Causes of an unfair trial in the administration of justice in developing nations

Document Type:Thesis

Subject Area:Criminology

Document 1

Address Printed in the United States of America First Printing, 2018 DECLARATION I declare that this research project is my original work and has not been submitted to any other University for assessment or award of any degree. Signature……………………………. Date……………………………… Vanessa Santiago Cordero A00232560 This research project has been submitted with my authority as the university supervisor. Signature…………………………. Date ……………………… Supervisor Inter-American University of Puerto Rico CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY This research proposal titled “Causes of an unfair trial in the administration of justice in developing nations” has limited literature and therefore deserves accreditation for more research. ………18 Theoretical framework……………………………………………………………. ……18 Justification and significance of the study………………………………………. 24 Variables…………………………………………………………………………………. 25 Conceptual framework……………………………………………………………………. 26 Defining conceptual terms…………………………………………………………………. 1: Conceptual framework…………………………………………………………. 23 ABSTRACT The main aim of this research is to explore out the causes of unfair judgment in the administration of justice in developing nations in general.

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The study aims at establishing which of the four factors identified as independent variables has a great influence in causing unfairness in criminal justice. However, the study will also examine on other possible causes of unfair judgment in the course of justice administration. The four main factors of criminal injustice that is, racial difference, ethnic difference, the difference in social class and bribery are identified as the independent variables while criminal justice system as the dependent variable. Judges in courts on the other hand tend to give ruling on cases on basis of the same factors. Therefore, it is clear that unfairness in criminal justice is trending in the word today especially in developing nations. The central point of this study will be to find out the most influential factor which leads to unfair trials in the administration of justice in developing nations.

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The study will investigate on factors such as ethnic difference, racial difference, bribery and difference in social classes to determine which causes unfair justice most. The independent variables to this study will be; racial difference, bribery, ethnic difference and the social class. They are normally humiliated, sexually harassed, beaten and even murdered in an attempt to hide facts. Police officers humiliates these people since they cannot depend themselves in the court of law and they cannot sue the police who treats them harshly (Dammer & Albanese, 2013). The whole criminal justice is unjust because cases presented by those from marginalized groups against the other group are always determined in favor of the private citizens. In most cases, the law enforcers do not investigate cases of the private citizen even when they are major but when a minor case is noted to the marginalized group investigation is fixed and the suspect is harassed and presented to the court where the case is unfairly determined (Kane et al, 2005).

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Criminal justice is a structure in which offences and criminals are identified, tried and ruled (Timothy, 2017). The administrative norms may be imposed to the descent-based groups preventing them from participation in certain occupations, accessing particular services and resources and more worse to educational opportunities (Cuneen, 2005). Members of descent-based groups fail to get protection from the police equally when they advocate for their rights in case of differences with the private citizens. The law enforcers sometimes stand by their citizen even when the private citizens had made attacks to the marginalized groups. Additionally, if the police are to stand by the truth, they normally delay their intervention hence unfairness to the descent-based groups. The investigation of such cases may be done unfairly (Weich and Angulo, 2007).

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Therefore, the whole criminal justice system is marred by unfairness with harsh treatment going to the marginalized groups. According to a report of sentencing project’s fact sheet on Trends in the US in 2016, over 2 million people in America were in prison. Many people supported the amendment of criminal justice system since those who were serving their sentence in prison was sentenced on basis of color. According to some researchers, racial sentencing is based on differences in crimes while others believe that the minority groups in America are punished more severely than the private citizens of America especially the white even when similar criminal activities are committed. Cassian C. The law enforcers use extreme physical force or psychological coercion against the individuals especially those from the marginalized groups.

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A report of the Mapping Police Violence shows that the police had killed approximately one thousand people in 2017 alone. On basis of the data analysis of this report, there is discrimination such that the marginalized people recorded a high number of the people who had been killed by the police. More than a quarter of the killed people were the Blacks meaning that the Black people were more targets of the police brutally than their White counterparts? A report by watchdog shows that approximately half of Americans consider the US justice system as corrupt. Most judges are being bribed hence ruling cases in favor of the client who have bribed them while leaving the other party to suffer from the verdict of the court.

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Statement of the Problem Today, many nations have experienced the issue of unfairness in the administration of justice where people are attended based on discrimination in terms of race or color and ethnic difference. The marginalized groups in many nations are not treated equally to the majority of those nations. Many developing nations have been experiencing this issue of unfairness where the minority groups face harsh treatment from the law enforcers, the judges in the courts and even from the government. More studies have been carried out in the field of criminal justice but a few have been carried to investigate the causes of unfair ruling in the administration of justice and yet they have not directly identified the major causes.

