Project profile — Support for the Ministry of Justice

The purpose of the project is to strengthen judicial institutions and operations via peace tribunals, an independent judiciary and magistrature and the provision of legal information on multiple levels (including creating a law review and publishing legal codes and texts and public legal education brochures).

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Results achieved as of the end of the project (December 2010) include: The project improved access to justice by supporting the École du Barreau de Port-au-Prince in its provision of legal aid and facilitated the work of peace tribunals. As a result, 645 cases were treated, representing 80 percent of the defendants of criminal proceedings in Port-au-Prince at that time. A national training program provided training to 454 justices of the peace, thus upgrading the skills of Haiti’s judiciary and building its human resources capacity. Equipment was provided to 64 peace tribunals, the École de la Magistrature (EMA), and the École du Barreau de Port-au-Prince, enabling these institutions to improve their operations. Legal information is now better disseminated, with Haitian laws from 1804 to the present scanned and digitalized, a compendium of offences and penalties published, and penal and criminal codes updated and published. The project also helped prepare three key justice reform laws in Haiti : the School of Magistrature Act, the Act on the Status of Magistrature, and the Act Creating the Supreme Council of Judiciary.