Criminal Justice: Discretionary Decision Making Elements Analysis

This assignment examines the pivotal role of discretion within the criminal justice system, highlighting its significance in law enforcement and judicial proceedings. It emphasizes how discretionary decisions are often made in response to uncertain legislations, ethical norms, and outdated laws, which can lead officers to explore substitute solutions to the issue. The document explores the interplay of discretion with integrity, authority, and morality. It underscores the importance of integrity in ensuring transparency and fairness in discretionary decision-making, emphasizing the need for officers to act with honesty and uphold public trust. The assignment references key legal cases and academic sources to support its arguments, offering a comprehensive analysis of the complexities involved in discretionary decision-making within the realm of criminal justice.

Running head: QUESTION 0
[Document title]
MARCH 16, 2020
STUDENT DETAILS:

QUESTIONS 1
The discretion is described as the powers or rights to take decision or perform as per the
personal judgment. There is important role of discretion in the criminal justice. The discretion is
considered as main component to the law enforcement. It can see that most of the discretionary
decisions are depended on misdemeanour as well as traffic enforcement. In addition, the
discretion has the connotation of performing on personal authority as well as personal
judgement. In law, the judges can exercise discretion as to legal ruling, like whether evidence is
debarred at the trial. In addition, it is essentially required by officers to utilise discretion at the
time of taking decision for enforcing law when some situations take place. For example,
uncertain legislations, nuisance behaviour, uncertainty in state statute, ethical norms, and
outdated laws can cause the officers to have substitute resolutions to the issue. In this relation,
Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186 (1962) was famous USA Supreme Court case.
Further, the utilisation of discretion by officers is very essential in the world of justice.
The integrity plays important role in making in discretionary decisions (Pennock, 2017). The
integrity ensures the transparency in the discretionary decision making process. The officers are
required to perform their functions with integrity. The integrity is important element to identify
and resolve the ethical dilemma. For maintaining the high standards, it is essential for the
officers to do work with integrity. It can say that the integrity is key asset of the public relations.
For promoting integrity in criminal justice, it is essential to consider some issues, such as
fairness of discretionary measures, desire to report misconduct, as well as organisational as well
as individual support (D’Amico, 2018).
Moreover, it can see that the discretion helps in contributing to the officer integrity while
this is utilised to motivate positive, just as well as fair results (Vance, et. al, 2019). It is evident
that integrity in decision making is critical to good governance as well as supporting public faith.

QUESTIONS 2
The honest officers follow a correct and appropriate procedure. They focus on the regulations,
implementation and compliance decision and complete procedure of policymaking. The
community needs to have confidence in the decisions made by public officers. For an example,
the motorist was speeding towards the hospital for taking injured children. Most of the people
should be agrees with the choice of officers (Dobel, 2016).

QUESTIONS 3
References
D’Amico, D. J. (2018). Rules Versus Discretion in Criminal Sentencing. In James M. Buchanan,
pp. 883-902
Dobel, J. P. (2016). Integrity in the public service. Dobel, JP (1990). Integrity in the Public
Service. Public Administration Review, 50(3), 354-66.
Pennock, J. R. (2017). Reason in Legislative Decisions. New York: Routledge.
Vance, S. E., Richmond, K. M., Oleson, J. C., & Bushway, S. D. (2019). Weighing the Value of
the Bargain: Prosecutorial Discretion After Sentencing Guidelines. Criminal Justice
Policy Review, 30(7), 1086-1108.