Parliament on Monday threw out all earlier court decisions in cases of violence, vandalism and rowdy behaviour during anti-government protests in autumn 2006, that were based solely on police reports and testimonies.
Parliament’s vote also annuls decisions concerning minor offences of disturbing public order, unruly behaviour or threatening other people between September 18 and October 24, 2006, if they were made on a similar basis.
The motion, submitted by MP of the ruling Fidesz party, Istvan Balsai, was passed with 297 votes for and 60 against in a roll call.
In September and October 2006, police arrested people who were on the streets at sometimes violent anti-government demonstrations, including a peaceful demonstration of the Fidesz party on October 23, the 50th anniversary of Hungary’s 1956 Revolution.
Civil groups and other observers accused the police of acting with excessive force in certain instances.
Courts later sentenced several demonstrators and acquitted police officers involved in the incidents based exclusively on police testimonies.
“Parliament on Monday threw out all earlier court decisions in cases of violence, vandalism and rowdy behaviour during anti-government protests in autumn 2006, that were based solely on police reports and testimonies”
Does any government that wants to strenghten law and order really want to undermine the police force like this. Then of course there is the seperation of powers issue, but nobody here seems to be familiar with Montesquieu.
Each case should have gone to appeal on own its merits.
It was the police which undermined itself with the atrocities the committed and then they covered each other for these in court. It’s just and absolutely agreeable that court rulings based solely on police reports and testimonies should be annulled.
Leto,
What do you think the long term effect of not treating a policeman’s evidence with the same respect as an average citizen’s will be on the administration of justice in Hungary?
In criminal cases most of the evidence is collected by the police. Eye-witness testimony is notoriously fallible, I rugby-tackled an absconding car-breaker, but couldn’t reliably identify him later. The police and my sister (who was with me) helped me build my statement in a way that it would be defense-lawyer proof.
The truly staggering thing is that there a judges, still in office, who are capable of bringing down punitive decisions against individuals on the basis of unsubstantiated police allegations. The police had no evidence to tender before the court, but they were prepared with mutually-collaborating lies. The judges who brought down the now-annulled decisions were perfectly happy to accept the validity of this ‘evidence’.
Judges who ignore the rules of evidence so blatantly should be dismissed in disgrace. Surely Fidesz will follow up its good work in kicking out these decisions by calling to account the judges who brought them down. After all, apart from their culpable departure form the norms of evidence taking, this rotten judges actually encouraged police sticking-up of individuals. (As if the police were not hated enough by the public without the courts licensing this criminal behaviour!)
Sophist, the ‘separation of powers’ doctrine does not require tolerance of politically motivated judges who bring down decisions in contempt of the rules of evidence. The legislature is fully in accord with this doctrine when it legislates to redress judicial failure to live by it.
‘Does any government that wants to strenghten law and order really want to undermine the police force like this.’
‘Undermine’? Hardly. Acting against police stitching-up of people specifically protects law and order. This sort of action seeks to re-direct police ethics to comportment that can earn the public’s respect for the police force.
Sophist,
‘In criminal cases most of the evidence is collected by the police.’
In criminal cases all evidence is presented to the court by the public prosecutor. There is always a preliminary judicial review of what of the presented evidence is admissible in court. I defy you to find one instance, in any parliamentary democracy, of admitted evidence that consists of nothing more than police allegations corroborating one another.
@Sophist:
This is quite a special case and you shouldn’t mix in everyday policing here.
It was unindentifiable policemen (remember they were ordered not to wear identification numbers!) who committed crimes. Later they covered each other in court as well. These were often done in the style of police chief Gergényi:
- “What’s a viper? We don’t know these animals.”
- Metallic rod used by some police troops shown in video.
- “Oh, somebody might have used such a thing on their own. They were ordered not to.”
- Evidence shown that commanding officers were aware of these killer devices.
- Silence.
Elle,
“I defy you to find one instance, in any parliamentary democracy, of admitted evidence that consists of nothing more than police allegations corroborating one another.”
Why would I want to, it’s not my point that the evidence in these cases isn’t as you describe. Isn’t it up to the “Civil groups and other observers” to present their evidence in appeal.
