between midnight and 5 a.m. except for religious reasons, emergencies, or employment. New Jersey's driving age should be left as it was prior to this new law because new drivers will always have higher death rates and the new law limits a teenager's freedom. The insurance industry and the government agree that new drivers have higher death rates. Therefore, the insurance industry is asking the state governments to increase driving restrictions. Insurance company executives and our current politicians may want to study new users of other vehicles. They would quickly realize that new users of every type of vehicle, including planes or farm equipment, have more accidents than experienced users. If the government raised the driving age to 30, then everyone above 30 would complain about the high accident rates of 30-year-olds. Furthermore, the new legal driving age has some negative consequences on the teenage community. If a teenager decides to become employed, he or she needs
Critique of The Criminalization of Homelessness.
\Critique In the article "The Criminalization of Homelessness", Celine-Marine talks about more than 50 cities in U.S have adopted the new ordinance and have the power to effectively punish the poor people who live on the streets. She argues that passing this ordinance is the best solution to solve the problems of the homelessness people sleep along sidewalks. The main purpose of this new ordinance that against homelessness people is to keep the sidewalks clear, since "the sidewalks in front of stores [are] belong to the store owners" (P.4, pp258). Therefore, under this ordinance, the police have the right to arrest the homelessness when they occupy the sidewalks and refuse to leave. This new legislation works perfectly because the number of crimes has dropped significantly in San Francisco, in 1993. After I read over and study the article, I put myself in the position, and I agree with Celine-Marine; I agree with her argument since I find this article is effective and logical enough. In this article, the author provides a lot of evidence and statistics to supports the entire article. "radio station KPFA... reported that only 20 robberies were committed at ATMs in San Francisco last year."(P.3, pp.258). This piece of evidence shows that the new law works effectively and the criminal rate of the homelessness people is decreasing. The evidence is also trust worthy because
Buckle Up!
One of the most widely ignored developments in safety, is also one of the most crucial: The Seatbelt. This contraption is not only a piece of equipment, but a car accidents best remedy. One of which is underrated by more than half of our country's population. There is at least one person fighting to prove the seatbelt as an indispensable device in your car. An individual named Carolyn Hanig. She is a flight nurse, and an emergency health care unit. One Mother's Day weekend, she sadly lost her son. As his death was due to forgetting to buckle up, Carolyn was devastated. And now, she attempts to heal this wound by enforcing seatbelt use, and ultimately, saving lives. Carolyn explains, the most efficient solution to this problem is by facing drivers with a more probable fate than a car accident. In states with a secondary seatbelt law, barely 50% of drivers and passengers can care enough to buckle their belts. As the law moves from secondary to standard, seatbelt rates shoot up more than 15%. One case, in Louisiana, the amount of clicks skyrocketed from 50-68%, simply because the state issued the standard belt law. In fact, if every state adopted this regulation, about 1,900 lives would be saved each year. The true victims of an accident aren't the people in the car, for these are the ones at fault. The real victims are the taxpayers. Society pays 85% of the medical costs,
Strict Liability
Question Explain how strict liability is used in criminal law, and consider whether it should be used in this way Answer In criminal law it is established that if a defendant is to be found guilty of an offence they must have the necessary actus reus and mens rea. However, for an offence of Strict Liability to be committed there is no need for the mens rea element because the state of mind of the accused is never questioned. Guilt in these cases is established as soon as it is proved that the accused committed the actus reus. Most of the strict liability offences such as Road Traffic Offences are statutory or Regulatory crimes created but statutes and not by common law. They are directed at businesses, whose owners may be prosecuted if they do not take adequate steps to ensure that their business operates properly. Where an offence is likely to affect the Public interest as a whole then the courts are more likely to decide that the offence is one of strict liability. People who are convicted of these offences are not normally regarded as criminals and will receive a penalty such as a fine. The courts start by presuming that mens rea is required for any of these offences even though the person committing the offence may not have been aware that they were doing any wrong as shown in Sweet and Parsley 1969 and Gammon (Hong Kong) Ltd v Attorney General of Hong Kong 1985.
At common law, the ownership of all the land in the country is vested in the Crown
At common law, the ownership of all the land in the country is vested in the Crown. No other than the Crown can own land. However, other persons may be tenants of land and have rights in the land which protect even against the Crown. There were different methods of land holding, or tenures. The doctrine of estates developed as a consequence of the doctrine of tenure. Since a tenant was not regarded as owning the land itself, it was necessary to determine what it was that he did own. Before the introduction of the 1926 property legislation, there existed 4 estates in land. The first type is the fee simple absolute in possession. On the death intestate of a tenant in fee simple the land passed or devolved upon his heir. The heir was ascertained by applying the canons of descent. If there was no heir the land was then passed to the superior feudal lord in a process known as escheat. The law then recognized the right of a fee simple owner to transfer or convey his property. The second type is the fee tail. A fee tail resembled a fee simple in that upon the death of the tenant the land devolved upon his heir, but the fee tail differs in that the heir had to be found amongst the descendants of the original tenant in tail. The third type is the terms of years absolute. This is the estate enjoyed by a tenant under a lease. The tenant is entitled to exclusive possession of the land
The aim of this study is to outline the difficulties confronting the court when fitness to plead and insanity defence are contested.
CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION The aim of this study is to outline the difficulties confronting the court when fitness to plead and insanity defence are contested. The relationship between fitness to plead, insanity and crime has been of interest to man from time. This is particularly so when crimes like homicide (murder) have been committed. Prior to the trial (Pre-trial phase), fitness to plead is usually contested. It is not unusual for a person appearing before the court to be unfit to plead. The jury, by resorting to the trial of facts, determines whether the accused committed the act or not. With regards to the Soham Killings, Huntley's "fitness to plead" was questioned. As a result of this he had to be remanded under section 35 of the Mental Health Act 1983, for a medical report at Rampton Special Hospital. The issue here is to ascertain that the individual has got sufficient intellect to be able to plead to the indictment and also understand the proceedings sufficiently to challenge jurors, take in the evidence, and make a proper defence. The test for this purpose is that set out in R V Pritchard. The fact that a criminal is insane, can affect the normal processes of the law at the trial phase. The legal position would be to divert as many mentally disordered offenders as possible from prosecution or penal disposal towards the health and social services.
