Court Observation

The court of common pleas operates in what appears to be a very systematic way. What I mean by that is everything is according to numbers. They call your court case number and then your name, at that point if the person is present they step up and ask for an extension and the judge determines whether or not the person will be trailed or allowed an extension. Unfortunately, I was unable to witness the process of a trail. Lots of people did not show up and when the judge did issue a trailing the person took a plea deal instead. But I was able to talk to the Judge who helped to bring a lot of understanding to the process we were viewing. The judge stated that the type of casing we were viewing, was a Jury-less court system which meant that

The Judge was very kind in my opinion, he allowed several of the students that were in his court room back into the jury room, where he described the court room setting and answered any questions we had. He had this same temperament when he was dealing with the lawyers and public defenders that approached him. He shared jokes with the lawyers and the prosecutor, but when the criminals addressed him he got a little tougher depending on the crime and I found attorney. For example the Judge laughed and giggled with all of the private attorneys that came into contact with him. They all asked for extensions and were granted their desire. But when a young man was called to the stand with the lack of a private attorney and just the defender who was assigned to him when he entered the court room, asked for an extension due to the lack of communication between him and the court system because he moved the Judge was not so nice and decided to trail the young man. The Judges attitude changed when the different levels of attorneys approached him. I

The police officers did not seem the friendliest so I was fearful of asking them any questions. So I did not, but when I was visiting home I had the opportunity to talk to one of my townships local officers. I've personally known this officer for a long time because he is actually one of my neighbors so when he stopped and asked how college was going, I asked him a few questions about his job. I asked him what made his job difficult and if he still enjoyed it. He said that he personally did not have lots of difficulties with his job because of the place where he patrols. He pointed out the lack of extreme crime in the neighborhoods he rode around; the most he got was a few calls about teenagers disturbing the peace. I found by talking to him that the rebellion between officers and teens differed in the many different areas. My local officer did not have much trouble with the teens he dealt with, he said that most of the times he would flash a light on them and they would get scared and run home. The difficulties experienced by officers are often determined by the area in which the work is what my local officer pointed out to