The status of a witness in Czech and French criminal procedure - comparison The subject of my thesis is a comparison of the status of a witness in a Czech and French criminal procedure. I have chosen this theme because I'm interested in criminal law and I also pursue studying French law. During this activity I found an institute of assisted witness which is completely unique and unknown in a Czech legal environment. This thesis is divided into three parts, at first I focus on the status of a witness in Czech legislation, the second part contains a French regulation and the third is a comparison of those two. The first thing in a first part is a determination who the witness is and who can be a witness in a criminal procedure. Then I concern with rights and duties which the witness owns and must fulfil during the proceedings. Next chapter deals with a course of an examination of the witness and with questions connected with an examination, e.g. tactics of examination. In the next chapter there is possible to find out specifics of a situation when the witness is a minor. Next important aspect is also a protection of a witness who is jeopardized because of a provision of a testimony. We can also find out conditions and methods of providing the protection. I affiliated two particular chapters in...

This study investigates the interface between science and law with reference to models of science described by members of New Zealand's Environment Court. The aim of the research is to identify differences and consistencies between the members of the Court in the way that they articulate their understanding of science and of scientific evidence. This research also aims to locate those individual models of science within a wider philosophical discourse concerning the nature of science. The research adopts a qualitative and interpretive approach that focuses on understanding the detail of contextual interactions arising from interviews with eight Environment Judges and 13 Commissioners. The interview group comprised all of the judges of the Court during the research period (1999 - 2000) and all but one permanent Commissioner. The analysis of interviews show a wide range of views concerning the scope and nature of science. Criteria significant to each individual's model of science have been identified as a series of micro themes. Those micro themes differ between individuals as to the combinations of criteria significant when locating the boundary between science and non-science. The analysis of interviews also identifies three macro themes that describe whether and how individuals differentiate science, technology and expertise. That analysis identifies a group of interviewees, comprising both judges and commissioners, that equates science with expertise without distinction as to any knowledge component or process considerations. The analysis of interview responses adopts a boundary-work approach that identifies how individuals locate the boundary between science and non-science through their articulation of the micro themes significant to their model of science. The study contributes to the discourse concerning the relationship of science and law within modern society. That discourse commonly addresses the appropriate legal framework to assess questions involving scientific expertise and invariably describes the legal process and the role of expert and decision maker within that process. However, that discourse rarely articulates the meaning of the terms science, scientist, or technology, assuming that science is a self-evident concept, its meaning having universal application and acceptance. This research challenges that approach and identifies wide differences in the models of science held by individual decision makers and differences in their expectations of evidence from expert witnesses. Aside from the implications of the research results for the discourse concerning the relationship of science and law, this research also has practical implications for the evaluation of expert scientific evidence within an adversarial system of law, and for expert evidence before the Environment Court. Suggestions to improve communication both within the Court and between the Court and parties appearing before it are made with a view to identifying consistent and fair expectations of experts and their evidence.

abstract: Approaches to Holocaust representation often take their cues from both academic and public discourse. General opinion demands serious engagement that depicts the full range of the brutality and inhumanity of the genocide and the victimization of targeted groups perpetrated by the National Socialists. Such a treatment is considered necessary to adequately represent the Holocaust for generations to come. The analysis of four texts will show that humor is not only appropriate but is also an important addition to Holocaust discourse. This study argues that humor plays an important role as a stylistic tool for discussing the Holocaust as well as for its remembrance and representation. Jurek Becker's novel Jakob der Lügner and Ruth Klüger's autobiography Weiter Leben: Eine Jugend are witness-texts by Jewish authors. Humor in these two works helps the authors engage and work their experiences. Klüger's autobiography also utilizes humor to critically engage in the discussion of Holocaust representation. This study also analyzes two non-witness Jewish texts: the stage play Mein Kampf by George Tabori and the feature film Mein Führer, die wirklich wahrste Wahrheit über Adolf Hitler by Dani Levy. These two works utilize overt humor to challenge established Holocaust representations. Drawing on ideas from Mikhail M. Bakhtin, Julia Kristeva, Giorgio Agamben, the core argument of this study demonstrates humor performs two main functions in the Holocaust literature and film chosen for this investigation. First, it restores a potential loss of dignity and helps victims endure the incomprehensible. Second, it challenges the prevailing truth and the established order. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.A. German 2013

