Category: international

Former Israeli Supreme Court President defends private meetings with Prime Minister

Miriam Naor, the former President of Israel’s Supreme Court, recently gave a rare public interview in which she defended her private meetings with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu while serving on the Court. Naor maintained that she was appropriately discussing major legislation that would effect judicial branch operations. Critics argue that such meetings could compromise the integrity of a court that could eventually hear criminal charges against the Prime Minister.

This is a delicate thing. As I have noted regularly on this blog, most courts worldwide depend significantly on the other branches of their respective governments for resources and enabling legislation. It is both pragmatic and smart for the administrative head of a court system to share judicial concerns and perspectives with lawmakers. But closed-door meetings invite the perception of an improper, closer-then-arms-length relationship between the branches and their representatives.

EU releases 2018 Justice Scoreboard

The European Union has released its 2018 Justice Scoreboard, which measures the judicial systems of its member countries against several broad measures of efficiency, judicial quality, and judicial independence. Key to the scorecard is the perception of justice among each country’s citizens; Croatia and Bulgaria did especially poorly in this area.

The full report can be found here. I may have more to say about the methodology and scoring after I have had a chance to digest the entire report.

Spanish judges and prosecutors go on strike

About half of the judges and prosecutors in Spain reportedly went on strike on Tuesday, to protest government neglect of the courts. Although this headline suggests that the judges were seeking more judicial independence, the story itself indicates that the real complaint is insufficient resources:

The main association behind Tuesday’s strike, which did not specifically mention Catalonia, called for more investment and staff for the justice system.

Prosecutors have “huge workloads”, said the spokeswoman for the Association of Prosecutors, Montserrat García, adding Spain unfortunately lacked “a justice of quality”.

Justice Minister Rafael Catalá said he did not “disagree in principle” with the protesters’ demands. He stressed that some measures were already adopted in the government’s draft budget for 2018.

A discouraging survey on lack of confidence in the Kenyan courts

A new study reveals that nearly half of Kenyans seek to resolve their legal disputes outside of court, either through informal means or by not pursuing a claim at all. The reasons are discouraging but unsurprising:

The top reason given for inaction was the belief that acting would not help, a view that was held by a third of the respondents.

The second most frequent rationale was that the other party was more powerful (20 per cent) than the complainant. Three in 10 Kenyans from the lowest income group say they did nothing because the other party was more powerful compared to one in 10 people in the highest income group. The numbers imply that the justice system is not seen as an equalising force by a sizable part of the population and that the experiences of those who sought legal services differed depending on income levels.

The study also found that 2 out of 3 Kenyans believe their court system generally protects the interests of the rich and powerful above all others, and only 1 in 3 felt that they can rely on the courts for fair justice.

Access to justice was hindered in other ways as well. Nearly 1 in 5 Kenyans said that they have no idea how to even initiate a legal claim. And those can file a claim may have to wait an eternity for resolution, since 1 in every 6 cases currently pending in the Kenyan courts is more than ten years old.

These problems are not unique to Kenya, of course. Every court system faces the considerable challenge of providing equal justice in a society that is inherently unequal. But the survey nevertheless brings those challenges into stark relief once more.

Canada’s federal criminal reform bill put on hold

A bill that would introduce a wide range of reforms into Canada’s federal criminal justice system has been tabled. Among other things, Bill C-75 would:

  • Take measures to decrease significant court delays;
  • Eliminate peremptory challenges of jurors;
  • Remove “zombie” parts of the criminal code that have been found unconstitutional; and
  • Increase the maximum sentence for repeat domestic abusers.

We will continue to keep an eye on the bill’s progress, if any, in the coming months.

Investigation will continue against Canadian judge who removed woman from courtroom for wearing hijab

Quebec’s Judicial Council will proceed with an investigation of Judge Eliana Marengo, who is charged with refusing to hear a case after a litigant in her courtroom refused to remove her hijab. According to news reports:

In 2015, Marengo refused to hear a case involving Rania El-Alloul because the latter refused to remove her Islamic head scarf while in the courtroom.

El-Alloul was violating a Quebec law stipulating people must be “suitably dressed” in the courtroom, Marengo said at the time.

“In my opinion, you are not suitably dressed,” Marengo told El-Alloul, according to court documents. “Decorum is important. Hats and sunglasses, for example, are not allowed. And I don’t see why scarves on the head would be either.

