In Mexico, a Justice System Where 'Citizens Are Heard' Begins to Take Root Whitney Eulich - The Christian Science Monitor
go to original June 8, 2016

Relatives mark the 20-month anniversary of the disappearance of 43 teacher's college students with a protest march in Mexico City last month. (Henry Romero/Reuters)

A man in bright orange garb takes a seat at a sleek wooden desk here on a recent afternoon. He intermittently wipes away tears with open palms and looks anxiously over his shoulder, trying to catch the attention of a young woman in the small courtroom gallery who is there to support him.

The defendant, accused of violently kidnapping someone, was arrested that morning. The fact that he’s in a courtroom, awaiting a judge the same day, was unimaginable in Mexico just a few years ago.

Mexican trials have historically been conducted in writing, with victims, witnesses, the accused, and even lawyers rarely gaining access to a judge. This created an opaque system of justice that presumes guilt over innocence and gives prosecutors vast power. It has also led to severely overcrowded prisons, with pretrial detentions that can last for years even for petty crimes, and impunity rates that hover near 98 percent.

Today’s deposition is a direct result of judicial reforms passed nationally in 2008 and set to be implemented federally and across all 31 states and Mexico City by June 18. The overhaul centers on oral hearings that are open to the public – increasing transparency and better guaranteeing access to fair and timely trials. The reforms are also part of a bid to gain public trust in Mexico’s judicial process, with hopes that citizens will be more likely to report crimes, for example.

But, just weeks before the implementation deadline, many states are rushing to reach the finish line. The reforms have required numerous steps – from updating or building new court facilities that can accommodate public hearings to training police and prosecutors to work together on investigations to teaching lawyers how to formulate strong oral defense arguments.

As of March, only four states had reached the “optimal” level of implementation, according to Maria de los Angeles Fromow Rangel, the technical secretary for the coordination of implementation of the justice system, in an interview with Mexican daily El Universal. And even in those cases, not all municipalities within the state necessarily were in full compliance.

Read the rest at The Christian Science Monitor

We invite you to add your charity or supporting organizations' news stories and coming events to PVAngels so we can share them with the world. Do it now!