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Therefore, this study seeks to fill the gap by investigating the causes of unfair judgment in the administration of justice in third world countries. Theoretical framework will introduce and describe findings and theories which provides reasons as to why research topic under this study is of importance. The theoretical framework will also consist of issues ranging from concepts, definitions, theories that will be used in this study (Sekaran, 2005). The ideas for these theories are directly related to the causes of unfair judgment in the course of administering justice in developing nations. The most common theories that the researcher will embark on includes the following; The Globalization theory, social disorganization theory, strain theory, social learning theory and the rational choice theory. These theories are discussed below.

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The social disorganization theory This theory ascertains that the social-economic environment may depict one’s character and hence may influence the activities that one may engage hence indulging to unlawful activities in order to earn living. The environment here represents the economic position of the country in general, therefore, the unemployment levels, the GDP, the inflation rate plays a very pivotal role in dictating the kind of life the residents intends to live. Alternatively, neighborhood exhibiting unraveling social structures are more vulnerable to crime rates. The neighborhood may have smashed buildings, vandalized schools, wrecked business structures and poor residential or commercial houses. In summary, the surroundings of a place may take part in determining one’s behavior (Steven, 2005). Additionally, white-collar crime is the most category of crime committed by people of respectability and high social class in the society in the course of their occupation.

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Some of the crimes committed are bribery, assault, burglary, theft and robbery. Therefore, circumstances may compel an individual to commit crimes in their line of duty (Briggs, 2012) The social learning theory People tend to copy behaviors from their peers or people they associate with. For instance, people at the lowest level of the social pyramid tend to imitate the behavior from persons of respectability in the higher ranks of the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (Brown, 2005). However, due to financial incapacity and other hurdles they engage to unlawful practices in their process of achieving their success. The results for this study will help many nations to understand the factors, which leads to unfair justice in their fight to ensure equal administration of justice.

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The results of this study will further help the departments which advocates for human rights to get a clear understanding of the causes of injustice and came out with the solutions of the same while in fulfilling their duty of ensuring equality to all people regardless of the race difference, social class, ethnic difference or any other factor. Furthermore, the study will establish the most influential factors which causes unfairness during the administration of justice. These factors are racial discrimination, ethnic discrimination, bribery and difference in social class. Therefore, after establishing the most influential factor, developing nations will focus on that factor in the effort of restoring equality in criminal justice as well as provision of other essential services to citizen without any form of favor.

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Social class- social class represents individuals who share common position in the economic system. There are three types of social class where individuals are classified; upper-class, middle-class and the lower-class. Administration of justice can be based on social class hence leading to unfairness since basically; the lower- class will be discriminated. Bribery – this is an act of giving or receiving money or equivalent for the purpose of stimulating the action of another person especially an official in liberation of his or her responsibilities. Law offenders can give bribes to the law enforcers then left to go unpunished while the attached person continue suffering. To facilitate the understanding of research concept, the literature reviewed will be organized in relation to the concepts and variables of the study.

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Embarking on the existing work on criminal justice, the researcher will gather more information as possible concerning this area of study. This will be aided by reviewing criminology journals and any other relevant material rendered valid presented by different scholars in the area of criminology. Based on the analysis of the data, the research will also engage on other materials with multi-disciplinary knowledge where different causes of injustice have been well presented. Causes of unfair trial in administering justice in developing nations This study will review literature on the variables identified in the conceptual framework and, which different scholars have carried out and make conclusions and recommendations based on the analyzing of data and information where applicable since this study is qualitative research proposal.

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Kramer, Steffensmeier and Ulmer conducted a research proposal whose aim was to explore the relationship between the variables: Race and sentence severity and based on their results and through the implementation of the proposal it is undoubtedly to summarize that black males from developing nations suffered most in all the phases of the criminal justice system processing. Discrimination on basis of race is a common problem in many developing nations. In criminal justice, racial discrimination is also found to be a key problem where the whole system is bias and many people from other races finds themselves suffering due to unfair justice. This unfairness starts from the police who mistreat people from other racial background who are found to involve themselves in criminal activities.

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The law enforcers brutally harass such individuals simply because they are from different racial background (Kramer et al, 2009). For instance, among black men of about 19 years, one in every three will be imprisoned at same point in their lifetime. Similarly, 1 in 6 Latino gents will experience the same fate. Astonishingly, only 1 out of 17 white gents is expected to be prisoned. A similar trend exists in women, 1 in 45 of Latino ladies will be prisoned at some point of their life time, 1 in 111 white women and 1 in 18 black women will some time face the prison. Furthermore, the Africans Americans are 2. Additionally, the researcher will borrow information on secondary sources of data such as criminal journals, different reports submitted by various scholars of criminal justice to determine the correlation between race difference and unfairness in criminal justice.

