Under the “ Quality” Working group of the CEPEJ, where we are observers, we participated in the development “of guidelines about the role of the experts in the judicial systems of the member states of the Council of Europe “. This document should be diffused by the CEPEJ in January, 2015.
The role of the EEEI was essential.
This document was unanimously accepted by all the countries represented during the plenary session of the CEPEJ which took place in Strasbourg on December 11th and 12th, 2014. THE EEEI was represented by Alain Nuée and Jean-Raymond Lemaire.
Please note a classification of the experts proposed by the CEPEJ.
“So It is necessary to differentiate the various types of experts :
- The “witness experts”, acting mainly within the accusatory systems type (in particular for Common Law countries), and which, at the request of the parties, bring their expertise to support the argumentation of the parties.
- The ” technical experts ” who put at the disposal of the court their scientific and technical knowledge on de facto questions (for example, within the context of the forensic medicine, the psychiatry, the criminal sciences, the biology, the architecture, the arts)
- The “jurists experts ” who can be consulted by the judge for specific questions of law or who have for task to support the judge in the preparation of the judicial work (but which do not participate in the judgment) “.
The definition of the technical expert used by the CEPEJ corresponds to the definition proposed by the EEEI during the colloquium in Brussels in March, 2012. Extract of the report of the CEPEJ.
The study defined the judicial expertise as a ” measure of instruction entrusted to a technician by a judge or an authority of pursuit or judgment – or with the authorization of this last one – to contribute, by bringing technical or de facto elements, to the jurisdictional solution of a present or future dispute. The judicial expert is the technician (doctor, plumber, architect, laboratory of biology, etc.) appointed by the judge to execute this measure of instruction “. (Extracted from the Paragraph 1 of the recommendations of the Acts of the Colloquium on the judicial expertise, the recommendations. Brussels, in March 16th, 2012).
A regret, guidelines do not apply to the parties experts (witness experts)
THE EEEI also participated to the works of the EVAL Workgroup, which estimates every two years, the efficiency of the judicial systems in the European countries and in some bordering countries.
This Workingroup included in its general questionnaire sent to all the countries, the particular questionnaire for the judicial expertise. In this capacity, the CEPEJ asks the EEEI for its opinion on this questionnaire, our answer that must be sent for the end of January 2015.
