The Three Major Components Of The Criminal Justice System

The criminal justice system is made up of three major components – law enforcement, the courts, and corrections. Law enforcement officials strive to keep innocent citizens safe and stop criminals. The courts make sure that everyone involved in a case is treated fairly and determine if the suspect has actually committed said crime. Correction facilities punish and rehabilitate the convicted so crime are not repeated. The United States has this system so that when all of these components work together crime is controlled, prevented, and justice is provided. Law enforcement is distributed into three major sections – local, state, and federal. At each of these levels and subsections, law enforcers aim to curb, control, and obtain justice for crimes. …show more content…
If the offender is put on probation, the most common ruling, this means that the courts have decided to give the offender a chance to prove that they made a mistake and will not break the law again. While on probation, the offender will be able to live in the community. The offender will be regularly scrutinized and monitored by a probation officer positively checking that the lawbreaker is indeed following the terms and conditions of probation set by the court. If the courts decide that the criminal is a threat to the community or should be punished, he or she will then be sentenced to incarceration in either jail or prison for a time also determined by the court. The offender will go to jail if the crime is minor or the sentence is short. If the crime committed was a major one or has a long sentence, the convict will go to a prison. After the convict has spent some of his or her sentence in prison or jail, the courts will usually allow the offender to finish the rest of the time on parole. While on parole, the convict must be have frequent and random visited by a parole officer. The terms and conditions of parole are very similar to the rules of probation. Another option the courts have in sentencing is to send the offender to a community based corrections facility. This sentence means that the courts have decided that incarceration and probation would not have rehabilitated this person in a way that would be helpful or correcting. This method of corrections includes half-way houses, residential centers, and work release centers. It is becoming an increasingly popular method of treatment for criminals that have lost their way and can be