The Right To Speedy Trial

Among the Constitutional and Legal rights of any person accused of any crimes in any democratic and free society is the Right to Speedy Trial.

In my previous blog titled “Justice Delayed Is Justice Deny” (Part I to Part V), I have given true to life example of criminal cases the disposition or termination of which involves unreasonable and unjustifiable delays.

The right to speedy trial assumes an even more importance when the accuse is in jail and cannot post any bail for the reason that the nature of the crime or offense charged is not subject to bail or is “non-bailable” in nature.

It is no joke to be charge of any crimes, and it is also no big joke if you are imprison or in jail while awaiting trial or during the course of trial and before the rendition of any judgment.

What Is The Right To Speedy Trial?

The rate of the disposition or termination of any given criminal case will depend upon the jurisdiction or the procedural law of the country under consideration. Rules on speedy trial may vary from one jurisdiction to another jurisdiction or from one country to another country. Be that as it may, one thing is sure or certain: any criminal case for that matter just like any other cases in court has a beginning and an end and must be put to an end at some stage in time.

It is a legal truism than any case for that matter or any litigation for that matter must come to an end within a certain point in time. Common sense tells us that any case in court cannot go on and on forever.

The word “speedy” as used in the phrase “speedy trial” is a relative term and will depend upon so many factors. The first thing to consider is the legal time-frame within which a case must be decided upon starting from the arraignment of the accused right down to the rendition of judgment in court.

While it may be true that the right to a speedy trial is consistent with reasonable delay, take note of the word “reasonable”, any criminal case must be dispose with dispatch consistent with the legal maxims that “Justice delayed is justice deny”.

Other Factors To Consider

Sometimes how the court or the judicial system function is a real mystery to the layman.

The excuse that we often hear as the reason for the delay in the disposition of court cases is due to the volume or numbers of pending cases in the court docket not to mention new cases that keeps on coming and add up to the current cases.

This is the perennial problem encountered by every court on how to schedule and allocate the time for all the cases. All cases needs to be schedules and calendar on any given date so that there will be an allotted time for this or that case to be hear.

Another factor to consider is the availability of the lawyer or attorney or party to the case on any given date. You must understand that any lawyer or attorney for that matter does not only handle one case but multiple cases at the same time. Thus, conflict of schedule of one case in relation to another case may arise resulting in the re scheduling or re-setting of that case for that particular date.

Other factor to consider is the availability of witnesses. No criminal cases may be tried in the absence of any witnesses thus necessitating the postponement of any given settings.

If there is unreasonable and unjustifiable delay in the disposition of any criminal cases then it is the duty of the defense counsel to move for the dismissal of the case in court in order to protect the rights of his or her clients.