1996 Second Empirical Court Observation Report

I. Description

In August and September 1995, the JRF trained lawyer and student volunteers to conduct the first-ever empirical court observation of all criminal court judges at the Taiwan High Court and the Taipei District Court. This was done to understand whether the litigation procedures practiced by judges had major flaws or involved abuses of power, and whether the parties were given sufficient opportunities for statements and debate. The first court observation report was subsequently completed on November 21 of the same year. The empirical observation revealed that the criminal litigation procedures in the observed courts contained serious flaws and abuses that disregarded criminal human rights. After the report was made public, it attracted widespread public attention, and the judicial authorities did not dare to take it lightly. However, the JRF believes that judicial supervision cannot be achieved overnight, and the functional requirement of long-term supervision must be implemented to achieve practical results. Therefore, in August and September 1996, the JRF once again conducted empirical court observations on the same courts to see if there had been any improvements or if other abuses existed one year after the last court observation. Furthermore, using the findings from this observation, we targeted specific judges who handled cases hastily and disregarded human rights, coordinated with judge evaluations, and submitted the results to public scrutiny.

• Organizer: Planned and executed by the JRF Action Committee.
• Observers:
  1. 20 lawyer volunteers, 60 law student volunteers
  2. Underwent three volunteer training sessions
• Observation Period: August and September 1996
• Observation Targets: All criminal court judges of the Taiwan High Court (the main court) and the Taipei District Court.
• Observation Methodology: Observers went to the courtroom in person to observe judges conducting trials, from the first case to the last case, and filled out a record form for each case (see Appendix I).
• Record Form Collection Status:
  • Number of observed judges

    Unit	Observed Count / Total Count	Percentage
    High Court	61 / 72	84.7%
    District Court	44 / 55	80.0%

  • Number of court sessions and cases observed

    Frequency	High Court (Judges)	District Court (Judges)
    Observed 1 time	35	76
    Observed 2 times	21	23
    Observed 3 times	5	3
    Observed 4 times	--	1
    Total Observations	92 (Average 2 observations per judge)	135 (Average 1.7 observations per judge)
    Number of Cases Observed	611 cases	524 cases

II. Analysis

1. Court Trial Delays

Item	High Court	District Court
Average scheduled trial time (minutes/case)	9.98 min per case	9.64 min per case
Average actual trial time (minutes/case)	19.79 min per case	22.34 min per case
Case delay ratio (%)	69.23% (423 delayed out of 611 cases)	71.56% (375 delayed out of 524 cases)
Delayed by 20 minutes or more (number of cases)	112 cases (19.5% of 611 cases)	106 cases (20.2% of 524 cases)
Delayed by 40 minutes or more (number of cases)	54 cases (8.8% of 611 cases)	49 cases (9.3% of 524 cases)
Delayed by 60 minutes or more (number of cases)	34 cases (5.5% of 611 cases)	19 cases (3.6% of 524 cases)
First case delay ratio (%)	31.61% (30 delayed out of 92 cases)	40.79% (31 delayed out of 76 cases)
Delayed by 10 minutes or more (number of cases)	8 cases (8.6% of 92 cases)	5 cases (6.5% of 76 cases)
Delayed by 20 minutes or more (number of cases)	3 cases (3.2% of 92 cases)	3 cases (3.9% of 76 cases)
Delayed by 30 minutes or more (number of cases)	2 cases (2.1% of 92 cases)	2 cases (2.6% of 76 cases)
Average delay time per case (minutes)	27.52 min	27.91 min

Analysis and Ratios of Causes of Delay

Item	High Court	District Court
Judge arrived late	34 cases (8.04%)	32 cases (8.52%)
Judge did not hold trials in order	82 cases (19.39%)	93 cases (22.13%)
Previous case delayed	370 cases (87.47%)	317 cases (84.52%)
Waiting for prosecutor	2 cases (0.47%)	39 cases (10.40%)
Waiting for public defender	1 case (0.24%)	3 cases (0.8%)
Waiting for lawyer	25 cases (5.91%)	27 cases (0.72%)
Other reasons	8 cases (1.8%)	21 cases (5.6%)

Special Notes

1. High Court: 130 minutes
2. District Court: 163 minutes

2. Court Trial Proceedings

Judge Trial Conduct

	High Court (Yes / Yes+No)	Percentage	District Court (Yes / Yes+No)	Percentage
Contemptuous or abusive language	49/600	8.17%	31/517	6.00%
Inattentive listening	31/603	5.14%	13/517	2.51%
Denying full statements	40/600	6.67%	22/514	4.28%
Proactive questioning	308/339	90.86%	214/227	9.40%
Lawyer requested cross-examination	24/46	52.17%	2/15	13.33%
Denied without stating reasons	3/35	8.57%	2/14	14.29%
Biased attempt at settlement	3/119	2.52%	7/112	6.25%

Prosecutor Attendance Conduct

	High Court Investigation Total 457	High Court Trial Total 154	District Court Investigation Total 100	District Court Trial Total 424
Attended	2	143	1	251
Attendance rate	9.19%	92.86%	41.00%	59.20%

Prosecutor Closing Argument Conduct

	High Court	High Court Ratio	District Court	District Court Ratio
Judgment in accordance with the law	102	75.56%	110	64.70%
Reading briefs aloud	10	7.41%	53	31.18%
Full debate	20	14.81%	0	0.00%
Other	3	2.22%	7	4.12%
Total	135	100.00%	170	100.00%

High Court Collegial Panel Conduct

	Associate judge inattentive	Judge-in-charge inattentive
Number of cases	63	25
Percentage	40.91%	16.23%

III. Comparison and Recommendations

1. Comparison with the First Court Observation:

1. Average delay time per case

   In the first observation, the High Court averaged 24.56 minutes and the District Court 20.57 minutes; in the current observation, the High Court averaged 27.52 minutes and the District Court 27.91 minutes. Comparing the two, the average delay situation has not improved.

