Judicial Regulations (Consolidation) Act

Judicial Regulations (Consolidation) Act

The Parliament of the Islands of Nymrod, pursuant to the article four of the constitution, resolves the following;

# Chapter One

**General Provisions and Definitions**

1  - By virtue of the passage of this Act, Parliament repeals and replaces the Server Protection Act; the Judicial Conduct and Civil Procedure Act; and Section 3 of the Elected Officials Protocol Act.

2  - The Committee of Transparency, Corruption and Ethics shall herein be referred to as the CTCE.

3  - The Rules of the Discord Server named ‘Parliament of Nyrmod’ shall herein be referred to as the Rules.

4  - The Discord Server named ‘Parliament of Nyrmod’ shall herein be referred to as the Server.

5  - The Judiciary of the Islands of Nyrmod shall be defined for the purposes of this Act as the CTCE and the Supreme Court.

# Chapter Two

**Interpretation and Enforcement of the Rules.**

6  - The Rules of the Discord Server shall be treated in the same manner as the ordinary Statute law of the Islands of Nymod.

(1)  - The Rules may only be amended by the same manner in which ordinary legislation is amended, by a simple majority of the National Assembly and the signature of the President.

7  - Arbitration of the Rules is the responsibility of the CTCE, pending a legitimate request by a member of the Discord Server.

(1)  - A legitimate request for the purposes of this Act must have the following;

(a)  - the name of the defendant of the case;

(b)  - the specific Rule that they believe the defendant has breached;

(c)  - the name of the chat that the alleged breach of the Rules occurred;

(d)  - the name of the person the Claim was made on behalf of, if made in accordance with Section 7(1)(a).

(2)  For a request to be considered legitimate, the Claimant must provide evidence in the dedicated Evidence channel. For this Evidence to be considered it must have the following;

(a)  - the name of the request;

(i)  - the name of the request shall be styled ‘x v y’ with x being the name of the Claimant and y being the name of the defendant.

(b)  - the date of the Request.

8  - In order for a Request to the CTCE with regards to an alleged breach of the Rules, to be valid, the Claimant must have legal standing to make the Claim.

(1)  - Legal Standing shall be defined as follows;

(a)  - In cases of an alleged breach of Rule one, four, seven and ten, the Claimant must be a party to the original dispute in order to have legal standing.

(i)  - An individual may make a request on the behalf of an individual who was a party to a dispute or breach of the rules with the express permission of that party. This written permission must be received prior to the request and cannot be made retrospectively.

(b)   - For violations of other Rules, it is enough to be a Witness to the alleged offense to have standing.

(c)  - The Attorney-General has legal standing to initiate any request.

9  - Vexatious Litigants.

(1)  - If, on application by the Attorney-General, the Supreme Court is satisfied that an individual has habitually and persistently and without reasonable ground initiated vexatious requests, whether in the Supreme Court or the CTCE, and whether against the same individual or different individuals, then they may issue an injunction against that member preventing them from initiating any further requests without the written permission of the Attorney-General.

(a)   - Anyone with an injunction against them made under section 9(1) of this Act who makes a request may be muted for 24 hours.

(b)  - Repeated violations of an injunction may result in a seven day ban from the server.

(2)  - Vexatious litigation shall be defined as a legal action or proceeding initiated maliciously and without Probable Cause by an individual who is not acting in Good Faith for the purpose of annoying or embarrassing an opponent.

10 - Penalties.

(1)  - The creators may issue the following penalties upon finding a breach of the Rules;

(a)  - a warning;

(b)  - a mute of no more than 24 hours.

(2)  - The creators must notify the CTCE, in writing, when a mute has been issued, and the reason for this mute.

(3)  - The CTCE may issue the following penalties upon finding a breach of the Rules;

(a)  - a warning;

(b)  - a mute. Mutes may be either 12 hours or 24 hours depending on which Rule is in breach. In cases where multiple mutes are issued, the CTCE may isse them to be served sequentially or concurrently.

(c)   - In the event of a serious breach, or repeated violations of the Rules, the CTCE may request the Supreme Court to issue a ban, either for a designated period of time or permanently. The Supreme Court may then uphold the Ruling of the CTCE, pending any Appeal made under section 19 of this Act during the two day grace period established by section 10(5), or may vote to commute the sentence.

(d)   - The CTCE may issue a punishment that is less than the penalty prescribed in the Rules, but they may not issue a penalty which exceeds it.

(4)  - If a member of the Server is found to be in breach of the Rules and issued a penalty according to this Act then this will be stored on an Official Record of Penalties for six months (IRL) and if there is a further violation of the Rule that was breached in the first case, then a higher penalty must be issued.

(5)  - If the Supreme Court votes to ban a member for a breach of the Rules, that member shall have a grace period of two days from the publication of the decision, in which the member may appeal against the ruling. The member shall be muted for this two day period.

11 - Clarification of Terms.

