Michelle's Journal

Saturday, 20 May

• Crime and Punishment Tour
• Imperial War Museum

Today we went on a crime and punishment tour in the City of London, learning about some of the most infamous crimes, trials, and executions that have taken place in the city. Apparently making counterfeit money was one of the biggest offenses, as it was considered stealing directly from the monarch themself, and many people were executed for it. Forging coins was punishable by being boiled alive in a vat of hot oil. Punishments focussed heavily on deterrence; for example, a person caught selling bad fish would be forced to wear their fish around their neck, and would be paraded through the streets, where the would be jeered at, and it ensured no one would buy from them again. Deterrence could be simple in a time when their reputation was often all people had. In the afternoon we visited the Imperial War Museum, which holds lots of artifacts from both WWI and WWII, including some airplanes, torpedoes and missiles, and vehicles. There was a section on the Holocaust, an insanely powerful exhibit, that held relics from the concentration camps, everything from shoes to the prisoner’s uniforms, SS officer’s uniforms, propaganda posters, and the star of davids that would decorate the clothing of the Jewish prisoners. A section talked about how at one point, the soldiers killed over 33,000 people in one day. In addition to Jewish people, they also killed gypsies, those with disabilities, homosexuals, and anyone else they considered inferior or unable to contribute to a productive society. There was a model of Auschwitz, showing how prisoners were moved through the (massive) camp, and tricked into entering the gas chambers, disguised as decontamination showers. One interesting thing was the precursor to the gas chamber buildings, where they used poison gas to carry out the executions, originally prisoners were put into the back of a sealed van, which was attached to the exhaust pipe of the van, and the prisoners were killed by way of carbon monoxide poisoning from the exhaust. It’s impossible to measure, but I’m still wondering; how many people were truly killed in the camps, in the war?

Friday, 19 May

• British Museum
• Jack the Ripper Tour

Today we went to the British Museum, and were sent on a bit of a scavenger hunt of sorts. We needed to find a fact about the museum itself, three different exhibits and some interesting parts about them, and a tie to criminal justice. We discovered that the museum was established in 1753, and finally opened to the public in 1759. Karl Marx wrote part of Das Kaptial in the reading room in the museum, and many other famous authors also worked on their stories there. During WWII, artefacts from the museum were transferred to the now-unused British museum tube stop for safekeeping. We went through so many different exhibits it was hard to keep track, each one a different country and age. For the criminal justice part, we found out that the museum works closely with government agencies and the Metropolitan Police for their security, and there are many undercover officers patrolling the museum. Some more interesting facts were that apparently every 1 in 35 pound coins are counterfeit, and the museum also displays the tablet with the Code of Hammurabi, an ancient set of Babylonian laws from Mesopotamia, and outlines the biblical rule of “an eye for an eye”, the punishment of retribution. In the evening, we took a guided Jack the Ripper walking tour, which has been by far my favourite tour! The guide walked us through where most of the women were murdered, and showed pictures of what the buildings looked like, and many were still there. He did an excellent job of describing what it was like, living in the slum conditions of the boarding houses in the East Side, infested with crime and rats alike. There were even some pictures of the bodies, both on the street and in the morgue, and we learned this was one of the first instances of using crime scene photography. I’m curious to know more about the museum- no one we asked seemed to know anything about attempted thefts, though they have to have occurred at some point. Has anyone gotten away with stealing something from the museum?

Thursday, 18 May

• Work Day

Today was mainly a work day to work on our projects, which was fine with me as it was raining and cold. It did give me some more time to think on the things we’ve seen here, however. A main topic I’ve been on, as it’s hard to miss when you’re out walking, is the CCTV used virtually everywhere in London. Every building has a camera on the outside, they’re on the backs of busses, inside the trains, inside stores, hallways, even the back alleys between roads are covered with cameras. From a criminal justice standpoint, this appears to be quite the asset to police, as with that many cameras, they could follow a suspect from a crime scene, all the way across the city, just by tracking them through the camera footage. Apparently this footage is monitored and compiled somewhere, aiding the city in fighting crime. From another standpoint, an American one, it’s very uncomfortable to know you’re constantly on camera. They aren’t exactly hidden cameras either, they’re massive security cameras, mounted on every available surface. It’s something Americans aren’t used to seeing, except perhaps in New York City, but still, not even to this extent. It’s made clear, at least, signs are posted everywhere informing people there is CCTV coverage there. In the US, if there’s cameras, they’re usually downplayed or hidden. Americans generally don’t like being on camera like that, it’s more seen as an invasion of privacy, than as a law enforcement tool. Big brother is watching you..

