SHOW TRIAL

The term 'show trial' is a pejorative description of a type of highly public trial. The term was first recorded in the 1930s^[1]. There is a strong connotation that the judicial authorities have already determined the guilt of the defendant and that the actual trial has as its only goal to present the accusation and the verdict to the public as an impressive example and as a warning. Show trials tend to be retributive rather than correctional justice.
Such trials can exhibit scant regard for the niceties of jurisprudence and even for the letter of the law. Defendants have little real opportunity to justify themselves: they have often signed statements under duress and/or suffered torture prior to appearing in the court-room.

Contents

Moscow Trials

Nuremberg Trials

Combatant Status Review Tribunals

See also

References

Moscow Trials

Show trials were a significant part of Joseph Stalin's regime. The Moscow Trials of the Great Purge period in the Soviet Union are characteristic. The authorities not only pre-determined the guilt of the defendants, but also orchestrated the whole trial processes. Massive campaigns in newspapers and at numerous meetings shaped the opinion of the public towards the cases.
The authorities staged the actual trials meticulously. If defendants refused to "cooperate", i.e., to admit guilt for their alleged and mostly fabricated crimes, they did not go on public trial, but suffered execution nonetheless. This happened, for example during the prosecution of the so-called "Labour Peasant Party" (Трудовая Крестьянская Партия), a party invented by NKVD, which, in particular, assigned the notable economist Alexander Chayanov to it.
The first solid public evidence of what really happened during the Moscow Trials came to the West through the Dewey Commission. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, more information became available. This discredited Walter Duranty, who claimed that these trials were actually fair.

Nuremberg Trials

British jurist F.J.P. Veale implied, in his book "Advance to Barbarism" that the 1946 Nuremberg Trials of Nazi leaders amounted to a form of show trial, as the judgments were not rendered by a disinterested party, which is a key element of independent judicial integrity.

Combatant Status Review Tribunals

The Seton Hall study "No-hearing hearings" concluded that the current CSRT's, as used in the War on Terror, are inadequate and biased in favour of determining a suspect "enemy combatant."^[2][3][4] According to Associated Press Mark Denbeaux said “These were not hearings. These were shams,” and called the hearings a show trial.
According to the St. Peterburgs Times and Glenn Greenwald the CSRT's are show trials.^[5][6][7] With the Military Commissions Act in mind the Washington Post stated:^[8]

''If the actual trials of the detainees are as empty and shallow and pre-ordained as were the Status Review Tribunals there is every reason to be mortified at the prospect -- made real by the legislation -- that the federal courts will be frozen out of vital oversight functions. If a regular trial court proceeding were this shoddy, this unwilling to perform a truth-seeking function, this unable to achieve a fair process, the judge presiding over it would be impeached.''

Nat Hentoff commented similarly in the Village Voice:^[9]

''Co-author Joshua Denbeaux tells me: "The government's own documents proved that the government's claims that the prisoners were the 'worst of the worst' was a false and shameful public relations ploy . . . We hope that our reports will convince Congress to amend the Military Commissions Act and restore federal jurisdiction." If that happens, the prisoners could contest their conditions of confinement, their imprisonment, and their sentences.''

See also

★ Trial of Charles I of England or High Court of Justice for the trial of Charles I

★ Trial of the Gang of Four

★ Jan Hus trial

★ Kangaroo court: A sham legal proceeding.

★ László Rajk, a show trial under Hungary's communist regime

★ Execution of Louis XVI of France

★ Nicolae Ceauşescu trial

★ NKVD Troika.

★ Nuremberg Trials

★ Secret trial: A trial not open to the public.

★ Trial of Saddam Hussein

★ Witch hunt, hunting down people of a certain race/trait/profession/political conviction for being/doing something sinful.

References

1. OED
2. No-hearing hearings by, Mark Denbeaux, Professor, Seton Hall University School of Law and Counsel to two Guantanamo detainees, Joshua Denbeaux, Esq. and David Gratz, John Gregorek, Matthew Darby, Shana Edwards, Shane Hartman, Daniel Mann, Megan Sassaman and Helen Skinner
Students of Seton Hall University School of Law
3. Bush's War Crimes Cover-up by Nat Hentoff, Village Voice, December 8th, 2006
4. Report: Gitmo detainees denied witnesses Lawyer calls legal proceedings ‘shams,’ by The Associated Press, November 17, 2006
5. At Guantanamo, America's own show trials By ROBYN E. BLUMNER, St. Petersburg Times,December 10, 2006
6. American show trials editorial, St. Petersburg Times,October 1, 2006
7. Possibilities for restoring habeas corpus rights by Glenn Greenwald, Unclaimed Territory,December 7, 2006
8. Gitmo Justice Is a Joke By Andrew Cohen, Special to the Washington Post, November 30, 2006
9. Our Own Nuremberg Trials by Nat Hentoff, Village Voice, December 17th, 2006