A Redacted America: Critiquing the Lack of Transparency at Guantanamo Bay

The willingness to undermine liberal standards of justice and imprisonment has been a major criticism of the detention camp at Guantánamo Bay. The camp’s propensity to evade judicial mechanisms offered on American soil is particularly due to its deliberate opacity. This paper begins with a brief overview of the major arguments in favour of the closure of the facility and the challenges that have prohibited the closure thus far, based on a review of debates and commentary found in investigative reports, legal documents, and scholarly analyses. A substantive portion of this piece will highlight three demonstrable areas where transparency is being detrimentally avoided in the conduct of the Guantánamo Bay detention camp: press access, health care, and the detainee defense counsel. A critique of increasing transparency as a possible impetus to keep the facility open will close the discussion. Ultimately, the transgressions of Guantánamo are so detrimental to American self-conception of liberal values that a correction of the facility’s opacity should be but an intermediary step to closing the facility entirely.

Prosecutorial Use of Victim Video Statements in Domestic Violence Cases

Prosecuting agencies frequently dismiss domestic violence cases due to lack of adequate evidence and limited victim participation in the case. Evidence-based prosecution asserts high quality evidence can enhance prosecutorial decision-making and reduce the reliance on victims. Video-recorded victim statements offer a potential improvement to evidence quality by capturing additional visual and factual information for prosecutors to determine applicable charges. This qualitative study examines data from six prosecution agencies in a southwestern state to understand how they use video-recorded victim statements to inform their decision-making. Findings provide preliminary evidence on the strength of video-recorded statements in offering more information on the victim, crime, and scene; strengthening negotiations with defense counsel; enhancing case strategies; and improving victim engagement. Implications for continued research and practice are discussed.

Realization of the Purpose of Criminal Proceedings by the Investigator and by the Defense Counsel: Opposition or Interaction?

The author discusses relationships between the prosecution and the defense during the preliminary investigation of a criminal case. Based on the analysis of contemporary Russian criminal procedure legislation and the links between the criminal procedure theory and criminalistics, the author concludes that it is necessary to single out the following forms of relationships between the defense counsel and the investigator: cooperation and counteraction to the investigation. The author, taking into account existing theoretical views, differentiates between these two concepts using the criterion of the legality of the actions of the sides. Correspondingly, it is suggested that cooperation is the activity of the sides carried out within the framework of the criminal procedure legislation and aimed at the realization of the purpose of criminal court proceedings as stated in Art. 6 of the Code of Criminal Proceedings of the Russian Federation. Using this as a basis, the author attempts to outline the procedural types of such interaction depending on the manner in which the defense counsel participates in proofing a criminal case. Firstly, there is a situation in which evidence is collected directly by the defense council. The author believes that in this case the investigator checks the evidence acting as an independent auditing body in the legal relationships and does not perform the function of the prosecution. Secondly, there is a procedural form of interaction when the defense counsel participates in the collection of evidence carried out by the side of the prosecution.

Documentary confirmation of the legal status of a lawyer as a necessary condition for realization the right to request

This research is devoted to the disclosure of problematic issues related to the practical implementation of one of the basic professional rights of a lawyer, which is an integral attribute of all advocacy, namely the right to request a lawyer.In the framework of this article a theoretical and applied study of different approaches of scientists, as well as the position of the legislator on the need for documentary proof of his status in order to exercise his legal right to request, as well as analyzes the requirements for the form and content of lawyers’ inquiries and possible ways. sending. The position is argued, according to which it is expedient to enshrine at the legislative level a provision according to which it is not necessary to confirm the request with documents certifying the lawyer’s authority, taking into account the need to comply with the requirement of legal secrecy. which does not depend on the acquisition of the status of a defense counsel or a representative lawyer.To achieve this goal, the authors used methods specific to legal science. The study was conducted using a dia-lectical method of cognition of legal reality, which provided an opportunity to analyze the essence of the right of a lawyer to request, while the use of system-structural method provided an opportunity to determine the general structure of work, which contributed to the proper disclosure of practical obstacles. rights.Based on the study, the authors conclude that the lawyer’s request should contain data confirming the connec-tion of the requested documents (information) or their copies with the provision of legal assistance, and the lawyer should not forget that for abuse of this right can be applied disciplinary liability.

Joining a Criminal Case by a Defense Counsel in the Course of Pre-Trial Investigation

This article discusses the problems of a lawyer’s entry into a criminal case during the preliminary investigation, emphasizes the need for the officials of the preliminary investigation bodies to ensure the timely entry of a lawyer into a criminal case, substantiates the important role of a lawyer’s participation in the legality and legality of investigative and other procedural actions committed against the client, investigates the question of the need for the participation of a lawyer from the moment of the actual detention of a person subjected to criminal prosecution.

Separate Grounds for the Obligatory Involvement of a Defense Counsel in a Criminal Case as a Procedural Safeguard

Despite the desire of the domestic legislator to get away from the elements of the accusatory bias in criminal proceedings, at the pre-trial stages the rights and possibilities of the prosecution are much wider than the defense. That is why the participation of the defense attorney in the pre-trial stages of the criminal proceedings is becoming more relevant and serves as a procedural guarantee both to ensure the adversarial process of the parties and to ensure the suspect (accused) the right to defense. The grounds for the mandatory participation of a defense counsel may also arise in judicial stages, where the principle of adversarial process of the parties should be ensured by providing equal procedural opportunities to the parties. The normative consolidation of the grounds for the mandatory participation of a defender is not entirely flawless, in connection with which, the author considers some of them through the prism of providing appropriate procedural guarantees to the person against whom criminal prosecution is carried out. As a result of the study of the grounds specified in paragraph 3.1, 5–8 part 1 of Art. 51 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, the author came to the conclusion that it is necessary to ensure the mandatory participation of counsel in pre-trial proceedings, as well as in the absence of the accused (defendant) in court proceedings.

Judgments in criminal proceedings in judicial practice of the Republic of Serbia

This paper analyzes court judgments rendered in criminal proceedings in the Republic of Serbia in the last 5 years, as well as the relationship of state bodies, primarily courts, and public prosecutor's offices to the most important legal principles and legal institutes of criminal law that have a decisive influence on proceedings. Courts in criminal proceedings, as well as the criminal policy of the courts. The emphasis is on the presentation of the inequality of procedural position of procedural parties in criminal proceedings (defendant in relation to the public prosecutor) with which the defense (defendants and their defense counsel) encounters on a daily basis in practice, as well as on specific reasons that significantly affect significant measures by the acting courts continue to be favored by the public prosecutor to the detriment of the defense -the defendants and their defense counsel. Specific reasons and explanations are presented, as well as some examples from court practice, due to which the number (percentage) of acquittals in our judicial system is very small in relation to the number of convictions.