Wednesday, 17 May

• Foundling Museum
• City of London Police Museum, Forensics Talk
• City of London Police Walking Tour

In the afternoon, we visited the Foundling Museum, where there’d been a hospital for “foundling”, or orphaned, children, started by Thomas Coram. The hospital actually operated until the 1950’s, until after World War Two. As it was a orphanage, many of the kids may have had ties to the criminal justice system. Many of the older boys bullied the younger ones, and therefore may have turned to petty crime after essentially being let loose once they were old enough. Another child was mentioned to be the child of a man who was convicted at Old Bailey, leaving the mother destitute, and therefore turned the child over to the hospital. Often, women would give up their child if they were illegitimate or if the father imprisoned, leaving only a token with the child to identify them, as they were renamed when they came to the hospital, in case they were eventually able to return for the child to care for it. Later, we went to the City of London Police Museum, then went on a walking tour. Apparently, the City of London police are olympic champions of tug-of-war. It hasn’t been played in the olympics since 1920, and they consider themselves reigning champions because they haven’t been defeated since! They discussed police call boxes, there before cell phones or portable radios. A police officer would patrol a set “beat”, and if the station needed to contact an officer, they would flash a red light on the top of the boxes. The officer would then know they needed to go to the box and use the telephone to call the station. Some of the historical events included attacks by the Irish Republican Army (IRA), who claimed responsibility for several bombings in the City of London, and the suffragettes. While some were peaceful protesters, some had turned to militant views, planting bombs in St. Paul’s Cathedral and outside the Bank of England and various other sites, and were responsible for several arson cases. Many were arrested, and their actions today would have gotten them put on trial as terrorists. The CSI aspect talked about a large amount of cybercrime perpetuated in the City of London, along with some stabbings and drug use, as being the main crimes they deal with. Interestingly, civilians can train to be CSI along with officers, picking an aspect to specialize in, whereas in the US, you would need to undergo quite a bit of schooling, in addition to being certified as CSI more generally. They also only use private industry labs for DNA/toxicology testing, there are no longer state laboratories. They have built up a DNA bank, as they take DNA samples from every arrest. After DNA advances, they began working on historic cold cases, solving them with this new evidence. With these profiles, they’re extremely likely to get a DNA profile from a crime, and they search everything. I’m curious to learn, now, if since they allow civilians to become CSI, what sort of training do they go through? Clearly it wouldn’t be as intensive as going to school for it like in the US, so what sorts of requirements are there?

Tuesday, 16 May

• Old Bailey
• Mounted Police Talk
• Tower of London

Tuesday we visited Old Bailey, the Central Criminal Court, and met a QC, then listened to some of a case being argued there. Old Bailey has been used for centuries, but the current building was built in 1908 and stands on the site of the Newgate Prison. There are 18 courts there in use. The judges there are QCs, or Queen’s Counsel, and preside over cases sent up from the Magistrate’s Court, to be heard in the Crown Courts. QCs receive yearly training to get “tickets”, which qualify them to hear different types of cases, such as murder, rape, theft, assault, etc. After that, we listened to a case being argued in one of the courts. A man had been arrested for attempting to hire a hitman to kill his wife, while the hitman was actually an undercover police officer. The part we heard was entirely the prosecution and the defence arguing over whether or not an objection over the method of cross-examination was valid in court. Barristers don’t actually interrupt each other with objections like they do in the US, it seems like they wait until it’s their turn to argue to bring it up. This seems counterproductive, though, as it just takes longer and longer to go through everything. It seems that British courts are very polite and focussed on formality, everything has a precise order, with no deviations, unlike the US. A question I took away from the court was a simple observation-- the court clerk was dressed in a robe and barrister’s wig. Must a clerk always also be a barrister, or is this only sometimes? Why would they need to be a barrister at all? The clerks seem to take a much higher position in the UK courts than they do in the US, as seen in the Magistrate’s court.