(1)  - In order to be in breach of Rule one, an insult must be;

(a)  - objectively offensive to a reasonable onlooker or;

(b)  - if based on a subjective characteristic of the claimant or party to the dispute, this characteristic must be known to the defendant prior to the offence.

(2)  - Hatred against minorities includes the use of slurs.

(a)  - slurs need not be aimed at a minority to be considered a breach of Rule 9;

(b)  - a breach of Rule 9 shall be a strict liability offence, and there need not be intention to direct it towards a minority for it to be considered a breach;

(c)  - usage of a slur in the course of a quotation shall not be considered grounds for defense.

# Chapter Three

**Committee of Transparency, Corruption, and Ethics.**

12 - The CTCE shall be constituted as a branch of the Judiciary and shall be governed by this Statute.

13 - All parties that are elected to the National Assembly shall be entitled to send one representative to the CTCE. This member is appointed by the Party Chair after an election is held within the Party.

(1)  - Members of the executive are not eligible to sit in the CTCE.

(2)  - Deputies may only be eligible to stand for election to the CTCE if there are no non-Deputies available to represent the Party.

(3)  - Members must be formally elected within three days of the General Election to be seated.

14 - The CTCE shall be presided over by the Speaker of the CTCE, who shall be elected by CTCE members using Ranked Choice Voting.

(1)  - Only members who represent the four largest parties in the National Assembly at the time of the election of the members of the CTCE shall be eligible to run for Speaker.

(2)  - The Speaker of the CTCE shall be responsible for forming the Docket for the session and for the publication of CTCE Rulings.

(a)   - The Speaker may delegate these functions to another CTCE member, however they shall retain overall responsibility for them.

(3)  - The Speaker may call an Extraordinary Session of the CTCE to discuss cases before them

(a)  - The Speaker must give at least one hour to members before the start of the session.

(4)  - In the event the Speaker is unavailable, the Speaker or at least one third of CTCE members may nominate another member to act as Speaker Pro Tempore for the duration of that Session.

(5)  - A Quorum of 1/3rd of the members of the CTCE must vote in order for a ruling to be considered valid. Any member who does not wish to vote must state their intention to abstain from voting. Any member who does not vote due to inactivity shall be recorded as ‘not present’.

(a)   - Recused members shall be counted separately from abstention as ‘Recused’, and these recused members shall be counted for the purposes of a quorum.

(b)   - Anyone who is not automatically recused by law must state their intention to do so before the voting is held. Otherwise it shall be counted as ‘not present’.

15 - Powers and Duties.

(1)  - the CTCE shall have the following duties;

(a)  - Investigation of allegations of Corruption from Public Officials;

(i) - For the purposes of this Act, Public Officials are defined as any publicly employed individual, or private companies which are deemed to operate a significant public service.

(b)  - Investigation of allegations of Ethics Violations from Public Officials;

(c)  - Arbitration over alleged breaches of the Rules.

16 - Procedure.

(1)  - The Speaker will put all requests that meet the criteria established by section 7 on to the Docket and shall call a Session of the CTCE to order.

(2)  - Once the meeting has been convened, the CTCE must work through the cases in the order that they appear on the Docket.

(3)  - The first order of business is for the CTCE to decide whether to hear or to dismiss the case. This decision must be taken, after a period of debate defined by the Speaker, by a vote of the CTCE members.

(a)  - Reasons for Dismissal of a case are;

(i) - insufficient evidence presented;

(ii) - the case is frivolous or made in bad faith.

(4)- if the CTCE votes to dismiss a case then they must move to the next item on the docket and start the procedure set out in section 16(1).

(5) - if the CTCE votes to hear a case, then after a period of debate defined by the Speaker, it must then vote on whether to issue a penalty as prescribed by section 10 or that the Defendant is not guilty is it is found that the alleged breach did not constitute a breach in law.

17 - Conduct of Members.

(1)  - members must refrain from becoming involved in disputes from Party members.

(a)  -If a CTCE member is a party to any disputes that comes before the CTCE they must recuse themselves from the case and shall inform the CTCE speaker about the recuse. Failure to do so will be considered as a Just Reason for removal under section 18(1).

(2)  - Judges must refrain from vocalising any opinions, both positive or negative, of any Discord member. Any Judge who fails to meet this requirement must recuse themself from any case involving that member. Failure to do so will be considered a Just Reason for removal under Section 18(1).

18 - Removal and Resignation of Members.

(1)  - CTCE members may be removed from their post, with just cause, by an injunction of the Supreme Court. Any Just Cause reason for removal must be derived from statute law to be valid.

(2)  - CTCE members may resign by stating their intention to do so to both the Speaker and their Party Chair. This resignation will be effective from the moment the Speaker notifies the CTCE of the resignation.

(a)  - in the event of a members resignation, the Party they represented on the CTCE may re-appoint another member for the remainder of that members term, according to the procedure within Section 13.

(b)  - if a CTCE member leaves or is removed from the party that they were originally elected to represent, this shall be treated as a resignation akin to section 18(2).

