International and Comparative Legal Perspectives on Victim Participation in Criminal Justice

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marie Manikis
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Legal Process ◽  
Legal Traditions ◽  
Criminal Justice Systems ◽  
Justice Process ◽  
Criminal Justice Process ◽  
The Common ◽  
Victim Participation ◽  
Historical Developments

Victim participation in common law has evolved across history and jurisdictions. Historical developments within conceptions of crime, harms, and victims in common law as well as the different victims’ movements provide an understanding of the ways that victim participation has been shaped in more-recent common law criminal justice systems. Victim participation in the criminal legal process has also given rise to various debates, which suggests that providing active forms of engagement to victims remains controversial. The forms of victim participation are also diverse, and the literature has provided typologies of victim participation. Forms of participation also vary across jurisdictions and the different stages of the criminal justice process, including prosecutorial decisions, pretrial and trial proceedings, sentencing, parole, and clemency. Finally, research that focuses on victim participation in legal traditions beyond the common law would provide an additional and important contribution to the field.

Investigating Impropriety in Jury Deliberations: A Recipe for Disaster?

2004 ◽  
Vol 68 (5) ◽  
pp. 411-422
Author(s):  
Nicola Haralambous
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Recent Case ◽  
Moral Integrity ◽  
Jury Deliberations ◽  
Justice Process ◽  
Criminal Justice Process ◽  
The Common

In light of recent case law, this article explores the principles underlying the common law prohibition against investigating into jury deliberations. It considers the effect of judicial refusal to inquire into genuine and serious allegations of impropriety in the jury room and examines the effect of the Contempt of Court Act 1981, s. 8. It proposes that the restrictive secrecy laws be qualified in order to safeguard against miscarriages of justice and to preserve the moral integrity of the criminal justice process.

Passing the Threshold of One Justice System to the Next: Challenges of Emerging Young Adults in Hong Kong’s Adult Criminal Justice Process

2017 ◽  
Vol 62 (9) ◽  
pp. 2650-2668 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin Kwok-yin Cheng ◽  
Becky Po-Yee Leung
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Young Adult ◽  
Future Directions ◽  
Legal Decisions ◽  
Criminal Justice Systems ◽  
Semistructured Interviews ◽  
Justice Process ◽  
Criminal Justice Process ◽  
The Life Course ◽  
Distinct Period

In many criminal justice systems, there is a clear separation for juvenile and adult defendants. However, those in between, referred to as emerging young adult defendants (ages 18-25 years), are treated as adult defendants despite a growing recognition that emerging adulthood is a distinct period in the life course. The aim of this present study is to investigate the experiences and challenges faced by emerging young adult defendants ( N = 25) in Hong Kong’s adult criminal justice process. Through in-depth semistructured interviews, it was found that emerging young adult defendants demonstrated a lack of understanding regarding their rights and the legal procedures, faced stress in being caught up in the criminal justice process, and were susceptible to influence by others, particularly family members, in making legal decisions. Implications and future directions of study are discussed.

Navigating through the effects of ‘Cracked Trials’

2018 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 136-149
Author(s):  
Kevin Kwok-yin Cheng
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Adverse Effects ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Criminal Procedure ◽  
England And Wales ◽  
Sliding Scale ◽  
Justice Process ◽  
Criminal Justice Process

‘Cracked trials’ have been identified as a major problem in the criminal justice process, causing wastage of resources and time for all parties involved. The sliding scale of sentence discounts was implemented in England and Wales to tackle the problem of ‘cracked trials’ through providing the greatest amount of sentence reduction for earlier guilty pleas and thereby discouraging defendants from entering late guilty pleas. The sliding scale has been recently implemented or is being considered by other common law jurisdictions. This article examines how legal practitioners in Hong Kong have navigated around the adverse effects of cracked trials prior to the implementation of the sliding scale and argues how the sliding scale of sentence discounts is problematic. The findings offer insights regarding strategies and reforms on other aspects of the criminal procedure in responding to late guilty pleas.

scholarly journals Victims of crime: culture, politics and criminal process in the twenty-first century

2017 ◽  
Vol 68 (4) ◽  
pp. 469-90
Author(s):  
Matthew Hall
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
First Century ◽  
The Political ◽  
Criminal Justice Systems ◽  
Justice Process ◽  
Criminal Justice Process ◽  
Victims Of Crime ◽  
Areas Of Concern ◽  
The One ◽  
Cultural Turn

This paper sets out to marry three areas of concern to modern victimology. In the first instance the paper will explore the ‘cultural turn’ taken in our understandings of what it means to be a victim of crime in thetwenty-first century. McGarry and Walklate (2015) characterise such ‘cultural victimology’ as comprising a wider sharing and reflection of individual and collective victimisation experiences, on the one hand, and,on the other, the mapping of those experiences through the criminal justice process. This paper will explore the interaction between such cultural understandings of victimhood and the political and policy forces which,since at least the late 1990s, have pledged to ‘rebalance’ the criminal justice systems of England and Wales and other jurisdictions to put victims ‘at the heart’ of those processes.

scholarly journals Fear or failure: Why victims of domestic violence retract from the criminal justice process

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lillian Artz
Keyword(s):  
Domestic Violence ◽  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Research Unit ◽  
Western Cape ◽  
Legal Process ◽  
Protection Orders ◽  
Domestic Violence Victims ◽  
Justice Process ◽  
Criminal Justice Process ◽  
Second Tier

