Understanding the Appeals Process and Habeas Corpus in the US Legal System - Prof. Steven , Study notes of Criminal Justice

Download Understanding the Appeals Process and Habeas Corpus in the US Legal System - Prof. Steven and more Study notes Criminal Justice in PDF only on Docsity! 9/22/11 Appeal vs. appeal de novo Appeal de novo(from the beginning): instead of a normal appeal where the court takes a narrow look at the issue, the appeal de novo does not give difference to the trial judge decision, but looks at it more comprehensibly, they make their own decision. “Legal error”- the appeal court is looking for errors made by the trial judge. The chance of having an error free trial is zero. Harmless error is something that happened that is not significant to the trial. Sometimes the appellate court will say that they found ‘harmless’ errors but they won’t do anything to fix it because they were harmless. Remedy: is what the appellate court will do for you if they find serious error in your trial court case. For certain kinds of errors certain remedies are appropriate. “Remand”: sending the case back down to the trial court for a new trial. Failure to raise a legal issue at the time will result usually with that being waived. You cannot raise it later. When is it an appropriate time to raise issues? The earliest appropriate time, and failure to do so will have it be waved. Time limits on appeal: first you have to file a notice on intent to appeal. Which is on a deadline, and if you let the deadline pass you will probably not be able to appeal. Then the appeal itself has to be filed on time also. 9/27/11 There has to be some end point to a trial. A trial cannot go on for 20 years. A double-blind line up is when the police officer doesn’t know if the criminal is in the line-up or not. The cop doesn’t know just like the victim. Exhaustion of remedies: levels of the appellate review must be used in the order in which they are available (you can’t skip over any), unless an exception has been created by law. Exception example: death penalty, you can go directly to the state high court if you were convicted to death, you can skip the middle level and go straight to the high court. New Evidence: includes new DNA testing technology. New evidence cannot be given after the trial is finished. You cannot bring new evidence to the appellate level that was not given in the district/circuit court levels.