The Role Of Wrongful Conviction In The Criminal Justice System

A failure in the criminal justice system or a wrongful conviction. Innocent people’s lives ruined over a crime they did not commit. A wrongful conviction or putting someone behind bars for a crime they did not commit. The repercussions when an individual is wrongly convicted can ruin an individual’s job, relationship, and many life-changing factors. Wrongful convictions affect everyone, they impact society majorly, and improving the legal representation for the poor will help solve this issue. Wrongful convictions provide an error in our justice system. They are important police issues and imply that the justice system failed to protect when an individual is innocent. The factors that occur most often in wrongful convictions are eyewitness
errors, false confessions, forensic error, and prudery. Compensation for wrongful conviction is providing in half of the 50 states. Wrongful convictions have several meanings such as when a person’s due process rights are violated because no person can be convicted until convicted in legal fair trial. The due process right of a person is the idea of innocent until proven guilty in court of law. The term wrongful conviction by in this refers to the conviction of a wrong individual or of an individual when no crime happened. Every legal system has wrongful convictions, even when there are rules and order to avoid them (Zalman, 2014). Though it is unknown and will remain unknown how many wrongful convictions are actually in the United States.
Those wrongfully convicted have challenges like reentering there community and having to rebuild the life they had before this happened (Karaffa, Koch, & page, 2017). Rebuilding a life that they had starts with the public view. Public attitudes after an individual has been wrongfully convicted are greatly affected. The affected family in a wrongful conviction depending on the individuals past convictions could have a negative affect in the community they live in. Not only is the individual themself affected but their family, their town, and those who saw it on television or the general public. Everyone involved and watching is an affected individual because there live has now changed. Life changing could be slightly or majorly depending on the closeness to the individual. The individual’s job is now changed and the relationship they had is all life changing. Many relationships after a wrongful conviction are subject to change, depending on if it is a friend or significant other there are consequences when imprisonment is involved. Studies show that individuals with a prior record have a greater chance of having negative affects in court and the live they live at home or in society (Karaffa et al, 2017). The individual that was imprisoned for the wrongful conviction causes a negative affect on them form being locked up. The individuals freedom is taken away incorrectly in result to them being imprisoned.
When an individual who is innocent is deprived of freedom and even life it becomes a problem in policies and practices (Huff, 2002).
When an individual has freedom taken away it affects a person with how they view society. Society just imprisoned an innocent man. The society in which the individual lives in has created problems and grief in family. Unethical conviction of an innocent man is causing the society to disbelieve in the justice system because it has flaws. The people in society don’t want to be the next person charged with a crime they did not in fact commit. The wrongful conviction creates fear in the people. The people are not supposed to fear the justice system it is meant to protect the people. When fear comes into society it creates negative outlooks. Having a negative society has no positive gain. Wrongful convictions are harmful to society and can cause more disturbances than the community needs. A community takes a hard hit from a wrongful
conviction.
Improving wrongful convictions can help society, family, and trust in the Criminal justice system.
The availability and quality of the lawyer at the trail affects the outcome and chance of release (Gould & Leo, 2010). With the quality of the lawyer, an individual has a greater chance of getting released. As a result this shows that the higher paid lawyers are better at what they do, defending the defendant. When a man on trail has a well-paid lawyer he must have the money to pay him. On contrast to that when an individual has less money he gets a less paid lawyer or someone who isn’t trained and as good as highly paid professional. When in court the people believe the lawyer who is better at their job. Being better at their job results in the lawyer getting paid more. Problems occur when an individual cannot pay a better lawyer. Getting the higher paid lawyers to people who classify as poor would help them get released. Getting released when indeed the person did no harm or break any law despite what he is being charged with is helping the wrongful conviction issue. A private lawyer as opposed to a public defender has a greater chance of proving the innocence in a person who has been framed and save an individual from being wrongly convicted (Gould & Leo, 2010 ). Public defenders are given to a person when they cannot afford a lawyer. When better public defenders are available people can have better faith in the justice system and believe it is in fact here for protection
rather than false imprisonment. The justice system needs better public defenders to help those peoples lives ruined by wrongful convictions.
Wrongful convictions hurt everybody, they have a negative affect on society and better representation for the individual who cannot afford it will help solve this current issue. Having a life changing event like a wrongful conviction is hard and ruins the trust people have in the criminal justice system. Mistakes like this one impact our natation, and will cause negative affects in society. Being wrongfully convicted makes it hard to have faith in a system that was crated to protect.