Monday 8th June (8/6)

📕 STUDENTS BOOK pages 84 and 85

📕👓 Watch the video of unit 9: how do you decide what’s fair?

📝 Make a list of concepts related to “Miscarriage of Justice”

• Wrongful conviction of an innocent person: This is the most widely recognized form of a miscarriage of justice. It happens when an individual is tried, found guilty, and punished by a court of law for a crime they did not commit. Often caused by false confessions, coerced testimony, flawed forensic evidence, mistaken eyewitness identification, or the withholding of exculpatory evidence by authorities.

• Unfair acquittal of the guilty: a person who has committed a crime walks free due to judicial corruption, procedural errors, or a failure of the justice system to properly prosecute them.

• Systemic and procedural flaws: any failure within the criminal justice process that denies someone their rights or leads to an absurd judicial result. This includes:

  • Wrongful arrests or charges without sufficient probable cause.

  • Sentencing disparities, where two individuals convicted of the exact same crime receive drastically different, disproportionate punishments.

  • Delayed justice, where trials or appeals take so long that fundamental fairness is destroyed

Criminal Trial Lawyers

Prosecutors (District/State Attorneys): Represent the government and bear the burden of proving that a defendant is guilty of a crime beyond a reasonable doubt.

Criminal Defense Lawyers: Represent individuals or organizations charged with crimes. They fight to protect the defendant’s rights and challenge the prosecution’s evidence.

Public Defenders: A specific type of criminal defense lawyer appointed by the government to represent defendants who cannot afford to hire private counsel.

📣 Speaking activity:

Find out information about different cases and explain if the case is a miscarriage of justice, which type, and why.