Criminal Justice System Paper

There are five stages of our criminal justice system; they are investigation and arrest, pretrial activities, trial, sentencing, and corrections. Each of these five stages has various steps and processes to them in order to ensure that each person’s right to due process is met. While each person has a right to be protected from crime, each person also has a right to be considered innocent until proven guilty in the court of law. The criminal justice system is set up in order to make sure the rights of individual are being met and respected. In the first stage, Investigation and arrest, there are two main things that occur which is warrant and booking. During this time, the police and/or detectives will gather evidence and try to reconstruct the events that occurred. The warrant is issued by a judicial officer to protect the police officer who performs a search from damages. Booking is more of an administrative process that shows who was arrested, the place and time of the arrest, the reason for arrest, and the arresting authority. During the pretrial activities there are four things that happen, the accused make a first appearance. This first appearance is when the judge will review the charges and advise the accused of their rights, and set bail if asked. Then there is the preliminary hearing. This is when it will be established that there either is or is not enough evidence to continue this person through the justice system. The judge is seeking to determine that a crime was committed and that the defendant committed it. The next step is the information or indictment. This means the prosecutor is asking to continue a case by filing an “information” document with the court. In some states it is required that an indictment be returned from a grand jury before the prosecutor can continue. Arraignment is when the accused will