4 - The Special Court’s Jurisdiction, Organization, and Trials

Summary

This chapter discusses the legal competence of the Special Court for Sierra Leone. First, the chapter discusses the personal jurisdiction of the Court and the decision to prosecute the crimes that had already been established as legal norms under international law and domestic Sierra Leonean law. The chapter thereafter examines the origin of each of the prosecutable crimes from prior international tribunals, namely crimes against humanity, war crimes and other serious violations of international humanitarian law, and the debates and difficulties that stemmed from using Sierra Leone’s law as the basis for offenses. Second, it analyzes the temporal jurisdiction of the court, while the civil war lasted nearly a decade the temporal jurisdiction of the Special Court only covered a few years in the last part of a ten-year conflict, leaving a large part of atrocities without any prosecutions. Finally, the chapter addresses the Special Court’s prosecutions of all parties to the Sierra Leone conflict, including the controversial government-funded militia, in an attempt to avoid criticism as another “victors justice” court.