Blog Assignment 2

     The piece of writing/article that I have chosen to analyze for this assignment is a case brief from my Criminal Procedure class. I took this class last semester and had to read and interpret several of these case briefs as well as share my opinion on them in the form of a short report. Case briefs in this context are brief rundowns of the circumstances surrounding a particular case and its outcome. This outcome is then analyzed by the Supreme Court and a decision on whether the outcome of the case was altered by the breakdown of some procedural issue is evaluated. An assignment in the form of this type of reading and analysis is typical of criminal justice classes.
      These case briefs are generally just that...brief. They are written in relatively formal language but no time is wasted on unnecessary details.The topics of these briefs vary from case to case but their connection arises from the fact that each of them contained a real or perceived violation of rights or breakdown in the criminal justice system. This has to be grievous enough to warrant review by the Supreme Court. While the Supreme Court always makes a ruling in the cases it hears, there are still other issues that arise from these rulings from time to time. Very often the cases that the Supreme Court chooses to hear are chosen because there is a great need for the issue at had to be ruled on.
     The author of the textbook that this case comes form is Joel Samaha; a criminal justice professor at the University of Minnesota. He teaches criminal procedure, law, and is also a lawyer. I feel that he is very qualified to discuss the topic in depth.
     The writers goal is fairly obvious, as he expresses his intent several times in the textbook. The intent is to inform the reader on the issues surrounding a given case, and then to help the reader to understand the decision that the Supreme Court made about the case and why they made the decision that they did. It is my opinion that this book is intended for students in the criminal justice or law fields as a catalyst for contemplation about where judicial law comes from and how it is made.
     This being the writers purpose, I feel that he succeeded in doing what he set out to do. Upon reading the excerpts from this book that I read for my class, I became more informed about laws and procedure and the circumstances surrounding how they came into being. I also gained a greater appreciation for the way that our judicial system functions.
     The language used was, at times, difficult to digest. There was a lot of legal terms and jargon that the author assumed the reader already knew. This, though, was generally true in my case as I had already taken several other lower level criminal justice classes. Even with my experience with such language, however, the reading was never easy.
     This is one thing that I feel that the author could have changed. I understand that having a working vocabulary is essential in professional and scholastic settings, but I feel that Samaha overly used some jargon just for the sake of using it. I feel that the author is very intelligent and knows full well what he is talking about, but his ability to relay his information in a manner that is usable to students at my level seemed lacking. This I suppose is more of a thought process issue than a writing one.