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One Nice Thing About a Written Constitution

A legal principle which prevents people being tried for the same crime twice is being scrapped in England and Wales.

The ban on “double jeopardy”, which has existed for around 800 years, will be consigned to history from Monday.

The Court of Appeal can now quash an acquittal and order a retrial when “new and compelling” evidence is produced. …The change will apply retrospectively, so someone could face a second trial if evidence such as DNA material, new witnesses or a confession came to light.


A Home Office spokesman said: “It is important the public should have full confidence in the ability of the criminal justice system to deliver justice. “This can be undermined if it is not possible to convict offenders for very serious crimes where there is strong and viable evidence of their guilt.”


The reforms — which also allow hearsay evidence to be admissible in court — come under the new Criminal Justice act.


However, it will only be possible to retry an acquitted person once.

One nice thing about a written Constitution is that it makes it easier to draw bright lines against torture, or cruel and unusual punishments, or holding people without a lawyer, or a chance to see the evidence against them. Unless those in power have utter contempt for such a Constitution, and insist, without irony, on their right to destroy the village in a vain attempt to save it.

(From Kip Esquire, quoting a BBC article. Emphasis Kip’s, and he has additional analysis )

2 comments on "One Nice Thing About a Written Constitution"

  • Axel says:

    You write “One nice thing about a written Constitution is that it makes it easier to draw bright lines against torture, or cruel and unusual punishments, or holding people without a lawyer, or a chance to see the evidence against them.”
    Is that the case? If it is true in the USA, it obviously holds only for US citizens – and not even for US perpetrators outside your country. There are numerous examples of foreigners being seized at the airport before going through immigrations and being held without lawyer, without telling them what evidence was there against them and so forth. There are numerous examples for less than perfect behaviour of US soldiers in war zones (including, but not limiting this to the infamous Abu Ghureib incident). There’s Guantánamo where people are being held without trial. And last, but not least, the case of Kevin Mitnick who was held for about three years without trial.
    Maybe you were being sarcastic and I didn’t get it. 🙂 The bright lines are there, only they are being crossed without any consequences – or even with the consequences of the masses yelling for more.

  • adam says:

    Am I being sarcastic? Hard to tell. Maybe I’m being vitriolic, and trying to cover it with sarcasm.
    And oh, ask Jose Padilla if all these things hold for US citizens.

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