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Neoliberal Austerity: The Impact of Political Injustice on the Universal Right to Legal Aid Advocacy for Defendants Facing Indictment Within the Crown Court: A Precursor Towards a Miscarriage of Justice

Jamie Heslop and Craig Collie
Denying defendants access to legal aid places a detrimental infringement on the right to due process. Post-2010 in England and Wales it is evidenced that such rights are impacted by political fiscal policy. This contribution therefore considers how political interference through the implementation of neoliberal austerity may impact the due process of legal aid for defendants facing trial within the Crown Court. Concerning such a query, advocacy aspects of criminal legal aid will be considered and how funding of advocacy may impact the very foundations of due process. Furthermore, the research agenda narrows focus specifically on the Crown Court due to the potential severity indictable offences pose, especially if defendants face the possibility of being wrongfully convicted. Similarly, legal aid issues surrounding the causation of the barrister strikes are considered and how these may have helped or hindered the defendant’s access to due process. In the advent of the creation of neoliberal legislation, an investigation will be further carried out within the remit of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPOA) which has possessed a detrimental grounding within the causation of creating a chain reaction towards a wrongful conviction within defendant’s facing an indictable based sentence.

Convicting the Innocent in Belgium: Historical Exonerations and Their Contemporary Relevance

Tamara L. F. De Beuf and Henry Otgaar
Over the past three decades, awareness of wrongful convictions has surged, mobilizing an innocence movement that started in the United States and later expanded internationally. Research into wrongful convictions has contributed to this awareness and remains a crucial component in addressing the issue, also in democracies with ostensibly robust criminal justice systems. In Belgium, however, discussions on wrongful convictions have been limited since the issue is considered an anomaly in this country. This narrative is supported by the apparent absence of formal exonerations. Yet, our research demonstrates that people have been wrongfully convicted and exonerated by the Belgian criminal justice system, including for serious crimes. Drawing on the works of the late journalist Jos Cels, we conducted a comprehensive investigation into historical exoneration cases using open sources, such as the Belgian official gazette and digital newspaper archives. The findings include 28 exoneration cases spanning from 1830 to 1963, involving 33 exonerees. For a subset of these cases, we provide descriptive information and document the factors that allegedly contributed to the wrongful conviction, such as fraudulent forensic expert testimony, and report the grounds on which the wrongfully convicted people were eventually exonerated. This study confirms the existence of historical exonerations in Belgium and takes a first step in collating these seemingly overlooked injustices. Our findings resonate with research on contemporary wrongful convictions across the globe. Given the universal characteristics of wrongful convictions, these historical cases help raising awareness and foster understanding of modern-day injustices, among criminal justice professionals, irrespective of their jurisdiction.

When Science Meets Justice: A Case Study on Eyewitness Misidentification and Wrongful Conviction

Facundo A. Urreta Benítez, Candela S. Leon, Matías Bonilla, Manuel Garrido, Micaela Prandi and Cecilia Forcato
In 2008, a group of three armed individuals entered a grocery store in the Buenos Aires area. The episode ended tragically with the death of the store owner. A local man, M.A.M., was accused of the crime and sentenced to life in prison. After the conviction, the defense filed an appeal with a higher court. There, legal organizations submitted amicus briefs raising concerns about M.A.M.’s factual innocence. Our team was consulted by Innocence Project Argentina to review the official records, providing a psychological and neuroscientific analysis of the eyewitness identification procedures that may have led to a wrongful conviction. Specifically, we examined the recognition procedures and the statements of key witnesses. Subsequently we presented an amicus curiae with our findings. Here, we discuss the results of that analysis in light of current theories on memory distortion, including reconsolidation, forgetting, and common errors in recognition. In 2022, the Provincial Court of Cassation acquitted M.A.M., citing the lack of reliable evidence to uphold the conviction. The expert report presented by our team was among the materials considered in reaching that decision.

The Victimology of a Wrongful Conviction: Innocent Inmates and Indirect Victims (Nicky Ali Jackson, Kathryn M. Campbell, Margaret Pate)

Shari R. Berkowitz