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Based on the analysis of data, many developing nations especially countries in the Middle East are struggling to have an independent body of judges. Racism has even encroached to the judiciary system. Independent judicial system is very pivotal in the course of resolving criminal cases. However, racism has taken root in determining cases hence compromising on the rights of the people in those nations. Therefore, this presents a true picture on how high social class individuals manipulate the key law administers to act on their favor regardless of the case. In fact, based on the analysis of the data these politicians involve either indirectly or directly in committing serious crimes. Ethnic differences as a cause of unfair trial in administration of justice It refers to treating one harshly or unfavorable simply because that person has a different national origin different from yours.

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In criminal justice, originality may be an issue in the process of administering equality to the law offenders. Courts in developing nations are formed to determine various cases subjected to its jurisdiction, some of these cases are the white-collar crimes, organized crimes and other criminal cases (Jefferson, 2017). The whole criminal justice system is found to be discriminative on basis of race in the course of administering justice in their nation. According to the Bureau of Criminal Justice System (CJS) black people accounted for39. 4% of the prisoned and jailed offenders, the non-Hispanic whites constituting 34. 2% while Hispanic of any race constituting 20. Additionally, in close reference to statistics on crime and ethnicity reflecting on various stages of criminalization process is exhibited below. According to the article “The purpose of criminal justice system by Richard Garside” the main objective of the criminal justice system is to deliver and safeguard justice for all regardless of social class, ethnicity, race or receiving or offering bribe through convicting, punishing the offenders (guilty) and rehabilitate them to cease from committing crimes while protecting the innocent.

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The author also ascertains that protecting human rights is the most fundamental function of the criminal justice system. His argument is also seconded by the Justice, S. B SINHA (Judge of Supreme court of India). Thus both scholars affirms that protecting the human rights through the delivering of criminal justice system is indispensable characteristics of every system as long as it is within the jurisdiction of the law. They may also influence the law enforcers to rule in favor of them even if they are guilty. The author also affirms that the poor people in the developing nations are generally intimidated when it comes to equity and justice. This is because the disadvantaged people in the society in terms of wealth do not enjoy the benefits of the existence of the law enforcers.

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Contrary, they face inequality when they seek their rights from the courts. Based on the research on the theoretical framework, it is in the public opinion that the high class people are treated differently from the low class people in that, in the rehabilitation centers there are rooms preserved for these “bosses” and other rooms generally for other offenders. In relation to the area of study “Causes of unfair trial in administration of justice” giving and taking of bribes can make administration of justice a nightmare to a nation. For instance, if the law enforcers accept to take bribes, then democracy also become a problematic phenomenon and hence loosing trust to them. Based on the research in the theoretical framework provided in chapter one, corruption is an impediment to criminal justice in that.

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If for instance, a law offender of a serious criminal case like murder gives out a bribe and he’s left free then the society can suffer a serious problem (Becker et al, 2012) The society in turn lacks trust in judiciary arm and all the law enforcers triggering justice unachievable. Though some nations have installed measures to curb corruption in the process of providing government services such as fair trial (justice), white-collar crimes is still a threat to it. The main reason why these developing nations lack an independent court with the jurisdiction to resolve cases of inhumanity and other criminal cases in their land is that, judges are not trusted and lack other merits to rule such cases. It is under this background that, the International Criminal Court peeps in to offer justice to the victims of effects of criminal cases.

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Based on the critical analysis of the data, corruption has exceeded the borders of the developing nations. The data supporting this argument reveals that, a key supporter of restoring peace and alternatively justice has indulged to this malpractice (corruption) making it very hard for the government to achieve leave alone restoring justice for these nations. The military body, which guards the borders and other key areas of a nation, has been greatly affected by corruption allowing the nation to be victimized by terrorists who carry out organized crimes. These are the corrective justice, the procedural justice, the retributive justice and the distributive justice. The subject of the criminal law under consideration is the retributive justice, a justice theory that considers fair punishment, an appropriate and fair and fair response in dealing with crime cases (Short, jr.

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Based on these results and the implementation of the proposal, the criminal justice system is expected to create a secure environment for every individual regardless of the aforementioned inhibitors of justice and makes everyone feel safeguarded when walking along the streets. Criminal justice system is a form of system formed in all nations to control criminal activities in the country, do investigation on criminal matters, and prosecute those who are found to have broken law after thorough investigation and to determine the magnitude of punishment to be given to those who are convicted. Criminal justice system is composed of various parties such; police who are the first conduct with the criminal suspects, they also do investigation on the crimes. However, this has not been the case in some of the developing nations where people are served on discrimination.

