Criminal Defense Essay

Criminal defense is better understood if the concept of criminal law is understood as well. Criminal law is defined as the body of law which deals with the constitution of offenses and the punishment given to offenders for their wrong doing. Among concept of criminal law, there are four important principles that correspond to the subject. The first principle is innocent until proven guilty which is considered the basis of the criminal justice system. Even though that an individual can get charged with an offense, he or she is still proven innocent until proven guilty of that offense. The case must have more than beyond the belief of reasonable doubt that the individual is guilty. Of course, if there is reasonable if there is reasonable doubt,
the individual would be acquitted from all charges. The second principle is burden of proof which is by proving the guilt of a defendant. This kind of proving or job falls on prosecution and it applies to all criminal trails. The third principle is the right to remain silent which basically means that a person has the legal right to remain silent when being questioned by the police. The most information a police officer can get from an individual is their name and address. And the final principle is known as double jeopardy. Double jeopardy just states that no person can be punished more than once for the same offense and no person should be place twice at risk of being convicted. In criminal prosecutions, a defendant may raise a defense in order to attempt to avoid criminal liability. When a person is accused of a crime, he has the chance to plead guilty or not guilty during the trail process. The defendant along with his lawyer must be able to prove to the judge or the jurors that he is innocent and should not be held liable for the crime in question. Criminal defenses range from insanity, Immunity, infancy, duress, necessity, consent, self defense, and etc.
Insanity Defense This form of defense is used when the defendant claims that they are not responsible for the act committed due to mental health problems which includes psychiatric illness or mental handicap. In order to define the insanity defense professionals use various test such as the M’Naghten test. Of course for this type of defense to be used insanity has to be proven and when proven there is a possibility that they will be transported to a mental institution for a while or the rest of their lives. In 2009 Superior Court Judge Peter Vazquez ruled in Newark stating that the defendant Jasmine Collins was found not guilty due to reason of insanity for the death of her nephew.
On November 19, 2006 Collins took her nephew Meshach in to a bedroom, locked the door, and started to repeatedly stab the child 57 times with a kitchen knife. Keith Collins which was Jasmine Collins’ brother in law and Meshach father dropped him off for a sleep over the day before. On Sunday afternoon while the other children were playing games and her husband was watching television, she was committing the crime. She had no previous criminal record, but had a substantial mental health record since 2003. The prosecution psychiatrist stated that he did not think she was insane due to the fact that she intended to hurt the child after he did not want to share a game with the other children. The prosecutor knew that she was in her right mind the day of the incident just because after she killed the boy, the blood was all over the room and on her clothes. She washed up and changed her clothes then fled the crime scene. Once she was arrested she asked for an attorney. The prosecution’s argument is what person would act like that if they were mentally unstable. She knew and was fully aware of what she was doing. The judge determined the sentence because of the way she was acting in the courtroom. “She always looked straight ahead at nothing in particular, as if she did not care what was happening, said Vazquez” ( 1 ). She did not show any emotion before or after the verdict. She was taken to the Essex county jail until full evaluation and treatment could be
established.
Self Defense Self defense is known to be a rationale force that a person will use in order to protect him or herself or another person from sustaining injury because of being attacked.
There are several states that validate self defense as a justification but there are some that it is not used in courts anymore. To use self defense the force that is used can not surpass rational because the threat would no longer be considered self defense. If the threat has also subsided and the person keeps on attacking then there the self defense does not count. A criminal homicide charge was dismissed against the defendant James Bryan Miller in the case where the Central High school student was killed in a home invasion. Isaac Robinson was killed in the incident where