No description available.

no abstract available / Practical Theology / (M.Th.(Pastoral Therapy)

During the late 19th Century there was considerable debate in the United States among members of the legal profession, the general public and even some scientists about the validity of using tree rings to determine tree age. In an earlier boundary dispute case in Maryland (1830) the Honorable Theodorick Bland rejected the use of tree rings to establish the date when a purported witness tree was marked with an identifying blaze. Bland did not believe that there was enough scientific evidence or legal precedent to support this idea. A review of the current scientific literature of the time, however, indicates that most scientists, especially in Europe, accepted that tree rings could be used to determine age. In the United States, however, this idea was debated, particularly in the late 19th Century, in both the popular press and scientific publications. The main argument of opponents such as A. L. Child was that the number of tree rings was often wildly in excess of the known age of the tree. These inconsistencies were likely because of the inexperience of the observer, mistaking earlywood and latewood for separate rings, and the presence of a small number of false rings, sometimes called secondary rings. The great ages reported for the giant sequoias may have also raised doubts among the public. Among scientists, however, the relationship between ring number and tree age and between ring width and climate became widely accepted. Several cases heard in both Federal and State Courts as well as Bernhard E. Fernow’s Age of Trees and Time of Blazing Determined by Annual Rings laid to rest any doubt of the relationship between tree rings and age in temperate forests, i.e. one ring equals one year’s growth, and showed that the date when a witness tree was blazed could be easily determined from a cross-section of the trunk.

The sexual abuse of children is becoming an increased tendency in South Africa. Sexual abuse of children is therefore one of the most difficult issues to prove in a court of law because there are usually only two witnesses: the child and the alleged offender. The child’s testimony is the most important and most often the only evidence of a crime that has been committed. The overwhelming result of sexual abuse in children is the experience of loss and powerlessness. The judicial process can aggravate the child’s feeling of loss and helplessness or be part of the healing process by empowering his/her self-esteem. The trial allows the child the opportunity to experience that justice had been served, but this can only happen when the child has been supported during the court procedure and treated with respect and dignity. Public prosecutors are the people who represent the complainant’s case in court on behalf of the State. It is therefor of utmost importance that public prosecutors and magistrates dispose of the necessary knowledge of the child as witness in court to ensure that the course of the legal process is in the best interest of the child. The foundings of this study proved that the knowledge base of public prosecutors and magistrates inadequate is in many ways. Recommendations were made in anticipation of an improved knowledge base for public prosecutors and magistrates. / Thesis (M.A. (MW))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2012

