Criminal Justice Reflection

A major aspect of the liberal arts education is gaining knowledge from a variety of departments and experiences both in and out of the classroom. This semester I was given the opportunity to enroll in an Introduction to Criminal Justice course as the final part of my political science degree. While I have had the opportunity to take a criminal justice law course in the past, this is the first opportunity I have to take a class that explores and explains the justice system.

Thus far in the class we have explored criminology: why people commit crime, measuring crime rates, criminal law, plea bargaining, court structure, sentencing and a variety of other topics. As part of the curriculum each student was required to select a book to read and review, I chose Indefensible: One Lawyer’s Journey Into the Inferno of American Justice.

Feige does a great job of taking the reader on a journey through the criminal justice system, showing a more realistic interpretation that people unfamiliar with the system do not usually experience. His best depiction of the criminal justice system is done through descriptions of things he sees and people he comes into contact with in his job as a public defender. The reader can find examples of these descriptions in varying places throughout the book.

The reader immediately finds a great example at the beginning of the book when Feige describes Dino Lombardi’s courtroom action, where Mr. Lombardi is responding to the judge who is asking him about concerns Feige has raised about the strength of a case. Mr. Lombardi is shaking his head no, while verbally stating that his office requires him to ask for an action that is opposite of the visual movement of his head. Feige describes this as, “the most decent thin...

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...he defendant; if he thought defense counsel was greedy, he’d jail the client.” All of the judge’s decisions are based on the power he has over his courtroom. In Feige’s description it appears as if there is a lack of checks and balances in this area of the system. The example demonstrates that sometimes the system is so revolving around itself the people that are going through it simply get in the way. Instead of an equal approach to all cases the judge let’s the representation of the defendant play a factor in the retribution that the person makes to society.

Feige does an excellent job of showing the reader many aspects of the criminal justice that they normally wouldn’t have any exposure to. His use of individual character descriptions to show different aspects, allows the reader to connect to the different characters and gives them an inside view of the system.