Week 9: Things are Starting to Wrap Up!

Welcome to the final weeks of my senior project! I continued what I stated last week about ramping up the pace of my research. This week however was used to begin the last section of my paper, the conclusion and analysis.

Over the past couple weeks, if you’ve been following along, I sectioned my paper into four parts with this conclusion being the last. However the middle two sections were based on research I did directly in the form of ten example cases and work on a live case. Here are some highlights with a more in depth analysis in my paper.

For the ten example cases I researched a broader understanding of how prevalent plea deals are in the system. However, what I couldn’t account for was the amount of cases ended up being dismissed by the prosecution without a plea or trial. Initially I viewed this a wedge in my paper screwing everything up, but over the past couple weeks I realized that this is just how the system works and by highlighting this aspect I’m able to give an even broader but still more in depth explanation of plea deals and the criminal justice system as a whole.

For the live case I researched how a plea agreement was agreed to and come into fruition. Unfortunately the case will still be ongoing after the senior project ends but the beginnings of the agreement will be written into my conclusion and paper.

Overall this conclusion is designed to sum up my work and bring it into a broader context. However, at the time of writing I am reflecting just how much the reality of my paper has changed and stayed the same from my vision. While aspects are now different I am thankful that I have this opportunity to teach a community about the ins and outs of the criminal justice system.

Come back next week for some final updates!