Supreme Court of Pakistan prohibits execution of condemned prisoners with mental illnesses: A promising start towards reforming Pakistan’s death penalty problem?
On 10 February, 2021, a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court of Pakistan (SC) delivered its landmark judgement in Safia Bano v. Home Department (along with 2 consolidated cases). This...
India’s Feeble Frontline Defence against Incarceration
An important constitutional safeguard against arbitrary incarceration is the fundamental right of an arrested person to be produced before a judicial magistrate within twenty four hours of the arrest. In...
Sadaf Aziz v. Federation of Pakistan: The end of virginity testing in Pakistan?
Across Pakistan, the two finger test (TFT), also known as the virginity and hymen test is conducted on female survivors and victims of rape and sexual abuse. It is a...
Classism, Hate Crime and the Law Commission’s Consultation Paper 250: Lessons from Discrimination Law
In the context of hate crime, class has two main analytical roles. First, it can be a ground of hate crime in itself, though the current law fails to recognise...
African Human Rights Court holds vagrancy laws incompatible with African human rights instruments
The African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights on 4 December 2020, delivered a historic Advisory Opinion against vagrancy laws (laws which criminalize the status of individuals as being poor,...
RBG: Advancing Justice in the Criminal Legal System
Over the course of her 27-year tenure as a United States Supreme Court Justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg consistently voted to protect the rights of the marginalized and dispossessed, reflecting an...
Police Brutality in the United States (with Shea Streeter)
This episode is part of a four-part series in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. In this episode, we talk to Shea Streeter about the seemingly intractable issue of...
The UK’s Overseas Operations Bill: licence to kill?
The UK Government is seeking to pass a new legislation that would impede prosecutions against British troops for crimes committed whilst serving abroad. The Bill, currently at the committee stage...
Ten years of the Argentine inquiry into Franco-era crimes: what has been achieved?
On 14 April 2010, the Argentinean criminal courts began an investigation into alleged crimes against humanity committed during the Franco regime. The investigation was initiated under the principle of universal...
Arbitrary & Disproportionate Criminalisation of Marginalised Communities: A Countermap of Pandemic Policing in India
The Criminal Justice and Police Accountability Project studied 34,000 arrest records and 500 First Information Reports filed in Madhya Pradesh, India to understand the patterns of pandemic policing and locate...
Unaccompanied migrant minors and ‘protective custody’ practices in Greece: light at the end of the tunnel?
The high number of unaccompanied migrant minors detained in ‘protective custody’ in police station cells and pre-removal detention centers across Greece has been a matter of vehement legal and political...
Communication, Education and Speech Difficulties in the Criminal Justice System
The level of educational achievement by incarcerated offenders in the UK is far lower than the average. In addition, 40-50% of prisoners assessed in John Rack’s research for the Dyslexia...
