The Criminal Justice System Operates At Various Levels...

The criminal justice system operates at various levels throughout the United States (US): the federal, state, and local governments combine to perform different tasks in order to properly enforce the law throughout the US. The judicial branch of the US contains the courts system, which enforces the law by punishing those who have committed illegal acts. The act by which a court executes its power and punishes somebody with some sort of consequence is referred to as a sentence (Greene, 2011, p.1). Throughout the history of the US, there have been many famous court cases where a defendant is either wrongfully convicted or given an unfair sentence because they belong to a minority group. Such instances where a person is given an unfair†¦show more content†¦According to Greene (2011), there are several stages in the sentencing process: first, the prosecutor states their evidence in regards to the crime committed and also any aggravating circumstances to help build their case. Se cond, the defense would try to convince the judge and/or jury of the defendant’s innocence or plead for a lesser sentence. At the same time, the defense would present any mitigating circumstances to the court which would help the judge decide in the end what type of punishment would be placed upon the defendant. At the end of the sentencing process the judge decides on what sentence to impose, depending on the aggravating and mitigating circumstances presented and any sentencing guidelines provided for the type of crime committed (Greene, 2011, p.1-2). Berman et al. (2002) describes aggravating factors to be those that can cause a judge to impose a greater sentence and a mitigating factor is one that may convince a judge to place a lighter sentence or no sentence at all. Aggravating factors include: the death or serious harm of the victim, resisting arrest, damage of others property, endangering the public, being a member of a known dangerous gang, using a weapon during the c riminal act in question, or causing psychological harm to the victim (Berman et al., 2002, p. 2). Mitigating factors can range from the crime in question being the defendants first, whether or not they turn themselves into authorities, if the crime caused little or no