group 9 the court system of english american law

● County Court The vast majority of civil cases take place in the County Court, More complex cases or those involving large amounts of money will appear at the High Court Types of civil

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY

UNIVERSITY OF LAW -

-GROUP 9: THE COURT SYSTEM OF ENGLISH &

AMERICAN LAW

LECTURER: HOÀNG NGOC ANH

A THE COURT SYSTEM OF ENGLISH LAW

Rather than being designed from scratch, the UK court system has evolved and developed over 1,000 years This has led to a complicated and, in some places, confusing structure

Consists of three different systems:

- England and Wales unified court system: based on common law principles, which originated in medieval England

- The court system in Northern Ireland: closely resembles that of England and Wales

- The Scottish court system: a hybrid model that combines elements of both common and law and civil law systems

In this presentation we will focus on England and Wales unified court system

In England and Wales, most civil cases are heard in the County Court

● County Court

The vast majority of civil cases take place in the County Court, More complex cases

or those involving large amounts of money will appear at the High Court

Types of civil cases dealt with in the County Court include:

· Businesses trying to recover money they are owed

· Individuals seeking compensation for injuries

· Landowners are seeking orders that will prevent trespass

Case management of claims is undertaken almost exclusively by the District Judge

As well as hearing cases, District Judges generally keep an overview of a case to make sure it is running smoothly They also deal with repossessions and assess damages in uncontested cases

County Court judgments may call for the payment or return of money or property Successful litigants may ask the court to enforce the judgment through one of a range of procedures, including writs and warrants of control

Who sits in a County Court?

Circuit judges: Circuit Judges are appointed to one of seven regions of England and Wales, and sit in the Crown Court and County Court within their particular region Fee-paid judges: Various fee-paid (non-salaried judges) sit occasionally in the County

Court – Deputy District Judges, Deputy Circuit Judges and Recorders.

District judges: District Judges are full-time judges who deal with the majority of cases in the County Court They are deployed on appointment to a particular circuit and may sit at any of the County Court or District Registries of the High Court on that circuit

● Judgment

Once the judge has heard the evidence from all parties involved and any submissions (representations) they wish to put forward, they deliver their judgment This may be immediately, or if the case is complicated, at a later date

Generally, civil cases do not involve the imposition of any punishment

If the judge decides that the claimant is entitled to damages, they will have to go on to decide the amount Or the claimant may have asked for an injunction - an order specifying the precise boundary between 2 properties about which the parties had never been able to agree The task of the judge is to decide on what is the appropriate remedy, if any, and on the precise terms of it

When the judgment in the case has been delivered, the judge will usually deal with the costs of the case This may include the fees of any lawyers, court fees paid out by the parties, fees of expert witnesses, allowances to litigants in person and other expenses incurred by the parties and their witnesses

Beside County court, many specialist tribunals have been created to resolve particular types of civil disputes

- The Upper Tribunal primarily, but not exclusively, reviews and decides appeals arising from the First-tier Tribunal

+ Administrative Appeals Chamber

+ Tax and Chancery Chamber

+ Immigration and Asylum Chamber

+ Lands Chamber

- First-tier Tribunal: The seven Chambers of the First-tier Tribunal deal with disputes

in a number of diverse areas of the law including:

+ War, Pension, and Armed Forces Chamber

+ General Regulatory Chamber

+ Social Entitlement Chamber

+ Tax Chamber

+ Health, Education and Social Care Chamber

+ Immigration and Asylum Chamber

+ Property Chamber

- Employment Appeal Tribunal: An independent tribunal which determines legal disputes relating to employment law throughout Great Britain

- The Employment Tribunals: are the judicial body with responsibility for workplace justice, being the main forum for deciding disputes between workers and employers

● Magistrates' Court

Magistrates, also known as Justices of the Peace, are individuals from all walks of life who are passionate about making a difference in their local communities They volunteer for at least 13 days a year, plus training, to hear a variety of cases in our courts The role is unpaid and many magistrates are employed alongside their role

Magistrates make decisions in criminal and family cases in Magistrates’ courts and the Family Court The most complex cases in Magistrates’ courts are heard by District Judges District Judges are appointed by the King, on the recommendation of the Lord Chancellor, following a fair and open competition administered by the Judicial Appointments Commission

Individuals do not require any legal qualifications or prior training to become a magistrate However, candidates must demonstrate the following five key attributes:

1 Making fair, impartial and transparent decisions

2 Understanding and appreciating different perspectives

3 Communicating with sensitivity and respect

4 Showing self-awareness and being open to

5 Working and engaging with people professionally

Virtually all criminal court cases start in a Magistrates’ court, and around 95% will be completed there Magistrates’ courts also have an extensive civil jurisdiction, comprising approximately 5 million cases a year

