People's Court Opens
EBRIM-HASZ – The People's Court of Zilatra opened for business on January 14th, with a marathon five-hour opening session covering five criminal trials and one preliminary hearing. The nation's legal system has taken seventy-two years, four Internal Commissars, the General Secretaries, and two High Judges to read this point, but it has finally opened its doors. All cases were heard by the High Judge, currently the sole judge on the bench, and were argued by some of the ten lawyers that passed the bar in the class of 68VE.
The docket started off with the case of Jacze si Qadali v Mikhail Suhochkocva, a case that has been floating around the Zilatra judiciary for decades. Comrade Mikhail Suhochkocva was accursed of one count of Hate Speech relating to the repeated use of an ableist slur in an argument, and a Constitutional Violation of §I-D-X, which prohibits the organisation of a political party separate from the Xeroist Union Party. The case ended in a default judgement after Comrade Suhochkocva failed to respond to the subpoena and appear in court, with the defendant being found guilty on both charges. Comrade Jacze's prosecuting lawyer, Comrade Szal si Ahuden, recommended a sentence of permanent banishment, the maximum penalty for Hate Speech under the Criminal Code — a recommendation that was accepted by Comrade High Judge Taliyah si Hala. The banishment was promptly carried out by the supervising ZSD officer.
The next two cases were Zilatra v. Eksar Prym and Zilatra v. Emerald Zelenik, both brought by Szal si Ahuden after the Commissars failed to submit reports to the Kelita in violation of III-1-a. These cases were short, only requiring the judge's certification of out-of-court plea deals negotiated in each case. The Incumbent Information Commissar, Comrade Eksar Prym was sentenced to a formal warning and a R$10,000 fine, while former Industrial Commissar Comrade Zelenik received a formal warning and a R$5,000 fine.
The fourth case on the docket was the day's main event: the case of Szal si Ahuden v. Ivan Iuminov. The prosecution alleged that Mr Iuminov abused his power in pinging the Citizen role twice to promote a political rally, affecting the fairness of the last General Secretary election. The defence, representing himself, pled not guilty to all four charges. The trial lasted more than two hours, with twenty-eight pieces of evidence being tabled, and thousands of words being presented in the arguments.