What advantages and disadvantages are there with federal, state, tribal, and local trial courts all having jurisdiction over categories of offenses, such as drug offenses? Should there be one uniform jurisdiction designated to handle those offenses?
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The advantages may include enhancing more supervision for court cases, protection of offender rights, spread the risk of corruption in drug-related cases and may encourage the application of different sentencing mechanisms. The disadvantage may include lack of specialization in handling drug-related cases, it may encourage errors in the sentencing of drug offenders and also the fact that the federal, state and tribal courts mail fail to raise awareness which may institute deterrence.
Drug related cases are among the common cases being prosecuted across the United States of America by different levels of the court system. There have been calls for the establishment of one legal entity to handle all drug and related cases. Whoever legal scholars have tried to debate on the advantages and disadvantages of this (Brown, 2011).
The advantages that are there with federal, state, tribal, and local trial courts all having jurisdiction over categories of offenses, such as drug offenses includes it enhances more supervision of court processes including sentencing and offender rights since some courts have a supervisory jurisdiction, it may also eliminate and spread the risk corruption that are common in drugs court with drug dealers bribing court officials, it may also result to tough and severe punishment for offenders in drug-related cases since different courts have different sentencing mechanisms that suit their jurisdictions. This is advantageous because it may also help states to focus on setting up efficient rehabilitation programs for drug-related offenders that suits their specific rehabilitation needs. The concept of disparities in law also makes it almost impossible to establish a single court to try drug-related cases.
The disadvantages that are there with federal, state, tribal, and local trial courts all having jurisdiction over categories of offenses, such as drug offenses includes lack specialization in legal matters especially related to drugs may lead to errors in the face of the law whereby sometimes state and tribal courts may misinterpret the law leading to wrongful convictions. It is also very expensive for such courts to run drug cases alongside other civil and criminal cases. This may lead to an increase in the administrative budgets, another key disadvantage is that tribal courts and state courts may fail to raise awareness on drug-related crimes due to a number of many other cases they are handling which may not be helpful in the deterrence of potential offenders. Sometimes federal courts, tribal courts and state courts may fail to recommend an appropriate treatment programs for an offender. Thus being less effective as compared to a single drugs court.