In criminal proceedings, magistrates deal with three kinds of cases:

1 Summary offences These are less serious cases, such as motoring offences and

minor assaults, where the defendant is not usually entitled to trial by jury They are disposed

of in Magistrates’ courts

2 Either-way offences As the name implies, these can be dealt with either by magistrates or before a judge and jury at the Crown Court Such offences include theft and handling stolen goods A defendant can insist on their right to trial in the Crown Court Magistrates can also decide that a case is so serious that it should be dealt with in the Crown Court – which can impose tougher sentences if the defendant is found guilty

3 Indictable-only offences, such as murder, manslaughter, rape and robbery These must be heard at a Crown Court

The more serious criminal offences are passed on to the Crown Court

● Crown Court

It deals with:

- cases sent for trial by Magistrates’ courts because the offences are ‘indictable only’ (i.e those which can only be heard by the Crown Court because of the seriousness of the offence)

- ‘either way’ offences (which can be heard in a Magistrates’ court, but can also be sent to the Crown Court if the defendant chooses a jury trial)

- defendants convicted in Magistrates’ courts, but sent to the Crown Court for sentencing due to the seriousness of the offence

- appeals against decisions of Magistrates’ courts

Almost all cases start in the Magistrates’ court With ‘indictable only’ offences the defendant will be sent to the Crown Court for trial

A defendant in an ‘either way’ case who chooses to plead not guilty can request a jury trial and, if they do, will be sent to the Crown Court Even if they don’t request a jury trial, magistrates can decide to send them for trial in the Crown Court if the offence is serious enough

If the defendant pleads guilty to a serious ‘either-way’ offence, magistrates can commit them to the Crown Court for sentencing

● High court

The High Court of Justice in London is a Senior Courts of England and Wales

It deals with all high value and high importance civil law cases and also has a

supervisory jurisdiction over all subordinate courts and tribunals, with a few statutory exceptions

The High Court consists of 3 divisions:

- King’s Bench Division

- Family Division

- Chancery Division

● King’s Bench Division

The largest of the 3 High Court Divisions with the most varied jurisdiction

Outside London, the work of the KBD is administered in provincial offices known as district registries In London, the work is administered in the Central Office at the Royal Courts of Justice

The King’s Bench Division deals with ‘common law’ civil claims – actions relating to contract, except those specifically allocated to the Chancery Division, and claims relating to civil wrongs, known as ‘torts’

Part of its civil work is handling contract and tort (civil wrongs) cases which are unsuitable for the County Courts for reasons of cost or complexity

Contract cases include claims for failure to pay for goods and service, and claims for breach of contract Tort claims include:

- Claims for negligence

- Claims for defamation and misuse of private information

- Claims for wrongs against the person, for example, assault and false imprisonment

- Claims for wrongs against property, such as trespass

Judges in the King’s Bench Division also preside over more specialist matters, such as applications for judicial review

Judges of the King’s Bench Division also hear the most important criminal cases in the Crown Court They also sit in the Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) on appeals from convictions or sentences passed in the Crown Court

They may also sit in the Employment Appeals Tribunal, the Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) and the Special Immigration Appeals Tribunal The KBD includes within it a number of specialist courts:

- Administrative Court

- Admiralty Court

- Circuit Commercial Courts

- Commercial Court

- Financial List

- Planning Court

- Technology and Construction Court

● Family Division

The family justice system exists to help families resolve disputes arising in respect of family matters quickly and with the minimum of disruption to those involved

In most cases, the parties are encouraged to resolve their family disputes out of court, for example through mediation, unless this is not a safe course This approach is taken because outcomes are more likely to be successful if the parties themselves have had a role

in planning and agreeing that outcome

Where agreement is not possible, the court still works to make the family dispute less adversarial, even though the case needs to go to court for the judge to decide the proper outcome

Types of Family Cases: The disputes that come before the Family Court and the Family Division of the High Court often involve very difficult circumstances and can touch

on almost every aspect of family life

- Cases about marriage

- Cases about divorce

- Cases about financial remedies following divorce

- Protection from domestic abuse and coercive and controlling behaviour

- Cases about child arrangements

- Cases about protecting children

- Cases about adoption

- Cases about child abduction

- Cases about human fertilization and embryology and surrogacy

- Cases about forced marriage and female genital mutilation

- Cases under the Inherent Jurisdiction

● Chancery Division

The Chancery Division undertakes civil work of many kinds, including disputes relating to business, property or land, intellectual property issues, insolvency, bankruptcy, tax and the validity of wills

