Legal Studies 88, Spring 2023
Learning Objectives on the Criminal Justice System for Quiz 1
From Lecture
The concept of “justice” is generally associated with fairness and in class we discussed various different
ways that fairness can be conceptualized – for example, random selection, merit, “the Golden Rule.”
o Know how the concept of justice is formulated in the US justice system;
o Know how the professor interprets the language used to define justice;
o Know the legal foundation on which the US justice system establishes fairness including the two
key sources in the law cited in lecture.
The course has emphasized the fragmentation of the justice system in the United States, the idea that it
is not a single justice system but many justice systems:
o Know the reasons why the justice system is fragmented;
o Know, roughly, according to lecture, how many different justice systems exist in the United
States.
Know the Constitutional source (the Constitutional amendment) that establishes:
o The legal standard for arresting someone;
o The right to legal counsel if you are arrested and charged with a crime;
o The right to a speedy trial;
Know the different types of cases in the justice system.
o Know the difference between juvenile delinquency and dependency cases.
o Know what a “status offense” is in the juvenile system.
o Know the main organizational differences between the criminal and civil system.
o Know how the three main classifications of criminal cases differ by severity of punishment.
o Know the difference between constitutional law and other types of law.
Know, roughly, how federal and state criminal justice systems differ in size.
Know how most criminal cases are resolved in state trial courts and roughly what percentage of cases
resolve that way.
Understand where national data on crime comes from:
o Know the two main sources of official (US Department of Justice) data;
o Know the main differences between these two sources of data;
o Know the limitations of the national data collected by the US Department of Justice (in other
words, know a couple of examples of cases that are not captured in the national data);
o Know why it is very rare for data on police killings of citizens to be included in the Uniform Crime
Report;
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Know the source of the data on lethal police shootings (the answer is not the Washington Post;
the answer is how it is collected, here).
Understand the concept of jurisdiction and know the two main types of jurisdiction.
Know the Constitutional Amendments that the Warren Court interpreted in a manner that expanded
individual rights in criminal law and know the names of the cases that led to this expansion.
Know what the Dickey Amendment was and how it affected research on crime.
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From the reading Not in It for Justice
o The justice system is a rule-based system in which individuals still exercise discretion. Know at
which stage in the pretrial process individuals can exercise discretion.
o Know what the “bail schedule” is.
o Know what the data / analytics are used to calculate it.
o Know what an “own-recognizance” release is.
o Know approximately how much bail bondsmen charge for posting bail (as a percent of the bail
amount).
o Know what “excessive bail” is.
o Know what “preventative detention” is.
o Know how California's bail compares to bail in other states?
From the Reading and Lecture on Probable Cause
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Know the different levels of certainty that are needed to:
o Temporarily detain someone;
o Arrest and lock someone up in jail, pre-trial;
From the Reading “One Lawyer, 194 Felony Cases, and No Time”
The article discusses a study of the workload of state public defenders. What did the study find about
how much workload public defenders had in Louisiana?
In the article, a federal, district court judge found that Louisiana was “failing miserably at upholding its
obligations under Gideon.” The judge went on to say that “Budget shortages are no excuse to violate the
United States Constitution.”
o Know what Gideon is;
o Know what the judge did in response to Louisiana’s failure.
From the Reading: “In Misdemeanor Cases, Long Waits for Elusive Trials.”
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o
o
Know what New York law establishes as the target number of days from arraignment for
misdemeanor cases to be tried.
Know how many of the cases that were featured in the article and were benefitting from the
assistance of a private law firm actually went to trial.
Know how plea bargaining is related to pre-trial detention (being held in jail pre-trial) and the
concept that “the process is the punishment.”
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From the Reading “FBI Director: we really have no idea…”
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o
Know what “the Ferguson effect” is;
Know what former FBI Director James Comey’s interpretation is of the data on unarmed black
Americans being shot by police.
From the reading “The Causes, Costs, and Consequences of Bad Government Data”
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o
Know the reasons that the article cites for why government agencies have and produce bad
data.
Know the characteristics of government agencies that are mostly likely to have “bad” data.
From the Reading Arrest Related Deaths Program – Data Quality Profile
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Know what the principal method is that official State Reporting Coordinators used to identify
arrest related deaths.
Know the approximate percentage of arrest related deaths that were still missing from the
system after improvements were introduced to the Arrest Related Deaths program.
Know what the penalties are that the federal government imposes on states and localities for
failure to report.
From the Reading and Lecture on the Uniform Crime Report (UCR) an the National Crime Victimization
Survey (NCVS)
o Know what types of crime are NOT counted in these two national systems.
o Know about what percentage of data is typically missing from these reports.
From the Reading and Lecture on the efforts to implement the National Incident Base Reporting System
(NIBRS)
o Know generally how the NIBRS differs from the UCR
o Know approximately what percentage of data was missing from the NIBRS in 2021.
o Know why local law enforcement agencies might be wary of implementing the NIBRS.
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