2. Percentage of first-session delays

   In the first observation, the High Court was 88% and the District Court 72.4%; in the current observation, the High Court was 32.61% and the District Court 40.79%. Comparing the two, the first-case delay situation this time has clearly improved.

3. Longest waiting time for parties

   In the first observation, the High Court was 100 minutes and the District Court 135 minutes; in the current observation, the High Court was 130 minutes and the District Court 163 minutes. The situation where cases are postponed and parties are left waiting bitterly seems to be getting worse. Just imagine if it is reasonable to make parties wait two or three hours for a single case?

4. Analysis of causes of delay

   1. According to the results of both observations, the majority of case postponements were caused by delays in previous cases. Other issues such as judges arriving late, failing to hold trials in order, and waiting for prosecutors, lawyers, or public defenders remain old problems. Over the past year, judicial authorities seem to have been helpless regarding this old problem, so the delays remain unchanged.
   2. Regarding prosecutor attendance: Prosecutors failed to substantively attend trials and present arguments, mostly just making routine appearances such as "as stated in the indictment" or "please render a judgment in accordance with the law." This has not changed at all over the past year.
   3. Regarding the trial conduct of High Court collegial panels: Associate judges failing to listen attentively remains extremely common. Comparing the two observations, there is almost no difference, indicating that judicial authorities still have no remedy for the malady of formalistic and ineffective collegial trials in the High Court.

2. Recommendations: How to Improve the Rude Court Culture?

1. From the above explanations, analysis, and comparisons, we can say that after two empirical court observations, apart from the first-case delay problem which has slightly improved due to increased supervision by judicial administrative units, the rest have largely "stayed in place." As for courtroom attitudes, they have even deteriorated. According to feedback from observers, generally speaking, the courtroom attitudes of High Court judges are even worse and ruder than those of District Court judges. The attitude of High Court judges in mocking, scolding, and insulting parties has reached a point that is unbearable to witness and hard to believe. The arrogant attitude and bureaucratic face of judges during trials have become intolerable. As quoted above, a judge teasing a party whose given name was "Keng-sheng" (rehabilitation), ordering a defendant to take off their shirt on the spot to satisfy the judge's curiosity to view "tattoos," making flippant remarks discriminating against women, and so on—the examples are numerous. We have only recorded the essential points, but more observers generally felt that judges showed signs of being "irritable, impatient," and "easily angered." As the saying goes, "Law is propriety." The aforementioned rude behavior of judges in the courtroom is clearly lacking in propriety. If it were an occasional emotional vent by one or two judges, it might be forgivable. But the problem is that the poor attitudes of judges during trials are quite numerous and have become a general malady, a substandard culture. Facing high-and-mighty judges who arbitrarily insult and scold parties and lawyers, ordinary people at the bottom can only swallow their grievances for the sake of peace. As one judge aptly put it: "Don't cause me trouble, it won't do you any good to cause me trouble," which best points out this hierarchical court culture.
2. In the face of judges' increasingly rude courtroom attitudes, on the one hand, it is indeed necessary to target judges with particularly poor courtroom attitudes for judicial evaluation, using long-term supervision methods and the social pressure of media public opinion to force them to improve. Furthermore, the argument that the excessive caseload of judges creates a mental burden, leading them to vent their emotions on the parties, is understandable but cannot be excused. Taxpayers go to court seeking justice; why should they bear the brunt of this frustration? If judges develop psychological illnesses (such as depression, irritability, etc.) due to excessive case loads, should the judicial authorities face this problem and provide counseling and treatment to judges with psychological barriers or illnesses? Moreover, if a judge has such psychological illnesses that are difficult to treat, should it be considered a reason of unsuitability for reassignment?
3. A legal proverb says: "Justice is not angry." If the rude trial culture in the courtroom cannot be improved, how can we expect the people to treat each other with "reason"?

IV. Conclusion

Uncovering the guiding hand behind the court culture—Must the people forever face courts with excessive caseloads?

Comparing the results from the JRF's first court observation to the second court observation, we can find the following points:

1. Apart from the first-case delay issue, other problems have not improved

   As can be seen from the above report, except for the first-case delay problem which improved slightly due to the court dispatching personnel to conduct regular "roll calls," other problems show no significant difference from the observation results conducted by the JRF in 1995. Although the Judicial Yuan has talked incessantly about judicial reform up to now, it has only been able to focus on the most formalistic issues, and has no effective remedy whatsoever for substantial courtroom culture issues.

2. Prosecutors making routine appearances and collegial systems remaining a mere formality remain unchanged

   Problems such as prosecutors making routine appearances and collegial systems being a mere formality have not improved at all over the past two years. Therefore, the failure of prosecutors to genuinely execute public prosecution leads judges to easily overstep their bounds and play the role of prosecutors themselves, acting like both players and referees. This is especially evident in how judges often treat defendants like fierce deities.

3. Must the people forever face such a court?

   Recently, judges have raised calls for "capped case closures." During the course of court observation, we also deeply felt that the burden of judges' caseloads indeed makes human-rights-respecting, reasonable, and fair trials hard to come by. Of course, we do not agree that judges can hastily close cases just because they have too many cases. However, we must raise serious questions for the judicial administrative authorities: all these maladies and problems have remained unchanged for two years, must the people forever face such a court? When on earth will the judicial administrative authorities show the willpower to truly solve the problem of judges' excessive case-handling burdens? When on earth will they return a court that respects human dignity to the people?