The work of the Chancery Division is divided up between several specialist lists, sub-lists and courts:

- The Business List

The scope of the Chancery Business List is broad It includes a wide range of national and international business disputes concerning a business structure, sale and purchase of businesses, claims for professional negligence, claims for breach of contract and rectification as well as other equitable remedies

The Business List has two sub-lists:

• The Financial Services and Regulatory List

• The Pensions List

- The Financial List: The Financial List is a specialist cross-jurisdictional list set up

to address the particular business needs of parties litigating on financial matters

- The Competition List: This list deals with claims previously brought under Article

101 and Article 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (‘TFEU’) and claims brought under the corresponding provisions of UK domestic law contained in Chapters I and II of Part 1 of the Competition Act 1998

- The Insolvency and Companies List comprises two sub-lists:

• Insolvency List

• Companies List

- The Intellectual Property List: Claims in the Intellectual Property List include those

brought under the Trade Marks Act 1994, copyright issues, passing off, and other intellectual property claims

- The Property Trusts and Probate List: This list is separate from the Business List

+ The property work includes all disputes about land ownership or development, commercial mortgages and leases, receivership, orders for sale to enforce charging orders and resulting and constructive trusts

+ The trusts work includes removal of trustees, claims against trustees, issues of construction/rectification, disputes concerning trust property and applications for approval

or administration orders

+ The probate work includes contentious probate claims, rectification of wills, substitution or removal of Personal Representatives and cases involving the Presumption of Death Act 2013 and the Guardianship (Missing Persons) Act 2017

- The Revenue List: This List covers claims involving major points of principle where

HMRC is a party This List does not include claims for the recovery of taxes or duties or where a taxpayer disputes liability to pay tax

● The Court of Appeal

The Court of Appeal is the highest court within the Senior Courts of England and Wales, and deals only with appeals from other courts or tribunals

It is divided into two Divisions, Criminal and Civil

All Court of Appeal Judges are senior judges with lengthy judicial experience Appointment is by The King on the recommendation of a selection panel convened by the Judicial Appointments Commission

B THE COURT SYSTEM OF ENGLISH LAW

Dual court system

Dual court system The United States is a federal state, so the state apparatus includes two systems of state agencies in parallel: federal state agencies and state agencies The United States has a national court system and a court system in the member states In total, there are more than 51 court systems in the United States, including the federal court system plus separate systems in all 50 states and the District of Columbia That is, in each state there are two complete parallel court systems that exist Historically, before the founding of the United States of America, each member state had its own court system So, when countries joined together to create the United States of America, along with the establishment of a federal judicial system, a dual court system was created

The United States is a dual court system where state and federal matters are handled separately

There are two types of courts in the United States — state and federal You can think about them as parallel tracks that can (though rarely) end up in the U.S Supreme Court Within the two respective tracks, there are three main levels: trial courts, appellate courts and the highest court for that respective track

1 The Federal Court System consists of

Supreme Court, Court of Appeal, and District Court

-The Supreme Court of the Union has jurisdiction over decisions of all Federal

Courts The composition of this Court consists of 9 judges appointed by the President with the consent of the Senate One of those nine judges is appointed as the President of the supreme court The Supreme Court is not divided into specialized courts such as criminal and civil The judges are all people with a high level of legal knowledge and expertise Decisions of the Court are taken by majority (over 50%) and at least 6 judges are required

to participate in the trial

The Supreme Court of the United States also has particularly important jurisdiction It has the power to judge the constitutionality or unconstitutionality of laws enacted by the US Congress It has the power to declare a law enacted by Parliament unconstitutional, nullifying such legislation The Supreme Court also has the power to interpret Federal statutes and such interpretation has the force of law as a legal document

-The court of appeal is organized by region (circuit) Each region consists of 3 or more States There are 11 Federal Courts of Appeal in the United States Each appellate court consists of 3 to 15 judges, depending on the workload of the region Judges are appointed by the President for life The trial courts consist of 3 judges with equal authority The decision of the Court of Appeal can be appealed to the Supreme Court

-The lowest court of the Union is the Military Court (The District Court) There are

94 district courts in the United States Each state has from 1 to 4 courts depending on the work more or less The total number of district judges in the Union is about 1,300, and each state has between 1 and 27 judges The district courts have jurisdiction to hear most litigation The judgment or decision of the district court may be subject to review by the litigant in the court of appeal If the decision of the appellate court is still unsatisfactory, the litigant has the right to appeal to the supreme court

There are also military courts in the Federal court system These courts do not operate regularly Usually, it is established to consider case by case, in the United States all Federal court judges are appointed by the President

2 Structure of the State Court System