The Case Of Aaron Hernandez: Inquisitorial Vs. Adversarial System

Aaron Hernandez: Inquisitorial v Adversarial system

About five years ago, a 27 year old man was shot seven times and murdered. His body was then abandoned in an industrial park, which was later found by the authorities. The man who was murdered, Odin L. J. Lloyd, was a linebacker for the semi-pro football team, the “Boston Bandits”. For this paper, I will cite the case of Commonwealth vs. Aaron Hernandez, which took place in the Superior Court of Massachusetts, for which the former pro football player was suspected of murder. Using this particular case, I will examine how the inquisitorial system can better serve justice than the adversarial system. Both legal systems aim to achieve justice for the cases that are presented to them. However,

After that, since Aaron Hernandez did not get an immediate response, he stopped by Odin Lloyd’s house to pick him up. That same night, Lloyd was last seen in a car with Aaron Hernandez, Ernest Wallace and Carlos Ortiz. Ernest Wallace and Carlos Ortiz were known to be Hernandez’s “right hand men”. While Odin Lloyd was in the car, he maintained contact with his sister until some time at 2:00 in the morning. He sent vague messages to her saying “you saw who im with”, “n f l”, and “just so you know”. The text messages were admitted into evidence but the defense argued that it was circumstantial evidence due to the fact that nothing was explicitly said, that the prosecution is just infereing what happened after those text messages. Odin Lloyd was murdered on June 17, 2013. He was shot seven times and it was assumed that he was first shot in his back. Early the next morning, his body was found in an industrial park, less than a mile away from Aaron Hernandez’s home, by a local

Societies that use the adversarial system as their legal structure, define their relationship with the state as “the rule of law”. Rule of law is defined by the United Nations as a “principle of governance in which all persons, institutions and entities, public and private, including the state itself are accountable to laws that are publicly promulgated, equally enforced, and independently adjudicated, which are consistent with international human rights principles”. The adversarial system defines the public interest in criminal justice as an interest of crime control and security, where authorities such as prosecutors are trusted as long as they are democratically elected to power. Also comparative criminal justice consists of a “detailed understanding of not [the] just criminal justice processes but also the actors involved in it and the society that forms the backdrop to these processes”. Unlike in the inquisitorial system, the adversarial system was tailored in such a way to ensure that the state will not have too much power making decision in a criminal case, because it could lead to lack of trust in the system. This is the reason why juries and jury systems were established, so that an ordinary citizen can partake in convictions and the responsibility