What are the reforms made in the United States justice system meant to benefit crime victims?
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“If it were not for injustice, man would not know justice” is a quote by Heraclitus. According to Bazelon et al. (2019), “For decades, efforts have been made to make the criminal process fairer and more humane for victims” (p.2). According to Bazelon et al. (2019), “The c riminal justice system, by design, is not set up to provide this kind of choice and empowerment” (p.8). “In major cities such as Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, as well as smaller jurisdictions, such as Corpus Christi, Texas, and Columbus, Mississippi, a growing number of communities have elected chief prosecutors who campaigned on expansive platforms of reform” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.7); This groundswell of support for change has been rooted in the growing public understanding of the failings of a criminal legal system that for decades embraced punitive approaches that fueled mass incarceration” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.7). “In the United States, organized efforts have been made for more than a century to improve the criminal justice process from victims’ perspective” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.8). “For example, state and federal laws are now designed to keep victims informed, allow them to be heard at sentencing, and afford them monetary restitution, but these efforts, while important, have not persuaded crime victims to trust criminal process” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.2). “For example, sexual assaults remain grossly under-reported and under-prosecuted, and less than 1 percent of sexual assault crimes result in a felony conviction” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.2). “Even the few victims who do receive their promised retributive outcome are not necessarily healed by the process” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.2). “Reform efforts seem to presuppose that victims of crime or victims of particular crimes such as sexual assault is essentially the same and have essentially the same need, namely, a need for the offender to be criminally prosecuted and sent to prison to serve the longest sentence the law allows” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.2). “Even when victims suffer similar harms and come from similar backgrounds, they often have distinct, though sometimes overlapping, needs and objectives. Some do not want to participate in the criminal adjudication process” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.2). “Some will be re-traumatized by a successful criminal prosecution, even with the implementation of procedural reforms promoted by the victims’ rights movement and others” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.2). “Some of the efforts have focused on victims of particular crimes, such as sexual assault or domestic violence, and others have focused on crime victims as a class” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.8). “Some of the focus is on improving social services and other assistance to crime victims, but much of the focus, and the subject of our discussion, concerns ameliorating the harms to victims caused not so much by the crime but by the ensuing criminal adjudicative process” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.8). Diversion programs and victim rights are some of the reforms adopted to benefit crime victims.
Diversion programs are one of the changes adopted in the justice system to benefit the crime victims, and prosecutors are in the forefront of reforming the justice system. According to Krinsky et al. (2021), “Diversion programs are one tool that these prosecutors have embraced to achieve these goals” (p.8). According to Krinsky et al. (2021), “Over the past five years, a new generation of prosecutors elected on platforms of transforming the criminal legal system have taken office across the country” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.7). “Accordingly, these reform prosecutors have redefined the role of the prosecutor to focus instead on correcting these failings and improving the well-being of the entire community, and in turn, are re-envisioning prosecutorial success” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.8). “Moving beyond indictments and convictions, these prosecutors are also increasingly measuring their impact in objectives, including lowered incarceration rates, reductions in racial disparities, increased stakeholder trust in the criminal legal system, and other metrics that reflect the values of these prosecutors and their communities” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.8). “Over the past forty years, the discretionary decisions of prosecutors, particularly about how to charge crimes and offer plea bargains, have been a key driver of the United States’ explosive increase in incarceration rates” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.8). “To rectify that damage, the growing reform prosecution movement prioritizes evidence-based diversion and alternatives to incarceration as the norm rather than the exception” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.8). “Diversion is a broad term that encompasses an array of interventions but typically refers to the practice of an individual completing some sort of program, often therapeutic, prior to trial or sometimes prior to charging or pleading in exchange for dismissal, a reduction of the charges, and, if relevant, a significantly lower sentence, typically involving no jail time” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.8). “Diversion includes interventions like drug courts, restorative justice processes, or one-time classes, and can be used in a wide range of cases” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.8). “While many diversion programs focus on low-level cases like simple drug possession that have no formal complaining witness, many diversion programs include property crimes, crimes committed by youth, and simple assaults with a clear victim” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.8). “Additionally, a small but critical number of diversion programs include serious crimes, such as gun offenses and those statutorily deemed “violent,” an approach that is consistent with research indicating that diversion programs targeted towards high-risk individuals may be particularly effective for improving public safety” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.8). “These reform prosecutors have redefined the role of the prosecutor to focus instead on correcting these failings and improving the well-being of the entire community, and in turn, are re-envisioning prosecutorial success” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.8). Thus, Diversion programs are one of the changes adopted in the justice system, and prosecutors are in the forefront of reforming the justice system.
Victim rights are the reforms implemented to benefit the crime victims. “The victims’ rights movement developed in the context of a call for more prosecutions and harsher criminal punishment – for the decades’-long “war on crime” waged by Republican and Democratic presidents alike” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.9). “The restorative justice movement was itself just getting started in the United States in the 1970s and 1980s when the victims’ rights movement was picking up steam” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.8). “But what came to be known as the victims’ rights movement tended to focus more broadly on problems that were not specific to sexual assault cases” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.8). “For example, other than via their testimony, scripted by the process, victims were voiceless they did not speak at sentencing and had no right to be informed about the progress of their case as it wended its way through the system” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.8). “Reformers recognized that in seeking to vindicate the interests of crime victims as well as the public generally, the traditional way of prosecuting criminal cases, including but not limited to sexual assault cases, often caused even greater misery for victims” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.8). “The evidence does not bear out those sweeping criticisms, but they do exemplify the tensions that have, at times, surfaced between “victims’ rights” and policies that adopt a less punitive approach to addressing crime, such as diversion or deflection from the criminal legal system” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.5). “As Professor Kay Levine writes in her accompanying piece in this Symposium, some would even describe this as a “diversion movement” that is potentially in tension with the victims’ rights movement” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.5). “Practices vary by jurisdiction, but in the context of diversion, the victims’ rights movement frequently calls for three overlapping rights for crime survivors: the right to notice of the potential case disposition, the right to have their opinions heard, and the right to veto diversion” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.6). “Some diversion and deflection programs, such as restorative justice programs for serious crimes, require victim consent and participation in order to function because the program itself is victim-centered, promoting the alignment of victims’ rights and diversion, but many other programs are not predicated on victim cooperation or participation” (Krinsky et al., 2021, p.5). “In 1980, Wisconsin adopted the first Crime Victims’ Bill of Rights, which was designed to address these problems, and other states eventually followed” (Bazelon et al., 2019, p.8). Thus, reformers recognized that in seeking to vindicate the interests of crime victims and the public generally, the traditional way of prosecuting criminal cases is generally used.
In conclusion, the government needs to prioritize on reforming the justice system. Diversion programs and victim rights are some of the reforms adopted to benefit crime victims. By reforming the justice system, the government can ensure that there is no systematic biasness in the criminal justice system, enabling them to improve everybody’s access to fair and nondiscriminatory justice. We can all ensure an equitable justice system and uphold the rule of law through our collective efforts to reform the justice system.
Bazelon, L., & Green, B. A. (2019). Victims’ Rights from a Restorative Perspective. Ohio St. J. Crim. L., 17, 293.
Krinsky, M., & Komar, L. (2021). ” Victims’ Rights” and Diversion: Furthering the Interests of Crime Survivors and the Community. SMU L. Rev., 74, 527.