The responsibility of judges to assure due process: Tension among neutrality, rights protection, and role

法官确保正当程序的责任：中立性、权利保护和角色之间的紧张关系

• 批准号: 1456772
• 负责人: Larry Heuer
• 金额: $ 19.38万
• 依托单位: Barnard College
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-07-01 至 2017-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1456772&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: responsibility; judges; assure; due; process

AbstractSES-1456772The Responsibility of Judges to Assure Due Process: Tension Among Neutrality, Rights Protection, and RolePI - Larry HeuerCo-PI - Steven PenrodThe decision of the US Supreme Court in Turner v. Rogers (2011) has prompted consideration of the role of judges in cases in which a party, or parties, are not represented by counsel. In Turner, the Court held that judges in child support cases have a specific duty to ensure that judicial processes are fair to parents who are not represented by counsel. Turner has given rise to debate about how judges can fulfill the duty to ensure that judicial processes are fair to parties without counsel while at the same fulfilling the duty to apply the law neutrally to all parties. The question has considerable currency. In communities across the country, state courts are inundated by millions of people unable to afford private counsel and unable to secure the limited free services made available by the civil legal aid bar. Communities are therefore weighing a range of options to helping to assure the fair resolution of cases for people without lawyers. Many states have modified their respective codes of judicial conduct, or have developed other guidance for judges, to provide that a judge may take steps to ensure that judicial processes are fair to unrepresented parties without violating the judge's duty to apply the law neutrally to all parties. Yet, how these changes will be realized on the ground is a complicated matter. Two studies carried out by this project will examine different aspects of the question of whether and how judges can fulfill their duty to ensure that judicial processes are fair to unrepresented parties while at the same fulfilling their duty to ensure that the law is applied neutrally to all parties. The research findings are expected to advance theory on procedural justice and inform practice and policy on judicial education. The project also has a broader educational impact, including training and mentoring of undergraduate students, law students, and a postdoctoral fellow. Both studies will be carried out in the New York City Housing Court, specifically focusing on the role of Housing Court Judges in reviewing the fairness of proposed stipulations of settlement in cases in which a landlord has brought an action seeking recovery of an apartment from an unrepresented tenant based on the tenant's alleged nonpayment of rent. The first study--a courtroom experiment--asks whether training judges to preserve procedural fairness in cases involving unrepresented parties can a) increase judicial engagement with the unrepresented party, b) help the unrepresented party understand the information needed in the case, and/or c) increase the unrepresented party's perception of procedural fairness and of the legitimacy of the court. The experiment will train 40 judges in procedural fairness and survey the judges (and litigants and attorneys in their cases) on five trials prior to the judges' training and five trials after training (thus permitting controlled testing of training effects). Four hundred target cases will be observed and the behaviors of the participants and outcomes systematically coded (with the above dependent variables in mind). A team of trained law students will code the case files. The second study--a controlled experiment--asks whether educating all the parties about the role of judges in preserving procedural fairness for unrepresented parties can minimize the parties' possible perception of judges as biased in favor of unrepresented parties. The experiment involves a 3 (Party Representation Balance: Balanced, Neither party represented vs. Imbalanced, tenant represented vs. Imbalanced, landlord represented) x 2 (Judge is engaged as per training vs. passive) x 2 (Party: Tenant vs. Landlord) x 2 (Outcome: Favors landlord vs. favors tenant) x 2 (Procedure Overview: Present vs. absent). The two studies are expected to cast light on additional underlying questions, including the following: a) do unrepresented parties' views on the treatment they deserve have a bearing on their perceptions of whether the judicial processes are fair, and b) is procedural fairness as important to the parties as it is to the judges?

法官确保正当程序的责任：中立、权利保护和角色之间的紧张关系美国最高法院在特纳诉罗杰斯案（2011年）中的裁决促使人们考虑法官在一方或多方没有律师代表的案件中的作用。在Turner案中，最高法院认为，审理子女抚养费案件的法官有具体责任确保司法程序对没有律师代理的父母是公平的。特纳引发了关于法官如何履行职责，确保司法程序对没有律师的当事人公平，同时履行职责，对所有当事人中立地适用法律的辩论。这个问题很流行.在全国各地的社区，州法院被数百万人淹没，他们负担不起私人律师的费用，也无法获得民事法律的援助律师所提供的有限的免费服务。因此，社区正在权衡一系列选择，以帮助确保没有律师的人的案件得到公平解决。许多州修改了各自的司法行为守则，或为法官制定了其他指南，规定法官可以采取措施，确保司法程序对无代表的当事人公平，而不违反法官对所有当事人中立适用法律的义务。然而，如何在实地实现这些变化是一个复杂的问题。 该项目进行的两项研究将审查法官是否以及如何履行其职责，确保司法程序对无代表当事方公平，同时履行其职责，确保法律对所有当事方中立适用的问题的不同方面。研究结果有望推动程序正义理论的发展，并为司法教育的实践和政策提供信息。 该项目还具有更广泛的教育影响，包括培训和指导本科生，法律学生和博士后研究员。这两项研究都将在纽约市住房法院进行，特别侧重于住房法院法官在审查拟议的解决规定是否公平的案件中的作用，在这些案件中，房东提起诉讼，寻求从无律师代表的房客那里收回公寓，理由是房客据称不支付租金。 第一项研究-一项法庭实验-询问培训法官在涉及无代表当事人的案件中维护程序公正是否可以a）增加与无代表当事人的司法接触，B）帮助无代表当事人了解案件所需的信息，和/或c）增加无代表当事人对程序公正和法院合法性的看法。 该试验将对40名法官进行程序公正方面的培训，并就法官培训前的五次审判和培训后的五次审判对法官（以及其案件中的诉讼当事人和律师）进行调查（从而可以对培训效果进行有控制的测试）。将观察400个目标病例，并对参与者的行为和结果进行系统编码（考虑到上述因变量）。 一组受过训练的法律学生将对案件档案进行编码。 第二项研究-一项对照实验-询问是否教育所有当事人法官在为无代表当事人维护程序公正方面的作用，可以最大限度地减少当事人对法官偏袒无代表当事人的可能看法。 实验涉及3（当事人代表平衡：平衡，双方都没有代表与不平衡，租户代表与不平衡，房东代表）x 2（法官参与培训与被动）x 2（当事人：租户与房东）x 2（结果：有利于房东与有利于房客）x 2（程序概述：在场与缺席）。 预计这两项研究将有助于阐明其他基本问题，包括以下问题：（a）无律师代表的当事方对他们应受待遇的看法是否影响到他们对司法程序是否公正的看法，以及（B）程序公正对当事方和对法官是否同样重要？