Judgment

The judgment is the judicial resolution that contains the decision of the judge or the intervening court on the merits of the issue that it has been commissioned to judge. The sentence is final when it is taken in a trial (litis) and puts an end to the intervention of that judge or court in that trial. The final sentence is not final or "executed", until it is confirmed at the end of all the review instances, through the resources established in the applicable procedure law. To conclude a case it is necessary that there firm final judgment. From that moment it is considered that there is "res judicata" and the case cannot be reopened, except in very exceptional circumstances (for example, the appearance alive of the person who had been considered murdered in a trial).

In criminal proceedings, because it has two stages, the first of investigation and the second of trial, the guilt of a person can only be established by means of a final sentence handed down in the trial, usually oral, once the person has firm and that the "double conformance" is produced, that is to say that there have been two successive judicial sentences establishing the guilt of the accused person.

The sentence declares or recognizes the right or reason of one of the parties, forcing the other to go through said declaration and comply with it. In criminal law, the sentence acquits or condemns the defendant, in the latter case imposing the corresponding penalty.

Usually the media erroneously refer to decisions that do not put an end to the case as "sentence". In those cases, the correct thing to do is to refer to them as "judicial decision".

Concept

The professor of procedural law at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso, Sergio Alfaro Silva, defines it as follows:

Judiciary that heterocomposively resolves the litigation already processed, by the acceptance that the judge makes of one of the found positions maintained by the antagonists after evaluating the confirming means of the statements made by the actor and of the particular application to the case of a legal norm that preexists in abstract, in general.

Classification

Constitutive judgement (civil procedure): those that create, modify or extinct a judicial relationship

• Due to the presence/absence of the defendant:

Contradictory judgment: when the defendant is present in the case.

In rebellion: when the sentence is handed down without the defendant's presence.

• For the possibility of challenge:

Firm judgment: the one against which there is no recourse, ordinary or extraordinary. And when both parties leave time and do not challenge appeal. It is protected by the principle of judged thing.

No firm or recurring judgment: it is the one against which resources can be filed.

• By the degree of jurisdiction:

Judgment at first instance: the decision of the organs of first instance, for their jurisdiction and jurisdiction.

Appeal judgement: when appealed, either to the same body or to the immediate superior (Provincial audit).

Sentence in cassation: it is the one that is issued by the Supreme Court intending to marry the case.

• By the way:

Written judgement: the one written in writing and thus made known to the parties.

Oral judgement: the oral statement before the parties involved, who are notified in that same act.

Requirements

The sentence must meet the requirements of time, place and form. It must be issued in a period of time suitable for the performance of the acts of the judge or court. The setting of this period varies according to the procedure in question.

Regarding the form, statements are generally made up of three sections:

• Heading or exposition: the date and city in which it is issued, the parties involved, their prosecutors and lawyers, without their names being omitted without affecting the proper integrity and publicity of the judgements. The requests submitted by the parties, together with the budgets or factual backgrounds on which they are based, are also noted.

• Considerable party: in which the basis of fact and law is expressed, which contain the arguments of the parties and those used by the court to resolve the object of the process, in relation to the rules deemed applicable to the case.

• Resolution: containing the decision or judgement of conviction or acquittal of the defendant or accused. The name of the judge who has drafted it and the signature of all those who have agreed to it is often incorporated.

On the other hand, the sentences must be consistent, that is, they must decide on all the issues that have been the subject of debate in the process. The ruling should not contain more, or something different, than what was requested by the parties. When it comes to criminal sentences, consistency means that there must be a relationship between the sentence and the criminal action brought. For example, if a person is accused of homicide, the judge cannot convict him of robbery (for this, another procedure would be necessary), since he is limited by the facts alleged. However, it could carry out a different legal classification from that made by the parties, for example, in the same case, convict for murder or parricide and not for manslaughter.

The inconsistency in the sentence can be classified by: 1) Lack of exhaustiveness, omitting the pronouncement on a proper subject. 2) Ultrapetitum inconsistency, conceding more than what was intended by the actor. 3) Extrapetitum inconsistency, granting something else and not asking for it.

The elements of the structure of a sentence are preamble, resulting, considering and operative points. In Spanish judgments, its structure is a heading (name of the parties and their data, identification of attorney and lawyer, object of the trial, date, place and court, judges or magistrates, as well as the speaker if it is a collegiate court), factual background (in separate and numbered paragraphs, exposing the requests of the parties, the facts on which they are based and the evidence that has been proposed and practiced -proven facts-), legal grounds (in separate and numbered paragraphs, where the right will be appreciated that grounds the claims, citing the applicable laws or doctrine) and, finally, the ruling (which is the operative part, where the lawsuit is resolved).

Writing

The wording of the sentence corresponds to the judge who issued it (if it is a single-person court) or one of its members, if it is a collegiate body (in this case, after deliberation and voting on the sentence by members of the court).

Once the sentence is signed by the judge or by all the members of the court, it is made known by reading it in a public hearing or by written notification to the parties.

Challenge

Under the rule of law, all judgments can be challenged, invoking the defects that could have been incurred. Procedural resources are used to challenge a sentence. The most common resource is the appeal before a court of second instance, admitted in most cases, with exceptions such as low amount cases. Less common remedies are those for annulment, in cases of insurmountable breaches of the law during the procedure, and those that question the constitutionality of the sentence.

While there are pending resources, the sentence cannot be executed.

Firm judgment

When a sentence is confirmed and there are no more instances or resources left, the sentence is considered to have been "firm" or "executed". Once a final sentence is signed, it becomes res judicata, which means that the same case cannot be tried again.

Execution

The execution of the judgment is the factual implementation of what was decided in the ruling. It normally corresponds to the judge, who is the one who controls how it is executed, but with the intervention of the justice operators and Administration bodies, specifically, the Public Ministry, which is the one that really using its powers enforces the judge's ruling, and the consequent control of its execution by the latter.