Discretion in Criminal Justice
Question
First, explain the role of discretion in criminal justice.
Next, describe the instance from the Module One discussion in detail, providing background information surrounding the discretionary decision. (You may use your initial post from the Module One discussion board to help you with this.)
Then, choose one element and describe the role it plays in the discretionary decision-making process in general:
Integrity
Authority
Discretionary power
Morality
Last, explain how that same element chosen above (integrity, authority, discretionary power, or morality) may have affected the discretionary decision made in the instance provided.
Specifically, the following rubric criteria must be addressed:
Explain the role of discretion in criminal justice.
Describe an instance of discretionary decision making you have seen in the media.
Describe the role one element (integrity, authority, discretionary power, or morality) plays in discretionary decision making in general.
Explain how one element (integrity, authority, discretionary power, or morality) may have affected the discretionary decision made in the instance provided.


Solution
Discretion in Criminal Justice
Discretion is the ability to use one’s
judgment when deciding how to act or make decisions. It involves choosing
between various courses of action or selecting a particular option from several
possibilities. In criminal justice, it is the ability of police officers,
prosecutors, and judges to decide whether or not to charge someone with a crime
and how to handle cases once they are brought before them. For example, police
officers can decide whether or not to arrest someone for an offence, and
prosecutors have discretion over whether or not to charge someone with a crime
and what charges should be filed against them (felonies vs misdemeanours) (Hardy, 2020). Judges also
have some discretion in sentencing if they choose not to give probation or
community service but instead send someone to jail or prison for their crime.
Government officials can also make discretionary decisions at various levels of
government (Hartley and
Tillyer, 2018). For example, elected officials often have discretion
over how tax revenue is allocated and spent because they are responsible for
making decisions about spending within their jurisdiction or district without
having to go through any kind of approval process before committing these funds
to projects that they believe will benefit their constituents most effectively.
I have seen an instance of
discretionary decision making in the media. The example is related to a news
story on an individual charged with a crime but was not convicted. The person
was released from jail after posting bail and was not found guilty, but the
media still reported on him as if he had been convicted. The article that I
read was about a man named Michael Brown, who was shot by a police officer in
Ferguson, Missouri. He was unarmed at the time of the incident, and there were
conflicting accounts of what happened before his death. The media reported on
this story as if he were guilty and that the police officer had done nothing
wrong by shooting him (First
et al., 2020). This may have been
due to racial bias against African Americans or because it sells more
newspapers when someone is accused of something wrong rather than when they are
acquitted or found innocent. In this case, it seems like there could be some
discretion involved in deciding how much information should be released about
someone who has been arrested or charged with a crime (like Michael Brown) but
hasn’t been convicted yet (before he died).
Integrity
The role of integrity in
discretionary decision making, in general, is to ensure that decisions are made
in the interest of all stakeholders, not just in the interests of the ones who
make them. The most important aspect of integrity is that it requires moral
courage. One must be able to make decisions that involve risk and uncertainty
and require one to take a stand on controversial issues when there is no clear
right or wrong answer. In addition, one must be willing to admit mistakes and
change policies based on new information or circumstances. Integrity also
involves fairness; people should not be treated differently because of their
position or identity (DeMichele
et al., 2019). . It also requires accountability; leaders should be held
responsible for their actions and decisions and should not be allowed to hide
behind ignorance or lack of knowledge as an excuse for failure or poor results.
Conclusively, in Ferguson, Missouri,
there was a police officer who shot and killed Michael Brown, an unarmed
18-year-old black man. The officer said he shot Brown in self-defence after
Brown assaulted him and tried to take his gun. The grand jury’s decision not to
indict this officer shows a lack of integrity by the prosecutor. The evidence
does not support the officer’s story. He could have been indicted for murder or
manslaughter, but instead, we’re left with an injustice that has led to massive
protests.
References
DeMichele,
M., Baumgartner, P., Barrick, K., Comfort, M., Scaggs, S., & Misra, S.
(2019). What do criminal justice professionals think about risk assessment at
pretrial? Fed. Probation, 83, 32.
First,
J. M., Danforth, L., Frisby, C. M., Warner, B. R., Ferguson Jr, M. W., &
Houston, J. B. (2020). Posttraumatic stress related to the killing of Michael
Brown and resulting civil unrest in Ferguson, Missouri: Roles of protest
engagement, media use, race, and resilience. Journal of the Society for Social Work and Research, 11(3), 369-391.
Hardy,
M. (2020). Discretion in the Surveillance State. Discretion and the Quest for Controlled Freedom, 41-61.
Hartley,
R. D., & Tillyer, R. (2018). Examining prosecutorial discretion in federal
criminal cases: Legal and extra-legal determinants of declination and charge
change decisions. Justice Quarterly, 35(7), 1195-1225.




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