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Criminal Law
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What is Criminal Law?

Criminal law is a foundational area of legal study concerned with defining offenses, establishing standards of culpability, and determining appropriate punishment for those who commit crimes against individuals or society. It appears across undergraduate and graduate curricula in law, criminal justice, and political science programs, often as a required course. The field is academically significant because it sits at the intersection of ethics, government authority, and individual rights, demanding that students analyze how societies decide which acts constitute crimes and how defendants are treated within formal legal systems. Texts such as Herring's Criminal Law: Text and Cases are among the assigned sources students engage with when building this analytical foundation.

Student papers on this topic approach the subject from several distinct angles. Some examine procedural dimensions, tracing how a case moves through the criminal justice process from arrest to sentencing. Others focus on substantive doctrine, analyzing concepts like the reasonable person standard or the principles underlying criminal liability. Applied angles are also common, with papers exploring how criminal law intersects with business activity, property offenses, and specific criminal statutes. Evidence problems and the role of police subculture within the broader criminal justice system represent additional threads that students pursue, often through case-study or policy-analysis frameworks.

A strong essay on criminal law requires a clearly bounded thesis — focusing on a specific offense category, legal standard, or procedural question rather than attempting to survey the entire field. Legal cases, statutory text, and scholarly commentary carry the most analytical weight as evidence. The most common pitfall is treating criminal law as purely descriptive; examiners expect students to evaluate why particular rules exist, how they function in practice, and whether they achieve just outcomes for defendants and society alike.

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Research Paper Undergraduate
9/11, the Patriot Act, and Islam–West Relations
¶ … attack in 2001 was in some ways a complete surprise to most Americans, though the country really should have expected that something like this would happen in time. The World Trade Center had been attacked before in…
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Paper Doctorate
Due Process in Criminal Law: Rights and Protections
Due process in criminal law protects the rights of citizens with equal protection under law, including the right to legal counsel, the right to a jury trial of impartial peers, and the right to not testify against one's self. Both state and federal governments are held responsible for following the Federal Rules.
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Research Paper Undergraduate
Plea Bargaining and Public Opinion in Criminal Justice
Plea Bargaining: What Does it Mean to the Criminal Justice System
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Research Paper Undergraduate
John Grisham's Career Turning Point: From Law to Fiction
John Grisham is an extremely popular author in the modern legal and criminal mystery fiction genre. His books and films have been translated into thirty - one languages and they have earned a gross amount of several…
~1 min read
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Paper Undergraduate
Causes of Crime: Theories, Criminal Law, and Society
Unwanted conduct of individuals and societal attempts to control behavior that is dangerous to others or to society as a whole obviously predates recorded history
~1 min read
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Paper Undergraduate
Crime Control vs. Justice: Goals of the U.S. Criminal Justice System
What is the more important goal of the justice system, to control crime or to ensure justice?
~1 min read
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Essay Doctorate
Stages of Criminal Investigation and Prosecution Explained
In this paper, we are going to be examining the role of different parties in the criminal justice system. This will be accomplished by looking at: the responsibilities of law enforcement, prosecutors, defense attorney and judges. Once this takes place, is when we can show how these parties are working together to create a balance between protecting the rights of the accused and the general public.
~1 min read
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Research Paper Doctorate
Forensic Hair Analysis: Inadequacy and the Rise of DNA Testing
One June night 13 years ago, a killer fired several shots, killing 30-year-old Perry Harder. The killer and an accomplice loaded the body into the back of a van and drove to an isolated spot outside Winnipeg, Manitoba,…
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Paper Undergraduate
Civil Procedure: Courts, Jurisdiction, and Due Process
Under the broadest definition, civil procedure refers to the regulations under which courts engage in civil trials. "‘Civil trials' concern the judicial resolution of claims by one individual or group against another and are to be distinguished from ‘criminal trials,' in which the state prosecutes an individual for violation of criminal law. ‘Procedure' is to be distinguished from ‘substantive law' in that substantive law defines the rights and duties of everyday conduct, such as in contract law or tort law" (cornell.edu, 2010). A great number of statues deal with the jurisdiction of the civil courts. The fourteenth amendment famously bestows individuals with the right to life, liberty and property and such things cannot be taken away without the appropriate due process of law.
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Research Paper Undergraduate
Indian National Congress and India's Independence Movement
The Indian National Congress was probably the oldest and the biggest democratic organization in the world (Indian National Congress 2004). It was the initiative of Allan Octavian Hume, which he shared during the 1884…
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