Decade-Old Cases Finally Being Heard in Court Amid Speedup Campaign
Mech Dara| Tue Sep 8, 2020 11:51 am

Oum Sophy has been locked in a land dispute with a government minister’s wife since 2007, and had an incitement charge hanging over her since 2008 — one of more than 12,000 stalled cases that had been stuck in the country’s justice system.

Over the intervening decade, her house was bulldozed; she was forced to move and change jobs; and she clashed repeatedly with military and police while leading protests over the dispute in Kampong Chhnang province’s Lor Peang village.

Her court case was not resolved until last month, when the Phnom Penh Municipal Court finally handed her a guilty verdict and suspended one-year jail sentence, meaning she would not have to serve time in prison.

There have been several court summonses over the years, but her dispute with KDC International, co-owned by Energy Minister Suy Sem’s wife Chea Kheng, reached a court verdict as part of a new Justice Ministry campaign to process the thousands of delayed cases around the country. Last week, it said the campaign, started in May, had cleared 8,000 — or 63 percent — of the cases.

Keut Rith, newly appointed as Justice Minister this year, said there were numerous cases that had been stalled for seven or eight years.

“Let’s think about cases being kept for seven or eight years — you can’t talk about whether their trials are just or not,” Rith said. When judges and prosecutors allow so much time to lapse, “it is already an injustice for the parties in the case, and the justice that they’ve waited for for so long becomes meaningless.”

Speaking at the opening of a new Appeal Court in Sihanoukville on September 3, Rith urged judges and prosecutors to continue to clear old cases “quickly, correctly, with justice and without corruption.” He added that he considered the accumulation of stalled cases simply a result of Cambodia “not being an advanced country with enough resources,” and estimated the campaign could be finished by early next year.
Full article: https://vodenglish.news/decade-old-case ... -campaign/