| Legal Aid Department | |||||||||||
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| Chinese | 法律援助署 | ||||||||||
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The Legal Aid Department often abbreviated as LAD, is a department in the Government of Hong Kong. It provides legal aid in legal representation for civil proceedings and criminal proceedings in District Court and above.
In most common law jurisdictions, the attorney general or attorney-general is the main legal advisor to the government. The plural is attorneys general. In some jurisdictions, attorneys general also have executive responsibility for law enforcement, prosecutions or even responsibility for legal affairs generally. In practice, the extent to which the attorney general personally provides legal advice to the government varies between jurisdictions, and even between individual office-holders within the same jurisdiction, often depending on the level and nature of the office-holder's prior legal experience.
In civil proceedings and criminal prosecutions under the common law, a defendant may raise a defense in an attempt to avoid criminal or civil liability. Besides contesting the accuracy of any allegation made against them in a criminal or civil proceeding, a defendant may also make allegations against the prosecutor or plaintiff or raise a defense, arguing that, even if the allegations against the defendant are true, the defendant is nevertheless not liable.
Édith Cresson is a French politician. She is the first, and so far only, woman to have held the office of Prime Minister of France. Other than her breakthrough gender role, her term was uneventful. Her political career ended in scandal as a result of corruption charges dating from her tenure as European Commissioner for Research, Science and Technology.
Legal aid is the provision of assistance to people who are unable to afford legal representation and access to the court system. Legal aid is regarded as central in providing access to justice by ensuring equality before the law, the right to counsel and the right to a fair trial. This article describes the development of legal aid and its principles, primarily as known in Europe, the Commonwealth of Nations and in the United States.
A public defender is a lawyer appointed to represent people who otherwise cannot reasonably afford to hire a lawyer to defend themselves in a trial. Several countries, including the UK, Hungary and Singapore, and some states of Australia, provide people with public defenders. Brazil is the only country in which an office of government-paid lawyers with the specific purpose of providing legal assistance and representation to the destitute free of charge, is established in the constitution. The Sixth Amendment of the US Constitution requires the US government to provide free legal counsel to indigent defendants in criminal cases, and public defenders in the United States are full-time lawyers employed by the state or federal governments.
The White House counsel is a senior staff appointee of the president of the United States and vice president of the United States whose role is to advise the president on all legal issues concerning the president and their administration.
The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service is the independent public prosecution service for Scotland, and is a Ministerial Department of the Scottish Government. The department is headed by Her Majesty's Lord Advocate, who under the Scottish legal system is responsible for prosecution, along with the area procurators fiscal. In Scotland, virtually all prosecution of criminal offences is undertaken by the Crown. Private prosecutions are extremely rare.
The law of Hong Kong is unique, being a common law system preserved, after the handover to China in 1997, within the civil law system of the People's Republic of China (PRC), under the principle of ‘one country, two systems'. Since the handover, the constitutional framework is provided by the Hong Kong Basic Law, which is a national law of the PRC and has constitutional status in Hong Kong.
A stay of proceedings is a ruling by the court in civil and criminal procedure, halting further legal process in a trial or other legal proceeding. The court can subsequently lift the stay and resume proceedings based on events taking place after the stay is ordered. However, a stay is sometimes used as a device to postpone proceedings indefinitely.
Right to counsel means a defendant has a right to have the assistance of counsel and, if the defendant cannot afford a lawyer, requires that the government appoint one or pay the defendant's legal expenses. The right to counsel is generally regarded as a constituent of the right to a fair trial. Historically, however, not all countries have always recognized the right to counsel. The right is often included in national constitutions. 153 of the 194 constitutions currently in force have language to this effect.
The Oregon Attorney General is a statutory office within the executive branch of the state of Oregon, and serves as the chief legal officer of the state, heading its Department of Justice with its six operating divisions. The Attorney General is chosen by statewide partisan election to serve a term of four years. The incumbent, Ellen Rosenblum, was sworn in on June 29, 2012, replacing John Kroger, a Democrat who was elected in 2008 and resigned six months before the end of his term to become President of Reed College. She was re-elected in 2016.
Additional Solicitor General of India abbreviated as ASG is a law officer of India and is the third ranking lawyer of the Government of India. The headquarters of Additional Solicitor-General may be at New Delhi or Mumbai or Chennai or Allahabad as the Government of India may specify from time to time. ASG is governed by Law Officers Rules, 1987.
Victims' rights are legal rights afforded to victims of crime. These may include the right to restitution, the right to a victims' advocate, the right not to be excluded from criminal justice proceedings, and the right to speak at criminal justice proceedings.
The Legal Aid Bureau (LAB) in Singapore is a department under the Ministry of Law of the Government of Singapore. LAB provides legal representation and advice in civil matters to persons of limited means. The department is headed by the Director of Legal Aid.
The Administration of Justice is the process by which the legal system of a government is executed. The presumed goal of such an administration is to provide justice for all those accessing the legal system. The phrase is also commonly used to describe a University degree, which can be a prerequisite for a job in law enforcement or government.
The Philippine House Committee on Justice, or House Justice Committee is a standing committee of the Philippine House of Representatives.
