By Alec Carter, Paralegal
When a court finds someone guilty of a criminal offence, most people focus on the outcome: was the accused convicted or acquitted? However, the law requires much more than simply announcing a verdict. Article 382 of the Criminal Code lays down essential requirements that every judgment of conviction must satisfy, all of which serve a very important purpose by ensuring that justice is not only done, but is done clearly, transparently, and according to law.
Article 382 effectively requires that a judgment contains three fundamental elements. First, the court must clearly state the facts of which the accused has been found guilty. Secondly, it must impose the punishment. And finally, it must identify the specific provision of the Criminal Code, or any other law, which creates the offence. These requisites are not optional formalities or matters of style. They are precautionary safeguards that allow the accused, the Prosecution, and anyone reading the judgment to understand precisely what crime has been proved and under which provision of law conviction has been found.
The Court of Criminal Appeal has repeatedly stressed that simply discussing the evidence is not enough. Possibly the most cited judgment in this regard is Il-Pulizija vs Stephen Bonsfield [REF: 327/2005], where the Court of Criminal Appeal asserted that referring to the facts of the case in passing during the drafting of a judgment do not satisfy the strict requirements laid out in Article 382. Hence, the law requires the Court to expressly delineate what offence has been proved, as it is not legally acceptable for the reader to infer the answer from the rest of the judgment.
The abovementioned judgment also stipulated that the citing of an incorrect article of the law is tantamount to the absence of an applicable provision under which the accused could be found guilty under. Moreover, a plea of nullity may be raised ex officio by an appellate Court, and this despite no grievance of nullity having been tabled by the appellant.
Thus, the first-instance Court may spend a hefty amount of pages analysing witness testimony, documents, and other evidence; but unless the operative part of the judgment clearly states the offence and correctly identifies the applicable legal provisions, the requirements of Article 382 would not have been met.
Similarly, in Il-Pulizija vs Saleh Saleh et [REF: 242/2023/1, 242/2023/2, and 242/2023/3], the Court of Criminal Appeal dealt with a different type of defect. The reasoning of this judgment stated that the accused could not be found guilty on one of the charges because the complaint had been withdrawn. Yet, when the court came to the final operative part of the judgment, it declared the accused guilty of that same charge and this in contrast to its earlier statement. This contradiction created uncertainty as to what the accused had actually been convicted of. The Court of Criminal Appeal held that such an inconsistency meant that the judgment failed to satisfy the requirements of Article 382.
Perhaps the most striking aspect of the case-law is the consequence of these errors. Jurisprudence has consistently held that a failure to comply with Article 382 is not a minor procedural defect. Instead, it is tantamount to the omission of a substantial legal formality, making the judgment itself null. Having established this, however, the resulting nullity does not invalidate the entire criminal proceedings. Rather, only the judgment itself is affected, and the first-instance Court is required to deliver a fresh judgment which complies with the requirements laid down by law.
The contents of this article are intended for informational purposes only and should not be construed as legal advice on any matter. Neither do they constitute or create a lawyer-client relationship with any reader. Said contents are not intended to be, and should not be used as, a substitute for taking legal advice in any specific situation. No responsibility is accepted for any actions taken or not taken on the basis of this publication.