Understanding Civil and Criminal Laws: An Overview

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When you think about law you think about justice, rules, and government. Law can easily be defined as people who regulate their actions as well as actions of other parties to enforce authority. Within the law, there are many rules that are enforced and should be followed. Laws are set in place to in a sense mold he public and their opinion so that how society functions can be positively changed. However, not every person will follow these “laws” especially if they do not believe in them or they do not fit so well in a functioning society. There are two main ways to categorize laws; civil and criminal laws. Criminal laws stop actions that harm public safety and welfare (such as child neglect/abuse). Criminal laws make sure that the punishment …show more content…

See while criminal laws protect an individual rather than the public, civil actions are in place to compensate an individual financially, physically, and emotionally for any injuries suffered. Even though the man had narcotics on him, he was also falsely accused of another crime and injured in that process (Ross, 2013). There could be potential civil action against Officer Jones for violating an individual given rights. Yes the man has pending charges against him however; he has the right to file charges on his perception of how the encounter between him and Officer Jones went. In this case, he could say Officer Jones used excessive force causing physical injury to the man (this man was unarmed) and did not actually commit the crime he was accused of (Saltzman, 1999). Civil rights laws are there to protect citizens from abuses by the government including those from police. The officer can argue that he was only acting based on the information that he received from the victim and that he believed the information to be truthful and that the suspect at first was not showing cooperation when he was asked to stop. His civil rights was violated because of the way he behaved leading the officer to think he actually has a gun on him (Ross,

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