Hong Kong courtroom proceedings ensure a level playing field

One major factor ensuring a level playing field is the responsibility of the jury. The jury consists of seven people randomly selected from different areas of the community. Jury is a representation of the public, and its role is to analyse the facts of the case objectively as a reasonable person, and to decide as a group whether the defendant is liable for his conduct . The Jury’s main role is to assist the judge to reach a conclusion and they are not responsible for the decision as to the sentence .

The language of law is quite different from normal English. This language barrier may cause some difficultly for people without a high degree of education, even for the educated ones, because the language of law is so formal and contains a lot of argots that can only be understood by occupation itself, there may be still some misunderstanding such as communication problems between these people and the lawyers and the judges. Most courtroom proceedings operate in English, I myself as a university student did not have full understanding of the language in the court, and 98% of Hong Kong inhabitants claim Chinese to be their native language. In courts, the use of English and Chinese are common, and hence without complete knowledge of both languages, this could lead to an unfair playing field because of these types of people.

However, It is not that ideal in reality. People are emotional and sometimes they may not see the issues objectively as different people have different values and beliefs. For example, from the video “Trail Consultancies”, the jury was selected scientifically from the mock trial to attend in a sexual harassment case, there were more male juror’s than female juror’s, as a result, the defendant did not get convicted for his conduct because the jury contained male and hence they were less sensitive to the issue. There is also a professionalism problem I observed from the court that the jury wa

Some topics in this essay:
Chinese English, Hong Kong, Language Barrier, Courts English, English Chinese, playing field, level playing field, level playing, , hong kong, language barrier, courtroom proceedings, fairness justice, adversary system, language law, factors affect fairness, legal system, language court,