Law of Evidence Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words - 4

Law of Evidence - Essay Example As a result, three recognizable problems can be established. First, the impact on the European Convention of Human Rights on the statutory provisions which seem to offer expressly for a burden of proof that is to be placed on a defendant. The second problem is that whether such burden has ever been placed on a defendant in a criminal trial. And, thirdly, if it possible to inform if Parliament has, in a specific statute, impliedly placed such a burden on a defendant3. Where the issue of implied reverse burden of proof arises by way of statute, it needs to be compatible and given effect with any rights protected under the Article 6(2) ECHR4. The Human Rights Act 1998 (HRA 1998) is where the Convention actually integrated into English laws5. A legal burden of proof is also known as ‘persuasive’ burden of proof. The persuasive burden of proof is the responsibility that is vested on only one party and ought to be satisfied so as to win in any specific issue in question. In that perspective, in some criminal trials, only one party bears the burden of proof on some issue and a different party on others. A discussion that relates to the legal burden of proof in any specific trial usually makes no sense unless that burden is related to a particular issue of fact. It is really very important to establish that the guilt of the accused is for the prosecution to prove and remains there all through the trial as in Woolmington v DPP6. Adrian cited that a legal burden is a burden of proof which a standard of proof can actually be assigned but saved in the case where the defendant needs to establish his insanity upon a balance of probabilities and of defence of insanity. In some instances, a ‘reverse legal burden’ is placed on the defendant7. Donnellan argued that reverse burden procedures usually arises when the statute that creates the criminal offense imposes a legal burden on the