Introduction

With the judiciary playing one of the most important roles within the criminal justice system, the main method of assessing judges' opinions, values and ethics is through reading case reports. The instructions stressed to the interviewers when writing up their interviews it was important to present verbatim the judges' views along with their interpretations of legal developments and current issues in the criminal law and procedural field experienced by the judges they interviewed. Increasingly, respective national jurisdictions have to deal with criminal cases emanating from transnational organised crime as well as the international terrorist threat. In addition to this, some jurisdictions, especially those in Europe, have to give consideration to the decision of courts from supranational/quasi-governmental bodies such as the European Union (EU). This introduction further presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book.