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Letters
Letters
Legal Eagle • Legal Goat • A Memory of Mystery 1 • The Inquisition Continues • Free Will Haiku • A Memory of Mystery 2 • Back To Back • A Back To The Future
Legal Eagle
DEAR EDITOR: Perhaps if Dr Ochieng’- Odhiambo’s article in PN 79 had incorporated a discussion of the wider legal system in which an attorney practises (based on the English Common Law), he might have shown that the Law itself has ameliorated the moral and ethical wrestling which so concerns him.
What Dr Ochieng’-Odhiambo did not raise was the crucial issue of the burden of proof. One of your correspondents in the same issue, Tibor Machan, made the same point. In criminal law, the burden is that of ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’ – often translated to the jury as ‘sure’, sidestepping an epistemological discussion on what that word means. In the civil courts in this country, the test is ‘On the Balance of Probabilities’ – is it more likely than not? In both jurisdictions, the onus of proof is on those bringing the case.
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