Judiciary in India is struggling hard to digitize itself for speedier justice and that is a good news. But the bad news is that judges can also make decisions based on what appears on front pages of newspapers or their web sites, as the research on judgements of US Supreme court shows.
US Supreme Court justices Sotomayor and Anthony Kennedy’s differences on use of internet in arguments became hottest internet news for a long time.
It raised the issue of how judges can grasp wrong idea and wrong information when flooded with new information at finger tip. Fact and fiction are thrown together by new data mining technology and raw statistics.
Allison Larsson, a professor at William and Mary Law School did a research on 15 years of US Supreme Court decisions. Her thesis asserts over 100 cases where facts were drawn from authorities that were not mentioned in briefs from either side. A total of 120 cases from 2000 to 2010, rated as best examples, were judged largely by whether they appeared on front pages of newspapers or their digitized web sites.
Sixty percent of these cases contained facts from in-house research. In-house research meaning using its own employees, time and machinery to find facts.
Larsson writes in Washington Post that virtually all justices “cite authorities they find themselves on a wide range of subjects (from biology to history to golf)”
The professor writes that there are no rules or formats established for in-house research, and that is risky, “The possibility of mistake, unfairness to the parties and judicial enshrinement of biased data which can now be posted to the world by anyone without cost”. The professor argues that “no lawyer from the other side knew about it or had a chance to challenge it”.
Justices should only consider facts given in the briefs and arguments during questioning. Outside information other than text of constitution or precedence of a case should be prohibited.
Google based research may not be far from political preoccupations in judges thoughts.
Asked candidly what is the best solution, the professor said, “I will tell you Justice Souter (under whom she did clerkship) did not own a computer”.
We the public salute professor Larsson for sharing such wisdom but what is the use if our lord justices can not be convinced that googling is bad, very bad for getting the justice.
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