(3)  - If a member is inactive for a minimum of two sessions without cause, then the Speaker may, with the consent of an absolute majority of the remaining members, request their party to replace them as if they had resigned according to section 18(2). The Party may decline this request if they vote to do so.

19 - All Rulings of the CTCE may be appealed to the Supreme Court on any of the following grounds;

(1)  - procedural impropriety or irregularity within the original hearing;

(2)  - Improper application or interpretation of the law;

(3)  - to consider new or unconsidered evidence which may be exculpatory.

20 - Appeals may be made by the defendant of the original case, the Attorney-General, or on the initiative of the Supreme Court itself.

21 - Only the Supreme Court may amend a ruling made by the CTCE, the CTCE may not change its own Rulings once they have been published.

22 - The CTCE shall be bound by the concept of Stare Decisis, and are bound by the precedents set by the Supreme Court.

(1)  - The CTCE may only divulge from its own precedent by the decision of an absolute majority of its members.

# Chapter Four Judicial Conduct

23 - Per the Constitutional requirements for impartiality, Supreme Court Justices must adhere to the following regulations;

(1)  - Judges must refrain from becoming party to disputes between Discord members, except when presiding over such a dispute in their capacity as a judge.

(a)  - If a judge is a party to any dispute that comes before the Court they must recuse themselves from the case. Failure to do so will be considered a Just Reason for removal under Article 6.7 of the Constitution.

(2)  - Judges must refrain from vocalising any opinions, both positive or negative, of any Discord member. Any Judge who fails to meet this requirement must recuse themself from any case involving that member. Failure to do so will be considered a Just Reason for removal under Article 6.7 of the Constitution.

(3)  - Judges must not publically express private support or dissent to any law, whether under consideration or passed by Parliament.

24 - When conducting Judicial Review of a law, Supreme Court Justices must not base their considerations upon their personal opinion of the aforementioned law, but rather whether or not it is in breach of the Constitution.

# Chapter Five Oversight of Elections.

25 - Only the Supreme Court may oversee the results of elections while the elections are still ongoing.

(1)  - in the event the Supreme Court has irrefutable evidence that the voting is being tampered with, they may order a suspension of the vote, by a unanimous vote of all the Supreme Court Justices, for a period of no longer than two hours while an audit of the vote is being conducted.

(2)  - if this Audit finds irrefutable evidence that the integrity of the vote has been compromised, the Supreme Court may suspend the election permanently. Once the CTCE has confirmed the findings of the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court may annul the election and order it to be held again.

26 - The CTCE may only oversee or audit results once the voting for the election has closed.

(1)  - this Audit may only be made in the following conditions;

(a)  - at the request of the Supreme Court, or;

(b)  - at the request of an absolute majority of CTCE members.

27 - In the event the election is annulled under section 25(2), new elections must be held within four days of the Ruling.

28 - The leaking of election results by any member of the Supreme Court or the CTCE to any individual, group of individuals, or organisation, before the designated time the results are to be released, shall be a bannable offense.

# Chapter Six Attorney-General.

29 - The Attorney-General shall be the Chief Prosecutor of the Islands of Nyrmod, and shall head the Attorney-General's Office.

(1)  - The Attorney-General’s Office shall be the Legal Department of the Federal Government.

(2)  - The Attorney-General’s Office shall be a subsidiary department of the Ministry of Justice.

30 - The Attorney-General is nominated by the Minister of Justice and confirmed by a simple majority of the Cabinet.

31 - The Attorney-General shall be have the following duties;

(1)  - investigating cases of domestic terrorism;

(2)  - representing the government in Court in cases where they are a Party;

(3)  - oversight of all public prosecutions within the Islands of Nyrmod;

(4)  - any other duties as may be prescribed by law.

32 - The Attorney-General may be assisted by up to three Assistant-Attorneys.

(1)  - These Assistant-Attorneys shall be appointed by the Attorney-General with the consent of both the Minister of Justice and the Prime Minister.

(2)  - The Attorney-General may dismiss the Assistant-Attorneys, with just cause, with the consent of the Justice Minister.

33 - The Attorney-General shall serve a term of 45 days.

(1)  - The Attorney-General may be removed from office, with just cause, by a two thirds majority of the members of the National Assembly.

# Chapter Seven Miscellaneous provisions.

34 - The Supreme Court and the CTCE may not launch an investigation into any party without sufficient grounds to do so. For the purposes of this law, sufficient grounds is deemed to be the following;

(1)  - prima facie evidence that the Party in question has acted contrary to the constitution, which must be received before any investigation is launched.

35 - Party Servers and Instagrams.

(1)  - The Rules shall be expanded to cover the instagram accounts and side servers of all political parties in Nyrmod.

(2)  - The Supreme Court and CTCE shall have jurisdiction over these areas as if they were part of the main server.

(3)  - In the event an investigation is launched pursuant to section 34 of this Act, the Party must allow the SC access upon the presentation of a valid warrant or Court Order.

36 - This Act may not be applied retrospectively.

Signed by: President GeorgeR. Jr