Chicago Personal Injury Lawyer - Article

The Appeals System

The United States legal system is designed to prevent innocent people from being punished for someone else’s actions. A number of legal safeguards, such as the Fifth Amendment, are in place to help defendants protect themselves against false accusations. One such system is the appeals system.

If a defendant is unhappy with the way a criminal trial or civil lawsuit turns out (in other words, if he is found to be guilty or liable), he may choose to appeal the decision. If he does so, the case is referred to an appellate court, a higher court whose job it is to review the proceedings of a lower court (in this case, the trial court).

The role of an appellate court differs from that of a trial court. While a trial court is concerned with resolving disputes of fact and determining the truth, an appellate court is focused on procedure. In reviewing the decision of a lower court, appellate judges usually treat the lower court’s opinion with great deference and do not contest the findings of fact made by the lower court. Instead, the appeals court examines the procedures used to handle the case to determine whether any significant errors were made.

The appellate court will also determine whether or not legal statutes and legal doctrines were correctly applied or interpreted in the case at hand. An extreme example might be a person who was sentenced to life in prison for shoplifting in a convenience store. While the lower court might have been absolutely correct in deciding that the man did in fact steal from the store, it made a serious error in its choice of sentence.

Appellate courts have great power; they can affirm or reverse a lower court’s decision, modify the judgment, or send it back to the lower court for further review.

Though defendants usually have an unlimited right to appeal, plaintiffs and prosecutors are restricted by the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment.

To learn more, contact Chicago personal injury lawyers Friedman & Bonebrake, P.C. at 312-466-8200.