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Police officers are found to be arresting and harassing some group on basis of ethnicity, race and even others are bribed by the law offenders to stops investigation on their cases hence making those who are victims of such crimes suffering. The law enforcers target some groups especially the marginalized groups in the nation subjecting them to brutally beating, sexual harassment, arresting them for no reasons and even killing them (Weich and Angulo, 2007). The judges of courts are not left behind in this kind of unfair treatment to targeted groups. Based on the analysis of data, the cases are not determined with fairness in some of the developing nations. It is evidently that criminal justice for most developing nations is biased and has preferences to certain group of people while discriminating the other group especially the poor, the young and those from other race or ethnic background (Kane et al,2005).

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Thousands of low-income citizens in most developing nations are imprisoned routinely since they are not able to afford many to pay for fines. Report conducted in Canada shown that most young people who commits minor crimes end up to jail due to lack of a legal representative in court and could not afford to pay lawyer due to poverty. Base on the report, 75% of the respondents reported that the Canadian justice system was unfair since it gave special treatment to wealthy people who were harsh towards the poor (Justice, 2006). Based on the analysis of data, biasness is seen to exist in the criminal justice system of many developing nations. On bases of research of the theoretical framework, police offices targets criminals from these marginalized groups since they lack power to defend themselves in the court which is also bias (Dammer & Albanese, 2013).

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Commonwealth state Formerly, the Commonwealth of Nations referred to British Commonwealth. It means to a group of intergovernmental organizations constituting of 53 member states that are mostly former territories of British Kingdom (Spohn, 2005) The Commonwealth nations are operated by the intergovernmental consensus of the member states, controlled by the Commonwealth secretariat together with the non-governmental organizations, planned through the foundation of the Commonwealth. Most importantly, no single member of this bloc exercises legal obligation over the other. In fact, they are amalgamated by culture, language, historical background and the shared principles of free speech, the human freedom and rights, democracy, good governance, free trade, world peace, multilateralism and law. Commonwealth was used symbolically to mean that, these states had government based on the same agreement of the people.

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The government was different from the one formed during the colonial period, therefore, leading to the term common “wealth” or common “welfare” of the people. In these four states, criminal allegations are passed in the name of “Commonwealth. ” Puerto Rico and Northern Mariana Island are two territories in United States which refer to them as “Commonwealth”. In broad perspective, when the term “Commonwealth” is used in connection to sovereignty, it means that the state has adopted its own constitution and therefore it can govern itself and United States Congress cannot withdraw its right to self-governing. It also recognizes other scholars work by quoting their references where necessary. This section also shows the interrelationship between different criminological theories, explanation of various causes of unfair ruling in course of administration of justice and its relevance to the research problem.

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From analyzing the various cases of injustice in developing nations and the implementation of the research proposal, meaningful changes to the criminal justice system cannot stand without acknowledging the racial and ethnic disparities in prisons or incarcerations, and focused attention on reducing the disparities. Moreover, based on results submitted by Justice S. B SINHA (Judge supreme court of India), without this branch of criminal justice system (criminology) individuals would enforce the laws within them thus posing challenges such a personal bias, making emotional stands or decisions, thus the disadvantaged (poor) being vulnerable to the strong, and people interpreting laws differently. The Bradley Report: Lord Bradley's review of people with mental health problems or learning disabilities in the criminal justice system. London: Department of Health.

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Becker, S. , Bryman, A. , & Ferguson, H. Criminal Justice Studies, 25(2), 177-189. Cunneen, C. Racism, discrimination and the over-representation of Indigenous people in the criminal justice system: Some conceptual and explanatory issues.  Current Issues Crim. Just. S. Comparison of convenience sampling and purposive sampling.  American Journal of Theoretical and Applied Statistics, 5(1), 1-4. Glaeser, E. L. Kane, M. , Oloka-Onyango, J. , & Tejan-Cole, A. (2005, December). Reassessing customary law systems as a vehicle for providing equitable access to justice for the poor. Pratt, J. , Brown, D. , & Brown, M. The new punitiveness: Trends, theories, perspectives. S.  The rich get richer and the poor get prison: Ideology, class, and criminal justice. Routledge. Roberts, J.  Public opinion, crime, and criminal justice. Routledge. Descriptive research design.  Retrieved Apr, 15, 2015. Spohn, C. Thirty years of sentencing reform: The quest for a racially neutral sentencing process.

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