In the afternoon, we heard a lecture given by an Inspector with the City of London Mounted Police. The City of London is very small, only one square mile, and holds mostly businesses. Very few people actually live there. The City of London is also called the financial district, as there are many banks, day trading, and other money businesses there-- and because of this, there is a high rate of suicide in the City itself. The Mounted Police take on this task, in addition to the police on foot patrol. The Mounted Police is very hard to get into, and takes a lot of training. Officers accepted into the program go through a four month intensive training, the longest in the country, in which they learn horses inside and out, very similar to the Army’s Cavalry training. Each officer has their own horse to look after, to build a bond with it, but they do not always just ride that horse when they’re out on patrols. Horses go through a two year training program, and are always at least four years old, to make sure they have the right temperament to be a police horse. An interesting aspect of mounted policing was they pair up with plainclothes officers, who observe the crowds and watch people’s reactions to seeing the mounted police, and it has been an effective way of catching people involved with terrorism or theft. The mounted police also play a big part in riot policing-- horses have proved very effective in crowd control! The horses have their own protective gear to shield them from rocks and petrol bombs thrown by rioters. Perhaps most importantly, though, they’re fantastic at community engagement. People might be afraid of a police officer, but they love to meet the horses, and it gives the police an opportunity to connect with the public. It seems a good idea, though I’m not sure how effective it would be in smaller cities. The US has mounted police in some areas, mainly New York City, but I’m not sure how effective it is there. Lastly, in the evening, we visited the Tower of London. We saw the crown jewels, and the White Tower, where the bodies of the two lost princes were discovered under a staircase during renovations. They had a display of armour and weapons, and even a chopping block and axe, in addition to the other various forms of torture used on those kept prisoner there. There was a memorial on the spot of the scaffolding, to the nobles who were executed there, most notably Catherine Howard and Anne Boleyn, queens of King Henry VIII. Apparently, the first prisoner to be kept in the tower escaped, and no prisoners were held there for several years afterwards, so for a time, the tower had a 100% escape rate!

Monday, 15 May

• Lewisham Police Lecture and Q&A

Today we had a lecture by two police officers from Lewisham. The majority of the calls they deal with as rookies tend to be landlord/tenant issues, and mental health issues. The police in England seem to have many kinds of liaison officers. Every borough in London, save one, has an LGBT+ officer that acts as a liaison between the police and the community. The police also have what are called “police community officers”, who wear blue shirts rather than white, and can do basically everything police do except arrests. In the south of London, there is a high population of gangs, and so there are officers who specialise in gangs, and try to steer young people away from the life of a gang member. The officers mentioned working with a drama group to basically roleplay police/community interactions, except with the officers playing the kids, the kids playing the officers, to show them an officer’s point of view, and how the things they do might be threatening to an officer, and therefore why the police react the way they do. Most prominently what happens when they’re sticking cell phones in police’s faces and filming them. It seems a very effective way of showing the kids what their interactions with the police are like, in a way that isn’t condescending or threatening to them. Another big issue to the police is stop and search, with the police constantly under fire for it. They have to have good justification for stopping someone, and must write down every little aspect of every call, and justify everything they do-- or don’t do. The police have basically no rights to self-defense-- in fact it seems like the public has more rights when they’re on a call than the police do. One story the officers told was on a violence call, her partner was stabbed with a pair of scissors and the man then wrestled her partner’s baton away from him, and she was trying to get the baton away while trying to subdue the man. Rather than taking her own baton and knocking him out or the likes. With guns, they’re literally taught to run away and hide, or try to hit the gun away from them, rather than defending themselves, an utterly crazy concept to an American, who’s used to stand your ground laws and the ability to defend yourself and have it stand up in court. Another interesting point was that the police do all the work for their cases prior to court, it’s not passed off to an investigator. The officer is responsible for following up with witnesses, collecting evidence, etc. After the police compile the case, they send it to the prosecutor. Similar to the US, police in England are often disgruntled by the court system, who will barely touch the cases or say they don’t have enough evidence, after the police have put so much work into building these cases. Since it’s mentioned that police do the majority of the work collecting evidence and statements to build their cases, I’m curious how CID fits into all this. Do they only do the more complicated cases, or only some of them?

Weekend, 13-14 May

This weekend, although I didn’t explicitly visit any criminal justice-related places, has given some time for reflection. In wandering around, I did manage to find another of the four existing buildings in London that still bear the pre-Great Fire of 1666 facade, with the black and white stripes. I went back past the Houses of Parliament, and it got me thinking about the comparisons between it and the US Congress. Congress has a combined membership of 485 people, Parliament has over 650. Congress has a requirement of meeting once per year as set in the US Constitution. England has no set constitution, and historically Parliament only met when a session was called by the monarch- meaning if a monarch wanted to rule absolutely, without having to push decisions through Parliament, technically they could simply by not calling them together, although history shows that never worked well for long. Congress and Parliament are both made up of two chambers; Congress with the Senate and the House of Representatives, and Parliament with the House of Commons and the House of Lords. The Senate and the House of Lords make up the upper chamber. The House of Representatives and the House of Commons make the lower chambers. Interestingly, while in the US, no Cabinet member may be in Congress, in England, government ministers must belong to a House of Parliament, and if they aren’t already when they take the government position, they’re given a seat in the House of Lords. I’m curious now about the complexities of passing bills in Parliament- given the House of Lords cannot stop legislation, only argue it, how often does the House of Commons use that to their advantage? How many bills have passed despite vehement opposition?

