Abstract
Abstract Judges should not be influenced by legally irrelevant circumstances in their legal decision making and judges generally believe that they manage legally irrelevant circumstances well. The purpose of this experimental study was to investigate whether this self-image is correct. Swedish judges (N = 256) read a vignette depicting a case of libel, where a female student had claimed on her blog that she had been sexually harassed by a named male professor. The professor had sued the student for libel and the student retracted her claim during the hearing. Half of the judges received irrelevant information - that the professor himself had been convicted of libel a year earlier, while the other half did not receive this information. For the outcome variable, the judges were asked to state how much compensation the student should pay the professor. Those judges who received information about the professor himself having been convicted of libel stated that he should be given significantly less compensation than those who did not receive the irrelevant information. The results show that the judges’ decision was affected by legally irrelevant circumstances. Implications for research and practice are discussed
Highlights
Judges should not be infuenced by legally irrelevant circumstances in their legal decision making and judges generally believe that they manage legally irrelevant circumstances well
Swedish judges (N 1⁄4 256) read a vignette depicting a case of libel, where a female student had claimed on her blog that she had been sexually harassed by a named male professor
Since the present study was conducted with a sample of Swedish judges, some remarks on the Swedish legal system are in order before moving on to a description of how irrelevant evidence affects legal decision-making
Summary
Judges should not be infuenced by legally irrelevant circumstances in their legal decision making and judges generally believe that they manage legally irrelevant circumstances well. Implications for research and practice are discussed It is fundamental for the rule of law that judges are not influenced by legally irrelevant circumstances. A large portion of research on how legally irrelevant factors affects legal decision-making has focused on aspects of the involved parties, such as judge or defendant characteristics. Since the present study was conducted with a sample of Swedish judges, some remarks on the Swedish legal system are in order before moving on to a description of how irrelevant evidence affects legal decision-making. According to the preparatory works of the Swedish Code of Judicial Procedure it is not the legislator’s intent that the possibility to reject evidence should be used to prevent information about criminal charges or other character evidence from being put forward by a party. A general ban of character evidence had not been consistent with the principle of free evidence and therefor the possibility to reject character evidence should only be used in exceptional cases when the evidence
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