Criminal Justice and Emotion

Commandment shall belong [...] and one shall obey to a faceless order, which may be expected, given its impersonality, to rule without passion and to be listened to without anger »2. To reach such an aim, practice and criminal procedure try to erase from judgment « passive » emotions as well as some « active » ones that are not based on any logical thinking, since they paralyse the judge's autonomous reasoning. However, among such hounded emotions, only those which can be genuinely controlled by their materialisation are likely to be avoided and to involve the judge's responsibility. Furthermore, one has to take into account the judge's self-discipline by making him aware of these issues thanks to deontological rules. Nevertheless, and despite the fear of arbitrariness that emotions might trigger, the right administration of justice cannot cast aside every emotional consideration : a judge perceives emotions such as the methodological doubts that are necessary to his judgment ; he must also take into account the ones felt by others. As a result, within the space left for emotions, a magistrate tries to regulate those which legitimately survive. A judge is ultimately brought back to his status of social being, he cannot escape the emotions which he has integrated through his socialization. He represents social emotions and stays in tune with the values they reveal. The contribution of these emotions to the final decision is legitimised by their representativeness. This legitimacy finally spreads out to the judge's decisions and actions.