Friday 12 May

• Thames Magistrate’s Court
• South Bank Tour
• Clink Prison Museum

In visiting the Magistrate’s Court, we heard two cases, both for theft and attempted theft. The overall setup of the court seemed very different, though some aspects were familiar. A sign hung in the gallery showed they also use the Exclusionary Rule, and a “bad character report” was also asked for, establishing the defendant’s prior offenses. Not knowing much about how Justices of the Peace in the US operate, I can’t make much of a comparison, but it seemed strange that the legal advisor seemed to be the one running the trials, not the magistrates themselves. In the afternoon, we toured the South Bank of London, historically the Red Light District, and across the Thames River from the main part of the city. The London Bridge (not the Tower Bridge that everyone pictures! It’s just a normal stone bridge) began as a Roman bridge when they occupied the area. It was much lower than the current bridge and was built of wood. Spikes on the south end of the bridge were used to stick heads of those executed, as a warning- the first of whom was William Wallace, the man who fought for Scottish independence. Later on, the bridge became an area for shops, and even a chapel, built directly on the bridge. When carriages were more commonplace, the bridge, with all its shops and people, became extremely crowded. Traffic wardens were established to help control the flow of people, with them instructing carriages to drive on the left to keep them moving- a method still used in London today, and why the English drive on the left. In 1832 a new London Bridge was built, on account that the London Bridge has a penchant for falling down, and remained until 1972. It was replaced again in ‘72 and part of the old bridge was purchased and sent to Lake Havasu City, Arizona. Moving on to Guy’s Hospital, Thomas Guy payed for the building in 1720, and it was established as a hospital for all, that would not turn people away. It was also a teaching hospital. An American studying at Guy’s Hospital learned about vaccinations there, and brought the idea back to the US, where the practice was established. The Queen’s Head Inn, which still exists, was run by Anne Harvard, mother to John Harvard. John Harvard brought over 400 books from England to Charlestown. In his will, he saw to the founding of Harvard College. In the 1700’s, the college burned, and all but two of the original books he brought were destroyed, but the college still exists to this day. Marshalsea Prison was a debtor’s prison, and was popular in mainstream literature thanks to Charles Dickens, whose father was imprisoned there. He visited his father, and later wrote about it in his books. Until imprisonment of debtors was abolished in the 1880’s, creditors could complain and have people who owed them money arrested and put in jail until they could pay back their debt- in addition to now having to pay for food and lodging in jail. The Clink Prison Museum played a part in this as well, debtors were commonly imprisoned there. The museum also displayed an array of torture devices, with wax models of prisoners, and the tour painted vivid pictures of what life- however short- in the prison would have been like. Established in the 1100’s and operating until it burned down in the 1700s, the museum still has the original floor of the prison! As this prison only operated until the 1700s, I’m curious how prisons after that operated, up until the more recent shift to privately funded prisons.

Thursday 11 May

• Lecture/Q&A with magistrate
• British Library

Thursday we heard a lecture from a woman that sits on a local magistrate court. A magistrate, or justice of the peace, has “the power to restrain”, and they are volunteers who receive a bit of training, but have no official legal background. They operate by the slogan of “local justice for local people”, which tries to mirror the local population by means of gender, race, etc. The magistrates sit in panels of three, and as they have no legal background, they always sit with a legal advisor. The magistrates hear about 95 percent of criminal cases, with the exceptions being murder, rape, and other high profile crimes. A magistrate always starts in the adult courts, but after experience, they can receive more training and move to youth or family courts. The initial charge in a magistrate court is determined by the CPS, the Crown Prosecution Service. Low income defendants may be entitled to legal aid for representation. For serious charges, those of low income are given the opportunity to see the Duty Solicitor for advice. A defendant may receive a sentence reduction for pleading guilty. There are three types of bail; conditional, unconditional, and remanding in custody pretrial. Unlike the US though, money is very rarely used in bail. In a hearing, the magistrates must decide whether they have the power to retain the case in their court, or if they want to send it to the Crown Courts. Either way, though, the defendant still can elect to have the case sent to the Crown Court to be heard before a judge and a jury. All indictable offenses are sent directly to the Crown Court. The sentencing powers of the magistrates are conditional discharge, fines, community orders, and custodial sentences. In the case of fines, the amount depends on the offense and the income of the defendant plus their savings. Costs and compensation are added, as is a “victim surcharge”, which is distributed to victim assistance programs, and a collection order is made. The maximum custodial sentence is 6 months per charge, though the sentences can be consecutive or concurrent. When the sentence is given, the magistrates must give their reasoning for the decision, especially if they’ve deviated from the sentencing guidelines. Decisions can be made with agreement 2 out of 3, rather than unanimously. Some courts may have district judges, who are trained as lawyers and sit alone rather than in a panel, and some may have non-CPS operating. Common things they hear in the magistrate’s court are drug possession, domestic abuse, shoplifting, drunk and disorderly, and gang affiliations. In a country that puts such emphasis on rehabilitation over imprisonment, I’d like to know how offenders are treated in society post-jail. A mention was made at one point about how a mark of dishonesty- even for minor shoplifting- could severely impact a person in terms of later finding a job. How does such a society support the rehabilitation of offenders? It seems like it would only serve to make things immensely difficult for them.

