A Visit to Westminster Magistrates Court

This report has been written later on a visit to Westminster Magistrates Court, unmatched of the 700 magistrates courts of England and Wales. A magistrates court is the foundation where well-nigh 95 % of any bend cases are cosmosness profoundly analysed by nearly 28,000 magistrates. According to Kate Malleson, ˜Magistrates turning the region of the count on and jury combined, in that they apply the law and catch the facts in each case. afterwards they devote reached a finding of fact in criminal cases (or, much comm alone, after a wrong plea by the defendant) they passageway sentence. The maximum sentencing powers of magistrates is currently 12 months in custody and a £5.000 fine (Malleson, 2010: 19). Looking more closely, thither are a curing of interesting things that I have give eared during this 3 hours visit. The first-year thing to be spy was the positioning of the three magistrates, academic session in a row. The magistrate in the middle is called chair man and ordinarily he is doing all the talking. The another(prenominal) two magistrates are called wingers that they all work together to take the decisions. Just in front of the magistrates is situated the Clerk, who has an great role in magistrates court, advising the magistrates on the law and procedure besides only when is necessary, keeps the records of the proceeding and assist defendants who dont have legal advisers by explaining them what is happening. In some cases, in that location can be only one judge academic session there and they are called govern Judges, who usually sit in busy courts rooms where they date cases alone and dont have a qualified Clerk.\nTo begin with, magistrates take on a truly serious role in criminal justice system since they lease with much larger look of cases than any other institution, as I said before, almost 95 % of cases, approximately 1.9 trillion cases per year are being processed at this level, umpteen of them being minor offences. They play the role of a judge and a jury in the same time, listening very carefully...