Issues in Criminal Justice
Wynter Edwards
Reaction Paper 2
October 23, 2013
Norfolk’s Deputy Commonwealth’s Attorney Mark West’s presentation to the class was awesome. It was nice to be able to use my prior experience working for the Commonwealth’s Attorney in Chesapeake to understand the language and court process’ he went through with the class. Even though I already have prior experience with the court systems and how everything works he was able to explain the system in a way that was easy for someone who is unfamiliar to be able to fully understand how everything works and why. Had I someone like him to break it down like that in the beginning of my career I could have been a lot more productive in the work I was doing because I would have already known the how and why part of the court system. Being that I worked for the Chesapeake Commonwealth’s Attorney for three years, I was very intrigued by the way 2 different offices serving the same purpose can differ so much in how things are broken down and how cases are handled. When you work for another city’s Commonwealth’s Attorney you sometimes assume that the offices are pretty much run the same way since the attorney’s all have a common goal in prosecuting criminals. The breakdown of the seven teams in the office seem to be a great system. In Chesapeake, we really did not function like that. The teams in Chesapeake were broken down into Juvenile and Domestic, Domestic Violence and the General District. The cases were then broken down by the weight of the crime to determine which prosecutor it was assigned to. It seems like it makes it easier to have things broken down into the different areas that are of concern like a drug team etc. I have also learned that the different cities may not prosecute all of the same types of crimes either. I know in Chesapeake we