2023-11-13 16:00:09
The future of the popular jury will be decided before the Constitutional Council on November 15, 2023. On this date, the constitutional judge will examine four priority questions of constitutionality (QPC) transmitted by the Court of Cassation: two tending to recognize the constitutional nature of the intervention of the jury in criminal matters, and two others criticizing the voting rules applicable before the departmental criminal court.
These criminal courts without jurors, exclusively composed of five magistrates, have been competent since January 1, 2023 to judge adults accused of crimes punishable by fifteen or twenty years of criminal imprisonment (rape in 88% of cases, according to the “ Report of the evaluation and monitoring committee of the departmental criminal court », Ministry of Justice, October 2022, page 12).
A difference in treatment
Despite a disappointing experimental phase, these courses were generalized through the law of December 22, 2021 for confidence in the judicial institution, supported by the current Keeper of the Seals.
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Indeed, before the Assize Court (jurisdiction composed of six jurors and three magistrates, competent to judge crimes punishable by more than twenty years of criminal imprisonment), decisions “carrying conviction” or pronouncing the maximum sentence are acquired by a qualified majority of seven votes to two.
On the other hand, before the departmental criminal court, any decision leading to conviction or imposition of the maximum sentence is acquired by a simple majority of three votes to two.
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The result is a difference in treatment to the disadvantage of defendants referred to the departmental criminal court, which marks a profound decline in the principle of presumption of innocence. This jurisdiction therefore achieves the miracle of reducing simultaneously the role of citizens in the judgment of crimes, the consideration due to victims and the rights of the accused.
A treaty left by Justinian
Certainly, in its most essential manifestation, the presumption of innocence only requires that the person accused be considered innocent until his or her guilt has been definitively declared. However, this statement hardly exhausts the subject, the presumption of innocence having numerous corollaries, among which is the rule according to which doubt must benefit the accused.
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This rule, which already appeared in the Digesta treatise left by Justinian (482-565), Roman emperor and great legislator of the 6th century, and which took the form of the adage in the 19th century ” in doubt for the accused “ (“doubt benefits the accused”), implies a double consequence: one valid for all criminal trials, the other only for criminal trials.
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