The Administration and Management of Criminal Justice Organizations - Research Paper Example

The verdict or sentence the jury set is rational, which is the final step towards determining whether an accused person is guilty or not. The person is also represented by a council, which ensures a fair and just trial especially when the cases tried are complex. He/she is granted the right to present his/her own witnesses as well as credible evidence to support his/her innocence. This presents the accused an opportunity to explain to the court that the circumstances that led to him/her being accused were misplaced (Blomberg & Cohen, 2003).

  An accused person has the right to question or to cross-examine the complainant, which on the other hand presents an opportunity to understand the basis of the accusations, and hence it is possible to determine the information that can help in establishing an innocent position. The accused is also protected against giving self-incriminating answers. For example in the US as well as other country’s legal systems, the indicted person is allowed to decline to answer such questions. This process indicates that a person convicted of a crime may not be given false judgment (Kalinich et al. 2004). The accused person is also protected from irrational search by law enforcers, which in the past as Neocleous (2004) noted, was used to provide false information against the accused especially when it was conducted in his/her absence.

It was possible for the police to introduce materials that incriminated the person leading to an unfair trial. This has been avoided through enforcement of the law against the practice in many criminal justice systems. Other forces assuring the accused of the fair trial also include the liberty of the accused from double jeopardy. Once some evidence or facts have been used for a ruling, the accused can not be once again tried on an offense on the basis of the same evidence. The trial can not proceed unless new facts are presented once the defendant has been acquitted.

This prevents the complainants from engineering facts to counter the witness offered during the trial. Witness protection is also a major factor that helps in encouraging witnesses to provide evidence to the best of their knowledge without intimidation. In any eventuality whereby the accused is dissatisfied with the ruling, he has a right to appeal. In many cases, appeals have led to changes in a ruling after reconsideration of the facts (Miller et al. 2006). In essence, a fair trial is a great possibility for an accused person due to the strong forces in the legal systems of countries such as the US, Canada, UK, Australia, Japan, and Germany among others.

Corruption is one of the factors that undermine individual rights and freedoms. The criminal justice systems of many countries have loopholes that lead to unfair judgment as a result of bribery. Accusations of bribery are common in the legal systems of many countries, such as the recent case of the British solicitor who is accused of receiving substantial bribes in the US (Evans, 2010). Such actions amongst the jury and witnesses as well as other parties who are entrusted to enhance a fair trial undermine the rights of the accused.

Sometimes the law enforcement agents arrest the accused without offering adequate reasons for accusation or denying him/her to have a meeting with the witnesses who testifies against them. This is a denial of the rights of the accused in the US. Failure to allow an accused person to seek the assistance of a lawyer or to call a sympathetic witness is also a form of denial of individual rights.