H. TRIAL HEARING

Purpose: The fundamental purpose of the trial hearing is to pursue the truth about the alleged honor offense.

1. If the student, having been properly notified, fails to appear at trial, the student shall be deemed to have waived his right to an Honor trial and to have admitted guilt (leaving admitting guilt is referred to as a "LAG"), whether or not such an admission is expressly made. In each such case, (a) the student is immediately dismissed and forfeits all of his rights under the Honor system, except for the right to file a grievance, pursuant to Section appeal, if applicable, in accordance with Article IV.J of these by-laws; (b) the Committee will so notify the Registrar; (c) the Committee will request that the Registrar remove the student from active class rolls and forever bar his readmission to the University; (d) the Committee will request that the Registrar place a notation on the transcript of the student reading "Enrollment Discontinued"; and (e) in the case of students who have already graduated from the University, the Committee will initiate degree revocation proceedings with the General Faculty. For students electing to attend their Honor trial, the post-trial process and the consequences flowing from a guilty verdict are described, in detail, in Sections IV.I and J, below. (Text Modified, September 18, 2005)

2. The Trial Chair will begin the proceedings with an opening statement, drafted and approved at the pre-trial conference. In the opening statement, the Chair will announce the charges and the parties involved, and will list the witnesses who will testify at trial, along with a brief description of the nature of their testimony.

3. After the opening statement, the panel will hear the witnesses. The panel will hear from witnesses for the accusation followed by witnesses for the accused student in the order determined at the pre-trial conference.

4. The format for hearing the testimony of individual witnesses will be as follows:

a. The Trial Chair will ask each witness to state the nature of his or her involvement in the case.

b. The panel will then be allowed to ask questions of the witness. The Trial Chair or the counsel can object to the panel's questions. With the goal of maintaining a fair trial for the accused, the Trial Chair shall rule on those objections.

c. The counsel for the party calling the witness can ask the witness any questions that were not asked and sufficiently answered during previous testimony.

d. Then opposing counsel can ask the witness any questions that were not asked and sufficiently answered during previous testimony.

e. When counsel are questioning a witness, the Trial Chair will rule on whether the questions have already been asked by the panel or counsel and answered by the witness.

5. The accused student reserves the right to appear as the last witness, even if the accused student has already testified in the trial.

6. After the panel has heard from all the witnesses, the panel will recess to formulate additional questions. Any witnesses recalled by the panel are subject to questioning from counsel as well. Only the panel may recall witnesses.

7. Once the panel is satisfied with the testimony, the Trial Chair will then remind the panel of the charges brought against the accused student and the standards for evaluating guilt and innocence.

8. After these instructions to the panel, the counsel for each party are allotted five minutes to give closing statements. Counsel for the accusation gives his or her statement first, followed by counsel for the accused student. or more - at the Trial Chair's discretion - to give closing statements. Counsel for the community gives his or her statement, followed by counsel for the accused student. Counsel for the community may then make a brief rebuttal, provided he or she is given no more total time than counsel for the accused student was given.

This amendment shall take effect immediately upon approval by the Honor Committee. (language modified, February 28, 2006).

9. The trial chair and the panel then convene privately to deliberate. The panel must determine if the evidence against the accused student demonstrates, beyond a reasonable doubt:

a. that the accused student committed the act;

b. that the accused student committed the act with dishonest intent; and

c. that the act was serious.

10. When relying on a conscientious retraction as a defense at trial, the accused student has the burden of demonstrating the validity of the retraction (and, in the case of an unwritten retraction, the completeness of the retraction as well). The standard of proof for a retraction's validity and completeness is "more likely than not."

11. When considering the issue of the existence of a retraction, the trial panel shall vote first on the retraction only, and afterwards, if necessary, on the issue of guilt. Affirming the existence of a retraction requires a simple majority vote of the panel.

12. When voting on guilt, the panel first votes on act and intent. If four-fifths of the panel votes guilty, then a second vote will be taken on triviality seriousness. If a simple majority of the panel votes that the offense was serious, then a guilty verdict is rendered. If four-fifths of the panel does not find act and intent or if a majority of the panel does not find the offense serious, then a verdict of not guilty is rendered. (language modified by student referendum, March 1, 2006)

13. In trials with multiple charges of lying, cheating, or stealing against one or more students, the jury panel will vote separately on each charge.

14. If at any time during the trial, the Trial Chair believes that the fundamental fairness of the trial is imperiled, the Chair may declare a mistrial.

15. Notwithstanding subsections (10) and (13), above, in cases where a student has requested a Hearing on CMD (as defined in Section IV.D, above), and such request has been denied, or such request has been granted but the Hearing on CMD did not result in a finding of CMD, the jury panel will be informed of the student's admission of the "act" relating to the underlying Honor charges, such student will be precluded from denying that he or she committed such act, and the jury panel's vote will reflect that the "act" element of the Honor offense in question has been satisfied.