Scottish Criminal Justice

1920 Words4 Pages

Scottish Criminal Justice

Scottish criminal justice is a very complicated are of study. There

are many different topics of thought that surround the Scottish

criminal justice system, in terms of both physical and mental areas.

The criminal justice system stems out into a number of different other

subject areas mainly because criminal justice affects so many

different fields in society. It’s not just simply about police

arresting criminals, the accused going to court and ending up the

criminal goes to prison. There are many other extending factors

connected with the process. There are many different officials

involved each putting input into different areas of the process. As

mentioned it is not just the police courts involved in the process but

other types of people are influential in making the system work.

Psychologists are an integral part on many different levels throughout

the criminal process. They help people understand why a crime was

committed and help other authorities with the convictions of accused

people. There are number of things that psychologist can do to help in

the conviction for example criminal profiling can be very useful when

trying to catch a person. Also psychologists are used for research

methods, trying to establish how important different aspects are. Eye

witness testimony is one of the areas that psychologists are very

interested in. Important areas that are considered are characteristics

of the witness and accused. Also memory and perception are major

factors when evaluating eye witness testimony.

The psychologists, as mentioned, take into account, when evaluating

eye witness testimonies various cha...

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...to what the witness can remember about the incident. This could be

using the short term memory for remembering a car registration plate

and giving that information to attending police officers. It could

also relate to the long term memory where a witness would remember

aspects of a criminal incident weeks, months or even years after it

occurred. All in all eye witness testimonies can be a very important

topic to the Scottish Criminal Justice system.

Bibliography

Brewer, K. 2000 Psychology and Crime. Oxford: Heinemann.

Duff, P & Hutton, N.1999 Criminal Justice in Scotland. Aldershot :

Dartmouth Publishing company ltd.

Feldman, P. 1993 The Psychology Of Crime. Cambridge: Press Syndicate

of the University of Cambridge.

McGuire, J. 2004 Understanding Psychology and Crime. Berkshire: Open

University Press.

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