Between Fact and Opinion: The Sui Generis Approach to Expert Witness Testimony in International Criminal Trials

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen Richmond ◽  
Sebastiano Antonio Piccolo
Keyword(s):  
International Criminal ◽  
Expert Witness ◽  
Witness Testimony ◽  
Criminal Trials ◽  
Expert Witness Testimony ◽  
International Criminal Trials

Between Fact and Opinion: The Sui Generis Approach to Expert Witness Testimony in International Criminal Trials

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-28
Author(s):  
Karen McGregor Richmond ◽  
Sebastiano Antonio Piccolo
Keyword(s):  
International Criminal ◽  
Expert Witness ◽  
Theoretical Perspective ◽  
Witness Testimony ◽  
Criminal Trials ◽  
Expert Witness Testimony ◽  
Open Court ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Law Of Evidence ◽  
International Criminal Trials

Abstract It is a fundamental tenet of the law of evidence, spanning all jurisdictions, that witness testimony should ideally be delivered in open court by the individual who observed the event in question, or by the expert whose technical knowledge is relied upon. A notable exception to this principle has emerged in the field of international criminal justice, where courts and tribunals may allow ‘summarising witnesses’ to present a summation of witness testimony. In the case of Ayyash et al., the Special Tribunal for Lebanon extended the principle, allowing voluminous expert opinion evidence to be presented in factual summation. This article analyses such approaches, utilising doctrinal methods alongside empirical Wigmorean analysis, to assess the probity of these sui generis practices. The results are placed in legal and theoretical perspective, demonstrating that international courts and tribunals are departing from an overarching obligation to integrate international and domestic standards in respect of expert testimony.

scholarly journals Sham of the Moral Court? Testimony Sold as the Spoils of War

2012 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Findlay ◽  
Sylvia Ngane
Keyword(s):  
International Criminal ◽  
Truth Telling ◽  
Witness Testimony ◽  
Criminal Trials ◽  
Judicial Decision Making ◽  
International Criminal Tribunals ◽  
Empirical Truth ◽  
Judicial Determinations ◽  
Truth Finding ◽  
International Criminal Trials

This paper analyses the critical influences on witness-based truth-telling for judicial decision-making in the international criminal tribunals. The judicial fixation on witness testimony reflects the weight and legitimacy given to personal testimony before international courts. This weight must be balanced by the awareness that a witness may provide false testimony intentionally, or may be coaxed by third parties to provide such testimony, as has been evidenced recently before the ICC. If witness testimony is tainted then its capacity to endorse the truth-finding function of the court is compromised. As a consequence the ability to assert that the tribunal is a ‘moral court’ based on empirical truth in such circumstances is jeopardized. The nexus between witness testimony, truth, the morality of judicial determinations, and the legitimacy this affords is explored in what follows. We question whether simple assertions that witness testimony, tested through adversarial examination, produces truth and resultant morality, are all they seem. The analysis also critiques the forensic reality of witness testimony before the international tribunals. Ultimately the paper suggests that while truthful testimony is crucial if international criminal trials are to produce legitimate judicial determinations, the naïve claim to a moral court as a consequence of tested witness testimony is problematic at least and unsustainable at best.

Witness Protection

2020 ◽  
pp. 381-390
Author(s):  
Nancy Amoury Combs
Keyword(s):  
Human Resources ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
Criminal Cases ◽  
Witness Testimony ◽  
Criminal Trials ◽  
International Criminal Tribunals ◽  
Tremendous Importance ◽  
International Criminal Trials

This chapter focuses on witness protection. Witness protection has long been a contentious and expensive component of domestic criminal trials, and it is an even more contentious and expensive component of international criminal trials of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. In many international criminal cases, the prosecution's case is based exclusively or almost exclusively on witness testimony. Thus, if witnesses are not willing to testify, then the prosecution's case will necessarily fail. Witnesses before international criminal tribunals are sometimes twice victimized, first by the trauma they lived through and second by dangers associated with participating in international trials. Given the tremendous importance of witnesses to international criminal cases and given the ease with which defendants can credibly threaten harm to those witnesses, one might assume that the international criminal tribunals do everything necessary to provide witnesses with whatever level of protection they need in order to assure their safety and thereby enable them to testify. The international criminal tribunals do spend vast sums—in both financial and human resources—to provide top-quality witness protection, but there are countervailing considerations in the form of fairness to defendants that place limits on the efforts they can and should undertake.

Regulating Physician Expert Witness Testimony

JAMA ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 299 (14) ◽  
pp. 1667 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dan Larriviere
Keyword(s):  
Expert Witness ◽  
Witness Testimony ◽  
Expert Witness Testimony

scholarly journals Trial and (Potential) Error: Conflicting Visions on Reparations Within the ICC System

2018 ◽  
Vol 29 (3) ◽  
pp. 221-248 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alina Balta ◽  
Manon Bax ◽  
Rianne Letschert
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Justice ◽  
International Criminal Court ◽  
Rome Statute ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Criminal Court ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
Court Decisions ◽  
Criminal Trials ◽  
Conflict Situations ◽  
International Criminal Trials

Twenty years ago, the International Criminal Court (hereinafter ICC or the Court) was established holding the aim of placing victims at the heart of international criminal justice proceedings and delivering justice to them through, among others, reparations. Article 75 of the Rome Statute lays out the reparations regime, and, in practice, court-ordered reparations are a means of delivering such justice. Focusing on Court decisions on reparations, our analysis takes stock of all developments before the ICC and attempts to highlight the mismatch between characteristics inherent to the objectives of international criminal trials such as providing accountability and punishment of the accused and delivering justice for victims of mass crimes—the so-called procedural challenges. We also submit that the Court is facing conceptual challenges, related to an apparent misunderstanding of the various concepts at stake: reparations as such and the various modalities and channels of enforcing them. We conclude that although the ICC’s reparation regime may not be the best reparative response to provide justice to victims in conflict situations affected by mass victimization, we suggest that improving the ICC’s approach includes, at a minimum, tackling these challenges.

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