Dual court system

Scholarly Paper 2 Instructions

CRM 220
Module 5

The United States has a dual-court system, which means there are courts at both the state and federal levels. The majority of crimes are tried at the state and local levels. Each level has trial courts and appellate courts – the state appellate courts oversee the state constitution and laws, and the federal appellate courts oversee the U.S. Constitution and federal laws; the U.S. Supreme Court has jurisdiction over all state and federal decisions.

Read the assigned sections in your textbook. Describe the path that a case would have to take from the state trial court level to the U.S. Supreme Court. Discuss specialized courts, such as drug courts, and whether or not you think they are a good idea and why. Make sure to gather evidence (law, policy, procedure, and data) and evaluate for relevance:

Are specialized drug courts used in your jurisdiction? What is their effectiveness? What are some direct/indirect consequences: Specialized courts have shown moderate success rates, but they are also expensive to run. Discuss which should be the most important consideration, cost or effectiveness, and how these two conflicting attributes can best be balanced.

Your paper must be at least 700-800 words in length, excluding the title and reference pages, and must adhere to the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (6th edition) writing format. If your paper does not comply with this format, you will lose points. You may want to visit Purdue OWL for assistance with formatting your paper in APA style.

You must cite at least two scholarly references for your paper. Please be aware that websites such as Wikipedia are not scholarly sources. You are encouraged to access the University’s online library resources to find scholarly journal articles, etc. The ProQuest and EBSCO databases may be helpful, but remember to limit your search to scholarly journal articles. You may also want to view the instructions for locating articles for Saint Leo classes. Please remember to review the information about locating and citing proper sources in your syllabus.

You must submit this assignment to the Scholarly Paper 2 Dropbox no later than (This Dropbox is linked to Turnitin.)

Your paper will be worth 100 points and will be graded according to this rubric.