Stages of Civil and Criminal Proceedings
1. List and briefly explain each of the major stages of a civil proceeding, including starting the case and pretrial, trial, and post-trial activities. A civil case starts out with pleadings. A lawyer files paperwork with the clerk of courts for his/ her client. This paperwork states that the client was injured in some way, either by the person or the unlawful act that was committed. After the pleadings the case then goes to the pretrial conferences. A judge and the 2 lawyers will sit and discuss what is relevant and what is not for the trial. At this conference both lawyers must state whom they will call for witnesses and what evidence they intend on presenting. …show more content…
The judge gives the jury instructions on what questions they must consider relevant, he also explains the relevant law and how it is tied to the case. The jury is now sent to the jury room to carefully consider all the evidence and reach a verdict. The jury must come up with a unanimous verdict. When the verdict is read the judge then decides (depending on who wins the case) what the amount of the judgment will be. This is the amount of money the plaintiff will receive from the defendant.
If the losing party chooses to take this one step further they have to right to appeal the case. This involves taking this case to the court of appeals; there the court will decide if the case was handled properly.

2. List and briefly explain each of the major stages of a criminal proceeding, including starting the case and pretrial, trial, and post-trial activities. The criminal proceedings start off with an indictment or a formal accusation of a person that committed a crime. The formal accusation is usually issued by a U.S. attorney or assistant U.S. attorney. The attorney then takes the evidence to the federal grand jury. The attorney needs to present its evidence to the jury to convince them that the person probably committed the crime and needs to be charged for it formally. When the grand jury issues the indictment the person that committed the crime needs to appear in court before a judge. This step would be called the arraignment. The person