24th April 2024 I am not an American lawyer, but here are some thoughts from an English litigation perspective. Trump is adept at what he calls (or his ghost writer …

How the legal system made it so easy for the Post Office to destroy the lives of the sub-postmasters and …

Individual Contributors to Policy Commons · 12 January 2024 English

12th January 2024 The Post Office Horizon scandal is both simple and complex, straightforward but also difficult to grasp in all its interconnected detail. The essence of the scandal is, …

“Computer says guilty” – an introduction to the evidential presumption that computers are operating correctly

Individual Contributors to Policy Commons · 30 September 2023 English

30th September 2023 This is first in a series of posts on the Post Office Horizon prosecutions scandal * The Post Office prosecutions scandal is the United Kingdom’s greatest mass …

Performative justice and coercion: thinking about coercing convicted defendants to hear their sentences

Individual Contributors to Policy Commons · 21 August 2023 English

21st August 2023 (Source) * The court system is inherently about performance: about justice being seen to be done. And the legal system, more generally, is inherently about coercion: about …

A note of caution for those clapping and cheering at the latest indictment of Donald Trump

Individual Contributors to Policy Commons · 8 August 2023 English

8th August 2023 (Picture credit.) * The former president of the United States is facing serious legal trouble, with a serious criminal indictment which takes seriously his role in the …

“How did this person die? – And what lessons can we learn?”

Individual Contributors to Policy Commons · 27 June 2023 English

27 June 2023 A sensible policy proposal to monitor the recommendations of coroners’ inquests * * “How did this person die?” In any organised society this is one of the …

The commercialisation of private prosecutions

Individual Contributors to Policy Commons · 19 May 2023 English

19th May 2023 In the Financial Times magazine this weekend – and on their website (though behind a paywall) – is a fascinating and detailed article on the commercialisation of …

How Prince Harry’s legal case shows how the phone hacking story has returned to the start of a circle

Individual Contributors to Policy Commons · 26 April 2023 English

26th April 2023 The news about the royals and hacking, well summarised and analysed by Joshua Rozenberg at his Substack, brings us back to the start of a circle. For …

The problem of PDD – the Public Display of Defendants

Individual Contributors to Policy Commons · 5 April 2023 English

5th April 2023 Let us start with the old adage: justice not only has to be done, justice must also be seen to be done. The phrase is sometimes attributed …

The Indictment of Donald Trump and the Art of the Process

Individual Contributors to Policy Commons · 31 March 2023 English

31st March 2023 Another “-ment’. Following his two impeach-ments, former President Donald Trump now has an indict-ment. (There is a pleasing parallel to this, as impeachment was the quasi-judicial process …