Evaluate The Elements Of The Australian Legal System

Evaluate the effectiveness of the various elements of the Australian Legal System in achieving justice for victims, offenders and society. In your response you will need to assess the effectiveness of the different elements of the Australian criminal justice system.

Justice is defined as exerting fairness and impartiality during a trial. In the Australian Legal System, young offenders are shown substantial levels of justice. They are identified as not entirely understanding the ramifications of their actions, and are therefore subject to lower levels of criminal responsibility. This is seen in the concepts of, age of criminal responsibility, the rights of young offenders when questioned or arrested, the procedures and penalties for children

This concept allows the law to treat children different in order to prevent children and young people from being exploited, to protect young people from the consequences of making uninformed decisions and to protect others from being disadvantaged by dealing with a person who is a minor. Doli incapax is a principle of juvenile justice that suggests that infants are incapable of committing wrong as they have an insufficient knowledge of good or bad. This Latin term means ‘incapable of wrong’ and as the Children (Criminal Proceedings) Act 1997 (NSW) states, is applied to children under 10 years old as a conclusive presumption. At 10 – 13 years of age there is a presumption of doli incapax but there may be rebuttal. When an offender reaches 14 – 17 years they are considered to be criminally responsible for any offence committed which is actus reus and capable of having mens rea which is criminal intent but there will be some differences to the adult system. At the age of 18, they reach full criminal responsibility. In the

This court deals with cases connected with the care and protection of children and with criminal matters concerning children and young people who are under the age of 18 or who were under 18 at the time of an alleged offence. The key difference between the Children’s Court and any other court is that it is a closed court. This means that the identity of the offender is protected from the media and the public. This is to ensure that they are not identified and labelled as a criminal. The Children’s Court is presided over by a magistrate, who plays an active role in the trial and questioning, rather than hearing cases from the prosecutor and defence. This is a much less adversarial system. This allows the court to remain relatively informal, with the aim of not isolating the juvenile form the legal proceedings, and allows them more involvement, making the accountable for their actions. In the case of Police v JM (2011) NSWChC 1, the key objective of the sentencing was rehabilitation. JM had breached the conditions of his parole when he was charged with aggravated break and enter resulting in the imposing of the most serious sentence available for juvenile offenders, a control order. To promote rehabilitation, a condition of his parole was rehabilitation for his alcohol abuse. Need a