Judicial Witness Assessments at the ICTY, ICTR and ICC: Is There ‘Standard Practice’ in International Criminal Justice?

Gabriele Chlevickaite; Barbora Hola; CCJH Bijleveld

doi:10.1093/jicj/mqaa002

Judicial Witness Assessments at the ICTY, ICTR and ICC: Is There ‘Standard Practice’ in International Criminal Justice?

Gabriele Chlevickaite, Barbora Hola, CCJH Bijleveld

Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article › Academic › peer-review

Abstract

Accurate assessment of witness testimonies underpins judicial fact-finding at international criminal courts and tribunals (ICCTs). However, the lack of formal assessment criteria and uncoordinated methods, coupled with advances in the scientific understanding of the psychology of witnessing, calls for a re-examination of the judicial practice. This study critically evaluates the state of the art of witness assessments at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), and the International Criminal Court (ICC),based on all the trial judgments issued in 1996-2019. The analysis results in a consolidation of this ad hoc, constantly evolving jurisprudence, into a framework that has been in development since the 1990s. The authors reflect upon the scientific validity of the criteria used throughout the analysis, based on up-to-date findings from psychology and criminology, and identify the areas that would most benefit from standardized procedures.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	185-210
Number of pages	26
Journal	Journal of International Criminal Justice
Volume	18
Issue number	1
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1093/jicj/mqaa002
Publication status	Published - Mar 2020

Funding

* Gabrielė Chlevickaitė is a PhD candidate at Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement (NSCR) and VU University Amsterdam, ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3132-0942 [[email protected]]; Barbora Holá is a Senior Researcher, Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement (NSCR), Associate Professor, Department of Criminal Law and Criminology, VU University Amsterdam, ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2371-7031 [[email protected]]; Catrien Bijleveld is a Senior Researcher, Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement (NSCR), Professor of Research Methods in Criminology, VU University Amsterdam, ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2455-533X. [[email protected]] This research was funded by The Dutch Research Council (NWO) Research Talent grant (grant no. 401.16.504). ........................................................................

Keywords

ICC
ICTY
ICTR
witnesses
evidence
international justice
international criminal justice

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

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10.1093/jicj/mqaa002

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Judicial Witness Assessments at the ICTY, ICTR and ICC: Is There ‘Standard Practice’ in International Criminal Justice?

Abstract

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Keywords

UN SDGs

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