Immunity (legal)

Immunity confers a status on a person or body that places him/her/it above the law and makes that person or body free from otherwise legal obligations such as, for example, liability for torts or damages or prosecution under criminal law for criminal acts. There are various types of immunity, such as judicial immunity, prosecutorial immunity, parliamentary immunity, immunity from prosecution, diplomatic immunity, qualified immunity, and sovereign immunity. This exemption from an obligation or being penalized was formed for instances wherein the gravity of finding the perpetrators or the elements of a crime or situation far out-weighed the penalty for the individual who was being considered for immunity. Societal benefits play an important role in decisions in the attempts to solve certain matters and a balancing act is created in favor of the development of other individuals, families, and communities towards a lasting peace.

Types of Immunity

Sovereign immunity

Sovereign immunity is based on the idea that a sovereign is superior to all in authority and power. It prevents, in advance, a suit or prosecution against a sovereign, being a monarch, ruler, or government, without the sovereign's consent.

Judicial immunity

Judicial immunity, which finds its origin in sovereign immunity, is the absolute immunity of a judge or magistrate from any kind of civil liability for an act performed in the judge's official capacity. Hence, while sitting on the bench the judge cannot be sued for defamation if he or she makes a statement about one of the parties before the court that might otherwise be considered slander.

Like judicial immunity, the prosecutor, who is acting under the direction of the sovereign or crown to prosecute cannot be held liable for acts done as an agent of the sovereign. This is distinguished from false arrest.

Parliamentary immunity

Parliamentary immunity is granted to elected government officials during their official acts in parliament, congress or other public deliberative organ of government. Such immunity is seen to be a means to the free discussion of ideas, although when it is abused there may be ways to surmount such immunity; this was invoked in the case of Jürgen Möllemann.

Lifting of Parliamentary immunity in the Mollemann case

Jürgen Wilhelm Möllemann (July 15, 1945 – June 5, 2003) was a German politician. Born in Augsburg, he served as a member of the German government as minister of state in the department of foreign affairs (1982-1987), minister for education and science (1987-1991), and as minister for economy (1991-1993) and vice chancellor (1992-1993) under chancellor Helmut Kohl, but had to resign in 1993 when he used an official letterhead for advertising a relative's business idea (the so-called Briefbogen-Affäre). Shortly before his death, Möllemann had been confronted with allegations he had been involved in illegal arms deals and evaded taxes on millions of euros he allegedly earned from those activities. To enable a full investigation on these charges, the Bundestag lifted his parliamentary immunity on June 5, 2003 at 12:28, 22 minutes before his death. The tax evasion charges were dropped after his death, while other investigations are ongoing.

Prosecutorial immunity

Immunity from prosecution occurs when a prosecutor grants immunity to a witness in exchange for testimony. It is immunity because the prosecutor essentially agrees to never prosecute the crime that the witness might have committed in exchange for that testimony.

In international criminal law, countries which are signatories to treaties may sign with the reservation that they are specifically exempted from prosecution, thus granting themselves immunity. For example, in 1948 the United States signed the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide with the proviso that no claim of genocide could be brought against it at the International Court of Justice without its consent. It later invoked this immunity in the Court of Justice to deflect charges of genocide brought against it by Yugoslavia.

International Court of Justice

The International Court of Justice (known colloquially as the World Court or ICJ; French: Cour internationale de Justice) is the primary judicial organ of the United Nations. It is based in the Peace Palace in The Hague, Netherlands, sharing the building with the Hague Academy of International Law, a private centre for the study of international law. Several of the Court's current judges are either alumni or former faculty members of the Academy.

Diplomatic immunity

Diplomatic immunity, an agreed policy between sovereign governments, ensures that diplomats are given safe passage and are considered not susceptible to lawsuit or prosecution under the host country's laws (although they can be expelled or declared unwanted).

Qualified immunity

Qualified immunity is a term in the United States granting immunity to individuals performing tasks as part of the government. Certain individuals are immune from lawsuits when "insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known." . Certain individuals who are not government employees may have qualified immunity if they are considered a "state actor".

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Cooper-Hill, James, The law of sovereign immunity and terrorism, Dobbs Ferry, NY: Oceana Publications, 2006. ISBN 0-379-21547-2
• Mooney, Krista Michele, The evolution and expansion of Eleventh Amendment immunity legal implications for public institutions of higher education, Pd.D. thesis, Florida State University, 2005. OCLC 124559656
• Zhou, Xiao Lin, The law and practice of state immunity: a thesis, Cambridge, MA: Harvard Law School, 1990. OCLC 33469690

External link

[1]. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (12/9/1948) United Nations Treaty Collection. Retrieved October 3, 2007.

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