CJCENTRAL: Criminal Justice Brief, 5E: Glossary

jail
A confinement facility administered by an agency of local government, typically a law enforcement agency, intended for adults but sometimes also containing juveniles, which holds persons detained pending adjudication and/or persons committed after adjudication, usually those committed on sentences of a year or less.

jail commitment
A sentence of commitment to the jurisdiction of a confinement facility system for adults which is administered by an agency of local government and of which the custodial authority is usually limited to persons sentenced to a year or less of confinement.

judge
An elected or appointed public official who presides over a court of law, and who is authorized to hear and sometimes to decide cases, and to conduct trials.

judgment
The statement of the decision of a court, that the defendant is acquitted or convicted of the offense(s) charged.

judgment suspending sentence
A court-ordered sentencing alternative that results in the convicted offender being placed on probation.

judicial officer
Any person authorized by statute, constitutional provision, or court rule to exercise those powers reserved to the judicial branch of government.

judicial review
The power of a court to review actions and decisions made by other agencies of government.

jural postulates
Propositions developed by the famous jurist Roscoe Pound that hold that the law reflects shared needs without which members of society could not co-exist. Pound's jural postulates are often linked to the idea that the law can be used to engineer the social structure to ensure certain kinds of outcomes (such as property rights as embodied in the law of theft do in capitalistic societies).

jurisdiction
The territory, subject matter, or persons over which lawful authority may be exercised by a court or other justice agency, as determined by statute or constitution. See also venue.

jurisprudence
The philosophy of law; the science and study of the law.

juror
A member of a trial or grand jury, selected for jury duty, and required to serve as an arbiter of the facts in a court of law.

jury panel
The group of persons summoned to appear in court as potential jurors for a particular trial, or the persons selected from the group of potential jurors to sit in the jury box, from which second group those acceptable to the prosecution and the defense are finally chosen as the jury.

jury selection
The process whereby, according to law and precedent, members of a particular trial jury are chosen.

just deserts
As a model of criminal sentencing, one which holds that criminal offenders deserve the punishment they receive at the hands of the law, and that punishments should be appropriate to the type and severity of crime committed.

justice
The principle of fairness; the ideal of moral equity.

justice model
A contemporary model of imprisonment in which the principle of just deserts forms the underlying social philosophy.

justifications
A category of legal defenses in which the defendant admits committing the act in question, but claims it was necessary in order to avoid some greater evil.

juvenile
In the context of the administration of justice, a person subject to juvenile court proceedings because a statutorily defined event or condition caused by or affecting that person was alleged to have occurred while his or her age was below the statutorily specified age limit of original jurisdiction of a juvenile court.

juvenile court
The name for the class of courts that have, as all or part of their authority, original jurisdiction over matters concerning persons statutorily defined as juveniles.

juvenile court judgment
The juvenile court decision terminating an adjudicatory hearing, that the juvenile is a delinquent, status offender, or dependent, or that the allegations in the petition are not sustained.

juvenile disposition
The decision of a juvenile court, concluding a disposition hearing, that an adjudicated juvenile be committed to a juvenile correctional facility, or placed in a juvenile residence, shelter, or care or treatment program, or required to meet certain standards of conduct, or released.

juvenile justice agency
A government agency, or subunit thereof, of which the functions are the investigation, supervision, adjudication, care, or confinement of juvenile offenders and nonoffenders subject to the jurisdiction of a juvenile court; also, in some usages, a private agency providing care and treatment.

juvenile justice system
Government agencies that function to investigate, supervise, adjudicate, care for, or confine youthful offenders and other children subject to the jurisdiction of the juvenile court.

juvenile petition
A document filed in juvenile court alleging that a juvenile is a delinquent, a status offender, or a dependent, and asking that the court assume jurisdiction over the juvenile, or asking that an alleged delinquent be transferred to a criminal court for prosecution as an adult.

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