Intro to Criminal Justice

Introduction to the Justice System – Crime and Criminal Justice Before I started reading chapter one, I knew the basics of criminal justice such as the three branches, the Miranda rights, and some of the steps in the formal criminal justice process. Now that I have gone through the chapter, I have a much better understanding of the criminal justice system. I know it isn’t over yet, but from what I have read so far, I have been able to grasp the concepts in this chapter. As I was reading, there were many pieces of information that were eye-openers.

One of the main ‘side stories’ that stood out to me was about Leroy Schad, the sex offender who was convicted in March 2007. I thought it was mind-boggling when I read that part of his probation requires him to have signs on his personal property stating that he is a sex offender. Even though the crime he committed was uncalled for and inhumane, I believe this is a definite invasion of privacy. I am not sure if there are more charges against him, but from what I read in the excerpt, it seemed as if he was like any other sex offender. I have never heard of someone who committed a crime having to ‘announce’ to the public what they had done.

Therefore, I will definitely be doing more research on this case to find out why Leroy Schad was given this punishment. Two figures that stuck out to me were the ‘criminal justice funnel’ and the ‘wedding cake’. Both of these were very interesting. When I reached the bottom of the ‘criminal justice funnel’ I was sort of shocked to see that the example started with a thousand serious crimes and ended with twenty-five incarcerated. This gave a bit of an idea of how the criminal justice system works. The criminal justice wedding cake seemed like a creative idea to me when I ame across it in the book. I like how the levels are laid out so we are able to see which categories fall into which layers. I am still wondering if there is a certain reason why specifically the wedding cake scenario was picked. Does it have something to do with past history? A piece of information I encountered was about how each police agency follows the code of silence: “that officers come to place loyalty to integrity above loyalty to other officers”. I wasn’t able to completely understand this concept so I am hoping I can gain some more knowledge about the code of silence.

There were many other concepts that were knew pieces of information to me such as the formal criminal justice process, the scope of the system, and I also thought it was very interesting that the first police agency started in London. I always thought the United States were the ones to initiate this process. I am glad I have been able to find out so much information and it is only the very beginning of the course. I look forward to seeing what else catches my eye! References Siegel, L. J. (2012). Crime and Criminal Justice. Introduction to criminal justice (13th ed. , pp. 4 – 38). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.