Justice System: How It Works

Court proceedings are the justice system's methodological approach in solving disputes under the full cooperation of the law as stipulated in the constitution. The justice system ensures free and fair trial for both the plaintiff and defendant in the determination of guilty and innocent parties. Ample time is given for thorough and detailed analysis of evidence for each case and testimonial accounts which are recorded for current and future use. Furthermore, both the judge and jury sit in the court proceeding to provide a neutral but significant eye and ear in the determination of the verdict that the case points to. All these processes and parties involved showcase how critical the act of due process and fair treatment in the justice system form a working relationship that ensures non-biased conclusions, lack of prejudice and ambiguity and lawful application of rulings and verdicts.

The jury entails randomly selected members of the public who have no direct or indirect association to the cases they are assigned to. Jury duty is a civic act under the justice system that is enjoyed by every individual who takes part in a court proceeding in an impartial way to provide the jury’s verdict. Factors that influence a jury in their decision-making process include pre-trial publicity which could affect how they perceive the case as the media has given a perspective on the case they are presiding over. Furthermore, being human, jurors might tend to take sides before analyzing the evidence presented in court. The jury is more often than not affected by the characteristics of the defendant. Media depictions, defendant history and mannerism, might indirectly influence a jury's decision-making process towards the case. Finally, another factor is termed as minority influence which is the use of existing stereotypes knowingly or unknowingly in the determination of a verdict by the jury. Things like race, gender, sex and religion contain stereotypes that might influence how a jury views the defendant, especially in criminal, which might sway them in a certain way.