Wednesday 10 May

• Westminster Abbey
• Houses of Parliament
• Supreme Court
• New Scotland Yard

Today we visited the Palace of Westminster, more commonly referred to as the Houses of Parliament, and Westminster Abbey. The Abbey was a Benedictine monastery, built into a church in the 1000’s by Edward the Confessor. The monarch of England is not only the Head of State, but the Head of the Anglican Church of England. Nearby stands The Church House, the administration of the Anglican church, and the site of the first United Nations Security Council. Westminster again used to be a palace, last used by Henry VIII, who was the last to reign there before a fire destroyed much of it, and the royal residence was moved. In the last 500 years, Westminster Palace has belonged to the House of Commons and the House of Lords, the two sections of government, similar to the US’s Senate and House of Representatives. The House of Lords is changed from older days, and is now comprised of 26 archbishops and bishops of the Church of England, 92 hereditary peers, or the sons of Lords, and the rest is comprised of experts, such as lawyers, doctors, and others leading in their field of study and called for their expertise. The number of seats in the House of Lords is not fixed, and currently sits at 800 members. The lower house, the House of Commons, is made up of 650 elected members, called routinely to represent until Parliament is dissolved. The House of Commons introduces legislature, which then goes to the House of Lords for them to amend and send back, and it is argued. However, unlike the US, the Parliament is sovereign, what it says goes. The Supreme Court is not like the US Supreme Court either. It was created as the result of the Constitutional Reform Act of 2005 and is the highest court of appeals in the UK, representing and taking cases from from England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. Also housed in the Supreme Court building is the Judiciary Committee Privy Council, the High Court of Appeals for Commonwealth and Crown Dependencies. We also learned that the US 2nd and 8th Amendments to the Constitution were taken directly from the English Bill of Rights, word for word. One of my original questions from the readings was also answered, if there was something of an English equivalent to the US Miranda Rights, and it’s sort of similar. “You have the right to silence, but it may harm your defence if you say something in court that you failed to mention when questioned.” I’m now curious, after learning that England has no fixed, written constitution, as to what keeps the government from just doing whatever it pleases, if all it takes is a majority vote, not even a unanimous vote, to pass any law through Parliament?

Tuesday 9 May

• Four Inns of Court
• Royal Court of Justice

Today we did a walking tour of London, during which we visited the four Inns of Court and the Royal Courts of Justice, along with learning more defined definitions of barristers and solicitors and tying in some historical points to US history. In contrast to the US, students wishing to be lawyers in England must choose to either be a solicitor, who deals with low level courts, or a barrister, who deals with higher courts. Barristers go to law school for a year of intense study, and must choose from one of the four Inns of Courts; Middle Temple, Inner Temple, Lincoln’s Inn, and Gray’s Inn. The Inns seem to be almost fraternities of sorts, or clubs, and consist of a dining hall, a church, a library, and sets of chambers for barristers. Many of the buildings date back to the fifteen and sixteen hundreds, while the church Middle Temple and Inner Temple share is a Knight’s Templar round church built in 1185. The Royal Courts of Justice, a recent building by English standards, was opened in the late 1800s, and is home to the High Court and the Court of Appeals. In sitting in on a trial in the court of appeals, it’s easy to see there are vast differences between the US and English justice systems. Three judges sit on the Court of Appeals, and there are several solicitors in attendance, while the defendant often only appears by video, rather than in person. A judge also reads the opinion in court, rather than making it available but never actually delivering it in court. In seeing this procedure in the Court of Appeals, I’m very curious to see the differences between this court and the Supreme Court, if the differences are minor or more substantial.