How the legal system responds to Abuse

The legal system can be confusing and frightening to children and families. Part of this confusion stems from the fact that two different ‘legal systems’ can be working on the same case at the same time. These two systems are the ‘criminal’ and the ‘civil’ system. In addition, there are two different court systems that can work on a child abuse case, Criminal court and Civil court. Both courts can work on the case at the same time but have different purposes.

The Criminal court is concerned primarily with guilt or innocence of the accused and often uses a trial to decide on the suspect’s guilt or innocence. The criminal trial focuses on issues such as:

~ Is there evidence to prove the child was abused?
~ What illegal acts occurred?
~ Was there a confession?
~ If proven guilty, what punishment should the offender receive?

The civil court is concerned primarily with the safety of the child and focuses on issues such as custody, supervised visitation and counseling. A number of different court hearings can be help to decide these issues. The decisions in the civil system do not depend on whether the criminal system finds guilt or not.