Judges as Tribunals of Fact Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Judges as Tribunals of Fact - Essay Example Criminal Justice Act of 2003 sought to remove the right to trial by jury for cases involving jury tampering or complex fraud. The provision for trial without jury is to circumvent jury tampering and came into force in 2007. However, some people have argued that this is in contravention of Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights is a provision of the European Convention which protects the right to a fair trial. It is argued that trial by the jury protects public interest immunity hence it is in conformity with Article 6. Jury tampering is the crime of attempting to influence the composition decisions of a jury during the course of a trial. This crime can be committed by attempting to discredit potential jurors to ensure they will not be selected for duty. Once selected, jurors could be bribed or intimidated to act in a certain manner on duty. It could also involve meeting them against the law for the purpose of introducing prohibited outside information and then arguing for a mistrial. There had been several reported jury tampering cases in the past which necessitated this change in trend. The jury plays the role of fact finding and leaves the interpretation of the law to the judge and instructing the jury accordingly. The jury will render a verdict on the defendants guilt, or civil liability. Work of the juries is often justified as they are considered to leavening the law with community norms. Usually if the jurors find the law to be invalid or unfair, they may acquit the defendant, regardless of the evidence that the defendant violated the law.

The smoking in ban south dakota Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

The smoking in ban south dakota - Essay Example Cancer, heart diseases, cough, fever, head ache etc are some of the major health problems associated with smoking. Recently the state, South Dakota passed a law saying no smoking in bars restaurants or any public place where people work. Majority of the citizens like the law; however the bar and casino owners do not like it since they are losing business because of the law. Moreover, South Dakota is getting lot of tax revenues from gambling. Dead wood South Dakota is a gambling city. After the smoking ban was passed, dead wood has lost about 16% of its annual profits. Now the question is; should the state government give preference to the interests of the public or to the interests of the business people. This paper argues in favour of smoking ban in South Dakota. Dr. ... It is the basic duty of each government to protect the life/health and properties of its citizens. Smoking is one way of destroying the health of the people and the governments have the moral responsibility to ban it or control it with the help of law. At the same time tobacco products are good sources of tax revenues for the governments. Banning of smoking will result in big financial losses to the governments. When we consider the expenses the governments suffer for treating patients suffering from smoking related health problems, the tax revenue from tobacco product selling is negligible. A committed government can never think in terms of revenues at the expense of the health of its citizens. Cigarette smoke contains more than 4,000 chemicals, of which forty-three are known to cause cancer. Among the more toxic chemicals in tobacco are ammonia, arsenic, carbon monoxide, and benzene. Cigarette smoking is now known to cause chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), heart disease , stroke, multiple cancers (including lung cancer), and adverse reproductive outcomes. Smoking causes about 21 percent of all deaths from heart disease, 86 percent of deaths from lung cancer, and 81 percent of all deaths from chronic lung disease (SMOKING CESSATION) Smoking in public places not only cause disturbances to the nonsmokers, but also it causes severe health problems also to the nonsmokers due to secondary smoke. Morally it is an injustice that a non smoker became the victim of smokers. It is a fact that people can take their own choices with respect to smoking irrespective of the consequences. At the same time they must ensure that their choices may not do any