“I will therefore not hear you if you are wearing a scarf on your head, just as I would not allow a person to appear before me wearing a hat or sunglasses on his or her head, or any other garment not suitable for a court proceeding.”

Incredibly, Judge Marengo’s defense for this behavior is judicial independence.

Dear Judge Marengo: Judicial independence is essential to assure that judges follow the law and provide an impartial forum for the resolution of disputes. It is not designed to justify or protect boorish behavior from the bench. To tie judicial independence to the mistreatment of litigants in your courtroom is to tarnish everything that concept stands for.

Good grief.

 

Two new justices appointed to Israel Supreme Court

Two nominees for Israel’s Supreme Court were confirmed this week.  Alex Stein, a Brooklyn Law professor who was born in the Soviet Union, will join current Tel Aviv District Court judge Ofer Grosskopf on the country’s highest court. They will replace Yoram Dinziger and Uri Shoham, whose terms end later this year.

The nominations were not without controversy. Stein has lived in the United States for the past 14 years (he previously lived in Israel), but has a reputation as a conservative and was strongly supported by current Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked. The confirmations also came just a week after another Tel Aviv District Court judge, Khaled Kabub, withdrew his candidacy for the Supreme Court. Kabub, an Israeli Arab and a Muslim, faced stiff confirmation headwinds after another Israeli Arab, George Kara, was appointed to the court last year.

 

Courts under water in India and Kenya

I have previously documented recent threats to the proper functioning of the court systems of India and Kenya. In India, appalling delays and overflowing dockets, combined with strife at the highest levels of the judiciary, have undermined with the effectiveness of the system and overall public confidence. Now, unfortunately, related news has been announced: the country’s lower courts face almost 6,000 judicial vacancies. Even for a country of more than one billion people, that number is shocking.

Kenya has faced a different set of challenges in recent months, after its Supreme Court invalidated a presidential election and was subjected to ongoing threats and attacks. This week’s news is of a less violent sort, but one that is perhaps even more problematic for the judiciary: more than 50,000 cases in the court system have been pending for a decade or more. And the total case backlog stands at more than 315,000.

These stories keenly illustrate the idea of judicial interdependence: courts must operate fairly and efficiently to earn public confidence, and they need adequate resources to be able to do so. When courts are properly resourced and properly run, they earn confidence and more resources–a virtuous circle. But when they are poorly run or under attack, they become inefficient and lose both resources and legitimacy–a vicious circle. The Kenyan and Indian judiciaries are locked into the vicious circle right now.

Nigeria’s top anti-corruption judge charged with corruption

Oh, dear.  From the Deutsche Welle story:

Nigeria’s top anti-corruption judge, tasked with high-profile cases, has himself been charged with illegally accepting money. The country’s anti-graft body accused Danladi Umar of demanding a bribe from a suspect.

Judge Danladi Umar allegedly demanded 10 million nairas (€22,300; $27,800)  from a suspect “for a favor to be afterward shown to him concerning the pending charge,” according to court papers seen by various news outlets.

The embattled Umar, who is the head of the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT), was also alleged to have received, through the intermediary of his assistant, the sum of 1.8 million nairas from the same accused in 2012 “in connection with the pending case before him.”

***

Nigerians reacted angrily at the news of the corruption charges against one of the country’s top judges.

“I’m not surprised about the corruption allegations against Danladi Umar. Corruption is like a tradition in the judiciary system,” Mayowa Adebola, a resident in Lagos, told DW. “You don’t have any reason to doubt corruption in the Code of Conduct Tribunal given their records, even though they have tried several high-profile corruption cases in the past,” he added.

Another resident, Yomi Olagoke, said, “The allegations against Umar are quite serious, and it boils down to how our anti-corruption bodies are set up and run,” adding that for many Nigerians, holding an anti-corruption post was an opportunity to make money.

 

Head of Poland’s top judicial body claims new rules are unconstitutional, resigns in protest

Poland’s ruling party, the Law and Justice Party (PiS), recently implemented new rules that place judicial selection and retention in the hands of the legislature. The new rules are part of a larger set of deeply controversial set of judicial reforms that have virtually ostracized Poland from the rest of the European Union.

Now the head of the National Council on the Judiciary, Poland’s top judicial body, has resigned his position to protest the new rules, claiming that they violate the country’s constitution and infringe upon judicial independence. It is an important move, albeit a symbolic one, since the PiS has a dominant majority in the legislature and shows no signs of slowing its reform agenda.