Analysis and Assessment of Jag Attorneys and Paralegals

My opinion of the on-the-job analysis and assessment of a JAG attorney and paralegal in the JAG Corps is that a paralegal specialist serving in the Office of the Staff Judge Advocate Military Justice Division plays an integral part of the Army’s legal system. They assist judges, Army lawyers and unit commanders with legal matters and judicial work. The paralegal specialist provides legal and administrative support in a variety of areas such as criminal law, family law, international law, contract law, and fiscal law.

Soldiers’ serving in this duty provide preliminary legal and administrative support to unit commanders and staff and coordinates legal actions with supervising legal office. They prepare and processes legal documents in support of courts-martial, non-judicial punishment, and other military justice matters, line of duty determinations, separation board proceedings, and other administrative law matters, legal assistance services, claims processing and investigations.

Senior paralegals supervise the operations of a section in a command or installation legal office, providing technical guidance to subordinates and maintains law and administrative library and section files and records. They monitor and review actions to ensure accuracy and timely disposition.

As for the impact of the challenges of individual work to teamwork, attorneys serves as the primary paralegal specialist for the Office of the Staff Judge advocate with responsibility for analysis and evaluation of a wide variety of criminal law issues. Not only do they provide direct legal support to the Staff Judge Advocate, they serves as subject matter expert and command liaison on all phases of and military justice matters. The also provides guidance, advice, assistance, and support to command representatives, investigators, and law enforcement officials on due process, interpretation of law and regulations and policy for the General court-Martial jurisdiction.

The difference between a paralegal and an attorney is that a paralegal does not have a license to practice law and an attorney does. A paralegal serves in a supporting role to attorneys, providing research, preparing documents, managing records, and recording certain formal statements that might be useful to a case. Attorneys represent clients more directly such as in a court case and they provide advice to help clients through many sorts of legal questions that may arise. Attorneys also assists the clients with filing a wide variety of documents, such as wills, contracts, and estates, just to name a few.

Where individual work of the attorney to team work with the assistance of the paralegals, paralegals can perform some of the same tasks that attorneys do, restrictions exist that prevent paralegals from providing certain services, like, a paralegal cannot establish the initial attorney-client relationship and providing legal advice. An attorney must make that connection with the client. Also, a paralegal is not allowed to represent a client in court. This means that in addition to being prevented from appearing on behalf of a client in a trial, paralegals also are prohibited from taking and defending depositions, and handling the signing of papers that will be filed in a court.

Paralegals received some formal paralegal education. Although that training can be completed in a matter of about 10 weeks in the Staff Judge Advocate School, equivalent to a two-year degree is considered the minimum level of college education for the field. Paralegals do not have federal or state license obligations. Attorneys must secure not only a bachelor's degree from a four-year college, but also a law degree, which is a three-year graduate degree. Then, attorneys must be admitted to the bar of any state in which they want to practice. This pretty much requires passing that state's bar exam, which is a type of a licensing exam.
To JAG attorneys, paralegals are a lot more than just secretaries. A paralegal can do the same paperwork, research, and client interviewing as an attorney but cannot give legal advice and cannot represent a client in court. A paralegal does not have to attend law school, as a lawyer does, and does not have to have a license. Regardless, the paralegal is vital to the JAG attorney and its accomplishments in the corps.