Hungary has now joined the ranks of Banana-republics where each new Government will annul the court verdicts done during the previous Government
This is the total disaster for Rule of Law and will open up a huge legal process for damages by every one earlier convicted, then the convicted people were not pardoned, but declared as victims of wrong-doing by the State
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Another angle is if the Police Union will stand up for their members and take the State to Court to free any member from suspicion of lying in Court, for these trials that now have had their verdicts over-turned
By declaring these verdicts illegal, the State also declared those Police Officers as having lied under oath and therefore should be punished
Of course Fidesz will not follow through with that, then Fidesz cannot, as usual, prove anything, but there is a legal possibility those Police Officers can take their case to first Hungarian Courts and then later to European Courts to get a chance to clear their names
Collective Punishment is illegal according to the UN and Israel one of the countries who likes to use it
Gives food for thoughts, right ‘elle junk’
Leto,
“This is quite a special case and you shouldn’t mix in everyday policing here. It was unindentifiable policemen (remember they were ordered not to wear identification numbers!) who committed crimes”
That I think would be grounds for either dismissing the cases on appeal, or – better – a criminal justice act that outlawed the secret policemen tactics – the law was changed in this way UK after ‘over-strenuous’ policing of demonstrations.
But this report suggests that convictions for crimes that took place during a particular series of events – between September 18 and October 24, 2006 – and depended on police evidence alone were annuled. This is not the same thing, either the report is wrong or you are.
‘Isn’t it up to the “Civil groups and other observers” to present their evidence in appeal.’
Sophist at March 8, 2011 6:57 PM
Sophist, I don’t know what you mean here. My point is that what constitutes evidence that is admissible in a criminal trial is subject to specific rules. Allegation and its simple corroboration is not sufficient to satisfy the rules of admission. Other evidence must exist to verify allegation. In this case, it might have been evidence of physical injury to police personnel that is consistent with the police allegations, impartial (in this case, not police) eyewitness evidence by statutory declaration, etc. None of this sort of evidence was tendered to the court. The court quite improperly accepted police allegation as evidence that is presentable to a criminal court. A prosecution should not have been allowed to proceed on this basis. Any decision that the court brought down is therefore declarable null and void for reason of procedure alone. The court admitted its procedural error. So there was no ground for appeal. But oddly, it did not annul its own decisions in this case. Hence the intervention of the legislature.
Elle,
“Sophist, I don’t know what you mean here”
Yes, that’s pretty obvious.
None of this sort of evidence was tendered to the court. The court quite improperly accepted police allegation as evidence that is presentable to a criminal court. A prosecution should not have been allowed to proceed on this basis
Elle at March 8, 2011 8:35 PM
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So the testimony of two Police Officers in a squad car seeing another driver driving against red light should not be allowed to go to Prosecution, if the two Police Officers cannot find any other source of “evidence”
WoW, Hungary The Country For Criminals:
Forget The Police
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In ‘normal’ countries the statement of a Police Officer is treated normally as having a greater weight in the Court than a “normal” citizen
In Hungary, from today, it is the criminal that rules, then his/her statement should be more worth than the statement of by the State Appointed person to keep the peace, aka Police Officers
.
Civil Rights Movements for Roma will have many field days in Hungarian Courts in the future, given the fact that Hungarian Police is seen as bias against Roma in general and with this new ruling the Police Officer’s statements will need to be backed up by other evidence also
It will not be enough that the Officers claimed that the accused resisted arrest and they had to beat the shit out of him. Yesterday that was enough, not today
Sophist, I hope, therefore, that you are now able to understand that your ‘Isn’t it up to the “Civil groups and other observers” to present their evidence in appeal’ cuts no ice at all. In other words, although you meant it as a critique of what I said, you now know that yours was a pointless and meaningless remark. But to explain further: ‘Civil groups and other observers’ have no standing to appeal the decision of a criminal court. That decision can be appealed only on grounds of procedure. Should substantive new evidence arise, permission has to be sought for a re-trial. That is very difficult to obtain.
Balsai István [Fidesz] came up today with a clanger today: He says that parliament has annulled no court decisions (re 2006 and police evidence). Rather, courts will examine/evaluate the existing court decisions in this matter. He reminds that judges always do have deliberation powers.
A parlament nem semmisített meg semmilyen bírói döntést, a bíróságok vizsgálják majd felül a korábbi döntéseket, a bíráknak pedig természetesen mindig van mérlegelési joguk.
http://www.magyarhirlap.hu/belfold/balsai_istvan_visszavagott_baka_fobironak.html
So what the dickens is going on? Has Fidesz modified the motion (Balsai’s) that parliament passed? This is a bit less than reassuring.