In 2008/9 MOSAIC,with the assistance of the Gender, Health & Justice Research Unit (UCT), embarked on research that sought to identify the factors that contribute to domestic violence victims withdrawing from the legal process before they finalise protection orders (POs) applied for under the Domestic Violence Act (DVA). This study was based on the 2008 work of this author who, in partnership with MOSAIC, interviewed 365 domestic violence victims in the Western Cape about their engagement with and retraction from the criminal justice process.The second tier of this project – reported on here – emerged with more focused interview schedules and the addition of eight jurisdictions from which the sample was drawn. The findings from this study were extensive and pointed to a range of personal, systemic and structural reasons why Domestic Violence Act [DVA] applicants disengage from the criminal justice process. This article will limit its focus on three areas that are relevant to the decision by survivors to withdraw their applications for protection orders: the history and severity of violence, deadly threats, and key findings relating specifically to experiences of DVA applicants with the courts.

scholarly journals A powerful toof of justice: Paralegals and the provision of affordable and accessible legal services

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Schönteich
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Legal Services ◽  
Legal Aid ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Medical Supplies ◽  
Criminal Justice Systems ◽  
The Family ◽  
Justice Process ◽  
Criminal Justice Process ◽  
Valuable Role

In many parts of Africa, a quiet revolution is transforming the delivery of legal assistance to pre-trial detainees and accused persons. Too poor to afford the services of a lawyer, and unable to rely on inadequate – or nonexistent – state-funded legal aid systems, many Africans are at the mercy of often oppressive and corrupt criminal justice systems. This is beginning to change as paralegals – who are less expensive and more accessible than lawyers – are empowering the poor and marginalised in their interactions with police, prosecutors, and the courts. In almost two dozen countries across Africa, paralegals are providing a critical service, particularly in the early stages of the criminal justice process. They provide primary legal aid services that often no one else is providing, which in turn results in the elimination of unnecessary pre-trial detention, the speedy processing of cases, diversion of young offenders, and reduction of case backlogs. Some paralegal services also provide food and medical supplies to people in detention. They may also be present at police stations in order to deter ill-treatment and forced confessions. Paralegals play a valuable role in reducing prison overcrowding by locating the family members of pre-trial detainees and facilitating bail hearings. This article gives an overview of paralegal services in a number of African countries, and shows how these services are assisting thousands of pretrial detainees and accused persons to access justice in environments where legal services are scarce or non-existent.

scholarly journals Taking trauma seriously

2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 183-208 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise Ellison ◽  
Vanessa E Munro
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Criminal Process ◽  
England And Wales ◽  
Current Trial ◽  
Trauma Informed ◽  
Justice Process ◽  
Criminal Justice Process ◽  
Victims Of Crime ◽  
Victim Participation ◽  
The Government

Over the last two decades successive governments in England and Wales have stated a commitment to placing victims of crime at the heart of the criminal justice agenda. A raft of polices and reforming measures have been introduced with the declared aim of improving the experience and treatment of victims within the criminal process. Despite these developments, the government has recently conceded that the criminal justice process has continued to fall short—whether in relation to helping victims to recover in the aftermath of a crime or supporting them through the stresses of investigation and trial. In this article we argue that applying a trauma-informed lens to evaluate victim-centred initiatives helps to explain the failure of victim policy in England and Wales to fully deliver on its promise. We highlight the barriers that experiences of trauma can present to effective victim participation and the extent to which current trial processes are often liable to exacerbate rather than ameliorate trauma amongst a broad constituency of victims.

Accusation, defence and morality in Japanese trials: A Hybrid Orientation to Criminal Justice

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ikuko Nakane ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Justice System ◽  
Common Law ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Legal Process ◽  
Historical Perspectives ◽  
Communicative Practice ◽  
Discourse Strategies ◽  
Justice Process

The Japanese criminal justice system has gone through transformations in its modern history, adopting the models of European Continental Law systems in the 19th century as part of Japan’s modernisation process, and then the Anglo-American Common Law orientation after WWII. More recently, citizen judges have been introduced to the criminal justice process, a further move towards an adversarial orientation with increased focus on orality and courtroom discourse strategies. Yet, the actual legal process does not necessarily represent the adversarial orientation found in Common Law jurisdictions. While previous research from cultural and socio-historical perspectives has offered valuable insights into the Japanese criminal court procedures, there is hardly any research examining how adversarial (or non-adversarial) orientation is realised through language in Japanese trials. Drawing on an ethnographic study of communication in Japanese trials, this paper discusses a ‘hybrid’ orientation to the legal process realised through courtroom discourse. Based on courtroom observation notes, interaction data, lawyer interviews and other relevant materials collected in Japan, trial participants’ discourse strategies contributing to both adversarial and inquisitorial orientations are identified. In particular, the paper highlights how accusation, defence and morality are performed and interwoven in the trial as a genre. The overall genre structure scaffolds competing narratives, with prosecution and defence counsel utilising a range of discourse strategies for highlighting culpability and mitigating factors. However, the communicative practice at the micro genre level shows an orientation to finding the ‘truth,’ rehabilitation of offenders and maintaining social order. The analysis of courtroom communication, contextualised in the socio-historical development of the Japanese justice system and in the ideologies about courtroom communicative practice, suggests a gap between the practice and official/public discourses of the justice process in Japan. At the same time, the findings raise some questions regarding the powerful role that language plays in different ways in varying approaches to delivery of justice.

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