Ratko Mladic war crimes trial suspended over evidence error

[dipsydoodle]

Source: BBC News

The trial of Bosnian Serb Gen Ratko Mladic has been suspended until further notice, the UN war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia says.

Mr Mladic's trial was due to resume on 25 June after it was halted in May.

Monday's suspension is a result of an error in the disclosure of documents to the defence, the court in The Hague said in a statement.

Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-18499018

[Igel]

1. This kind of thing renders justice a farce.

I understand these kinds of penalties. If the prosecution makes an intentional mistake, you punish the prosecution--even if those punished are citizens on whose behalf the prosecution is, in some sense, speaking.

Then it's you punish any mistake that might have been reasonably intentional, since it's really, really important to nail any wrong-doing by a prosecutor to avoid intentional malfeasance. Better to punish the innocent than to let the guilty get by. After all, it's unclear who's really hurt if the prosecution's docked but it's very clear that the defense would be victimized by prosecutorial malfeasance.

But it's really hard to figure out what's "reasonably" intentional, so we wallow in ill-will and assume that it's always intentional. Perhaps the defense is mirroring. But the result is that you have to show, beyond all doubt, that the error wasn't intentional. And then hope that your proof is taken to be convincing.