The Trial on Trial: Volume 1: Truth and Due Process

Description

The trial is central to the institutional framework of criminal justice. It provides the procedural link between crime and punishment, and is the forum in which both guilt and innocence and sentence are determined. Its continuing significance is evidenced by the heated responses drawn by recent government proposals to reform rules of criminal procedure and evidence so as to alter the status of the trial within the criminal justice process and to limit the role of the jury. Yet for all of the attachment to trial by jury and to principles safeguarding the right to a fair trial there has been remarkably little theoretical reflection on the meaning of fairness in the trial and criminal procedure, the relationship between rules of evidence, procedure and substantive law, or the functions and normative foundations of the trial process. There is a need, in other words, to develop a normative understanding of the criminal trial. The book is based on the proceedings of two workshops which took place in 2003, addressing the theme of Truth and Due Process in the Criminal Trial. The essays in the book are concerned with the question of whether, and in what sense, we can take the discovery of truth to be the central aim of the procedural and evidential rules and practices of criminal investigation and trial. They are divided into four parts addressing distinct but inter-related issues: models of the trial (Duff, Matravers, McEwan); the meaning of due process (Gunther, Dubber); the meaning of truth and the nature of evidence (Jung, Pritchard); and legitimacy and rhetoric in the trial (Burns, Christodoulidis).

Antony Duff is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Stirling. Lindsay Farmer is Professor of Law at the University of Glasgow. Sandra Marshall is Professor of Philosophy in the University of Stirling. Victor Tadros is a Professor of Law at the University of Warwick.

...thought-provoking essays...This project can influence research into various criminal processes as well as European Court of Human Rights jurisprudence...a substantial contribution to a valuable project. A theory of the criminal trial has the potential of guiding theoretical work on various aspects of the criminal justice process, and the editors should be appreciated for initiating it. -- Marny Requa * British Journal of Criminology. Vol 46, No 5 * ...analysis is sharp and comprehensive. -- Robin Johnston * The Journal of the Law Society of Scotland * This is a stimulating and diverse collection which deserves to be read widely. -- Jacqueline Hodgson * International Journal of Evidence and Proof, Vol 11/1 * ...the project's bringing together of lawyers and philosophers from adversarial and inquisitorial jurisdictions is an especially promising start to ground a normative theory of the criminal trial on interdisciplinary work. -- Sabine Gless * Criminal Law Forum, 16 *