Lay judges

A lay judge is a person assisting a judge in a trial and as such are sometimes called lay assessors. Lay judges are used in some civil law jurisdictions. Japan began implementing a new lay judge system in 2009. Lay judges are appointed volunteers and often require some legal instruction. However, they are not permanent officers, as they tend proceedings about once a month, and often receive only nominal or "costs covered" pay. Lay judges are usually used when the country does not have juries. Lay judges may be randomly selected for a single trial (like jurymen), or politically appointed. In the latter case, they may usually not be rejected by the prosecution, the defense, or the permanent judges. Lay judges are similar to magistrates of England and Wales, but magistrates sit about twice more often.

In criminal proceedings, lay judges sit alongside professional judges on cases carrying a maximum punishment of more than five years, as well as for political crimes. Lay judges are also used in labor, social, and commercial law disputes.

In Brazil, the Law Nº 9.099/1995 created the "Juizados Especiais" (Special Petty Courts), with restricted jurisdiction to settle small claims (understood as those with a "lawsuit worth" lower than 40 times the country's minimum wage) and/or criminal misdemeanors (listed in the Executive Order Nº 3.688/1941). In this procedure, lay judges act under supervision of judges to preside over the court as well as to act as conciliators. Their decisions, called "pareceres", are submitted to the judge for homologation before it has any effects between the parties. According to the law, lay judges must be selected among lawyers with more than 5 years of experience.

Except for most crimes for which the trier of fact is a single professional judge, and serious political crimes which are tried before a panel of professional judges, in the judiciary of Germany all charges are tried before mixed tribunals on which lay judges (Schöffen; a kind of lay judge or alderman) sit side by side with professional judges. Section 263 of the German Code of Criminal Procedure requires a two-thirds majority for most decisions unfavorable to the defendant; denial of probation by simple majority is an important exception. In most cases lay judges do not directly examine documents before the court or have access to the case file.

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