Comparative Law, Constitutional Law, Criminal Law, Murder, Police and Prosecutors, Soering

Jens Soering’s Guilt and a System Failure of German Journalism

UPDATE: 15 July. Full disclosure: this post has gotten some attention since I posted it. I've made a number of revisions to it after correspondence with people very familiar with the case, who graciously corrected some errors. I'm also reading 'Beyond Reason', the 1990 book about the case, and may update the post a bit… Continue reading Jens Soering’s Guilt and a System Failure of German Journalism

European Court of Justice, Federal Administrative Court, Human Dignity

Human Dignity and Laser Tag

The guiding principle of the post-war German legal order is human dignity, which stands symbolically at the very beginning of the modern German constitution, the Basic Law: (1) Human dignity shall be inviolable. To respect and protect it shall be the duty of all state authority. But what exactly is human dignity? In common-law countries, it's… Continue reading Human Dignity and Laser Tag