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Words: | Submitted: Mon Jun 19 2006
... some jurors will engage in estimating his probable guilt during the course of the trial. For these circumstances, the presumption of innocence is a reminder to all members of the court that this is not how a criminal procedure ought to be. Even though its value to the legal process as introduced seems to be a very normative one, the presumption of innocence is also of great practical importance in structuring the procedure of a trial - more specifically, in allocating the burden of proof. It is a general rule in criminal law that, while the accused is presumed to be innocent, the prosecution bears the legal burden of proving guilt. In this sense, the presumption of innocence expresses the incidence of the prosecution's burden of proof, his obligation to establish his case, the defendant's guilt, beyond a reasonable doubt. To say that an accused is presumed to be innocent ...
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