O desenvolvimento tecnológico que se apresenta no dia-a-dia, mediante o aprimoramento de aparelhos domésticos, de videogames, de celulares, de computadores, de televisores, etc. é da mesma forma, porém paulatinamente, inserido no judiciário. Hoje é possível, por meio da videoconferência, percorrer centenas de quilômetros sem se deslocar, fazendo com que a distancia entre juízes e testemunhas ou réus seja limitada à distancia entre esses sujeitos e o aparelho de vídeo e televisão instalado em penitenciárias e fóruns. Outrossim, prestigia-se a dignidade da pessoa humana ao evitar a revitimização de crianças e adolescentes vítimas ou testemunhas de violência, diferenciando-as, nos termos do preconizado pela Constituição Federal, dos adultos, no decorrer do processo judicial. Por outro lado, o desenvolvimento alcança também as organizações criminosas, fazendo com que essas se tornem cada vez mais ameaçadoras à segurança pública, dificultando a produção de provas em seu desfavor, pelo que alguns Tribunais passaram a aceitar, de forma ainda polêmica, a produção de provas por meio de testemunha indireta e de testemunha anônima. Com todas essas transformações afetando diretamente o judiciário, e face ao surgimento de novas formas de se produzir provas consolidadas no direito, como é o caso da prova testemunhal, surge a necessidade de se fazer uma análise da admissibilidade desses novos meios de produção probatória. A análise de admissibilidade é feita inicialmente por meio de um estudo da tipicidade e dos elementos típicos da prova testemunhal como concebida no Código de Processo Penal atual. Após estabelecido o parâmetro, analisa-se os termos em que vêm sendo produzidas as novas formas de produção de prova testemunhal. Se essas estiverem de acordo com os elementos típicos da prova testemunhal, devem ser aceitas no ordenamento brasileiro como prova testemunhal típica. Se, por outro lado, os novos meios de produção probatória derivados da prova testemunhal mostrarem-se em desacordo com os elementos típicos da prova testemunhal, não poderão ser aceitos no ordenamento, exceto se não representarem prejuízo às partes. / The technological development that is presented in day-to-day, by upgrading household appliances, video games, cell phones, computers, televisions, etc. is in the same way, but gradually, inserted in the judiciary. Today it is possible, through video conferencing, travel hundreds of miles without moving, making the distance between judges and witnesses or defendants is limited to the distance between these subjects and the videocamera and television set in prisons and forums. Furthermore, honors the dignity of the human person to avoid revictimization of child victims or witnesses of violence , differentiating them, as recommended by the Federal Constitution, of the adults, in the course of judicial proceedings. Moreover, the development also reaches criminal organizations, making these become an increasingly threat to public security , dificulting the production of evidence in their disfavor, that´s why some courts have come to accept, in a still polemic form, the production of evidence through indirect and anonymous witness testimony. With all these changes directly affecting the judiciary, and with the emergence of new ways to produce consolidated evidence, as is the case of testimonial evidence, there is a need to do an analysis of the admissibility of these new means of evidentiary production. The analysis of admissibility is initially done through a study of typicality and typical elements of testimonial evidence as conceived in the current Code of Criminal Procedure. After the parameter is set, starts the analyze of the terms that are being produced the new forms of production of testimonial evidence. If these are in agreement with the typical elements of testimonial evidence, they should be accepted in the Brazilian system as typical witnesses. If, on the other hand, the new means of production derived from testimony show themselves against the typical elements of testimony, these can´t be accepted in the order, except if they do not represent harm to the parties.

The aim of this research was to explore the lived experience of educational psychologists (EPs) working as expert witnesses in the family court and to capture some of their tacit knowledge. The research was conducted during a 'perfect storm' of reforms in family justice, austerity measures and following the publication of 'The Ireland Report' (Ireland, 2012) which was highly critical of the quality of psychological reports prepared for the family courts and captured the attention of the national media at a time when several high profile cases involving expert witness malpractice were also under scrutiny. Adopting Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) as the methodology, two EP expert witnesses were interviewed using in-depth conversations based around two semi-structured interview prompts. Interview transcripts were then analysed using IPA, firstly within individual interviews and cases and then across interviews and cases. Superordinate themes emerged as five main focus points: 1) The role of being an EP and an expert witness, 2) Maintaining a phenomenological attitude, 3) Personal and professional identity, 4) The context of court and 5) The experience of the interview. Findings indicate that the widely accepted Fallon, Woods and Rooney (2010) definition of who EPs are and what EPs do also holds in the context of the family court, with the scientist-practitioner identity being further illuminated in this milieu, especially with regard to formulation, maintaining a phenomenological attitude and reflexivity.

This dissertation examines the discourses of witnesses in their response to the exigence of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. I find significant clusters of terms and phrases that I read as reimagining the meaning of the attacks as well as the position of audience members who themselves rewrite the rhetorical situation or context in which the attacks take place. Traditional uses of the "rhetorical situation" model to understand the exigence of the attacks - as an objective external event that called discourse into being, a spectacular image that confused and traumatized audiences, or set of opportunities for President Bush to manipulate its meanings - continues to miss the vernacular, everyday texts of witnesses that struggle to articulate the exigence. Through conflicted and contradictory testimony analyzed in each chapter, I show how witnesses' discourses problematize the status of the exigence of the attacks, keeping its meaning open and dynamic. I conclude that audience members' discourse - the words and phrases of witnesses - may therefore be read as an "event" rather than as part of a stagnant situation. In this way, the rhetorical force of words maintains a capacity to transform the very context in which it takes place as opposed to being read by critics as just another instance of a pre-existing situation.