Chapter 4: The Court System

The Court System

Now that we have spelled out the di0erences between criminal law and civil law, we need to ad-
dress the topic of the court system. Although we could spend some time talking about the histori-
cal roots of the American court system in the tribal communities of the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes
in England, that would be pretty boring. Instead, let's talk about our court system as it exists
today.

Those Wacky States

One mistake that all new legal professionals make is to assume that all state court systems are
organized in more or less the same way. They aren't. The di0erences from state to state are vast.
An attorney who is licensed in one state cannot practice in another state until he or she has been
admitted to that bar. For medical professionals, this might seem a bit bizarre, but there is no na-
tional standard for legal practice. There are so many di0erences from state to state—in court or-
ganization, legal systems, statutes, and case law—that most attorneys never leave the state in
which they were originally licensed.

These di0erences are important to you because—if you later relocate to another state—the legal
system there will be di0erent from the one you learned. You should also keep in mind that our
discussion here is general, not speciJc. There is no way to summarize the di0erences among the
51 (the 50 states plus the federal government) di0erent legal systems in the United States.

The Court System Hierarchy

No matter what state you are in, the state's court system is organized as a hierarchy. At the bot-
tom of the pyramid are the trial courts. The trial courts answer to the state Court of Appeals,
which in turn answers to the State Supreme Court. All state Supreme Courts answer to the U.S.
Supreme Court, which doesn't answer to anyone. The organization of the court systems in the
United States is based on a straightforward premise: The actions of one court can be reviewed
(and changed) by another, higher court.

Let's start at the bottom and work our way up.

Trial courts

The trial court is the court that most of us think of when someone refers to the
court. I mentioned Sam Waterston and his role on Law & Order earlier. When
you see him questioning witnesses and giving powerful, and admirably brief,
closing arguments to the jury, he is in a trial court. This is the court where wit-
nesses testify, where juries are impaneled, and where the drama of a trial is played out. It's where
the action is, and it can be a very exciting place to be.

State Court of Appeals

When a party loses in a trial court, he or she has the right to appeal to an appellate court. Most
people have never seen an appellate court and wouldn't want to if they knew what went on there.
Trial courts can be exhilarating and exciting; appellate courts are dull and boring.

All states have appellate courts, although they aren't always called the state Court of Appeals.
When a party loses at a trial, he or she can bring an appeal to the state Court of Appeals and ask
that court to overturn the trial court decision. Unlike trial court, where witnesses testify and juries
hear impassioned arguments, appellate courts are quiet, uneventful places.

Appellate courts do not hear testimony. No one ever testiJes before an appel-
late court. These courts do not consider new evidence. Instead, they review
the transcript of the original trial and read briefs submitted by the parties.
That's it. When you hear someone who's just lost a trial saying that he's going
to get a new trial from the appellate courts, he doesn't know what he's talking about. If the appel-
late court decides that something improper happened during the trial, the court will send the case
back and tell the lower court to do it over.

State Supreme Court

When a person loses his appeal before the state Court of Appeals (or whatever name it's called in
your state), that person can try to appeal to the next higher court. In most states, that court is
called the state Supreme Court.

The state Supreme Court functions exactly like the state Court of Appeals. It hears cases from the
lower court and decides their merits. It has the power to change the state Court of Appeals' deci-
sion or leave it as it is. If the whole process sounds pretty dull, it is.

U.S. Supreme Court

A person who loses in the state Supreme Court can appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, but very
few cases ever get that high. We'll explain why in a future lesson.

Why do you—as a legal nurse consultant—need to know and understand the di0erences among
these various courts? Because your income will derive almost exclusively from trial work. Very few
Jrms who specialize in appellate work ever contract with legal nurse consultants. If you see an ad
for a Jrm that handles appellate work, don't bother sending them a résumé. They don't need any
medical evidence; they must rely solely on the evidence that came out at trial.