Justice Efficiencies and
Access to the Justice System

Final Report on Mega-trials of the Steering Committee on Justice Efficiencies and Access to the Criminal Justice System

III. CHARACTERISTICS OF MEGA-TRIALS

Although it is impossible to provide an exact definition of the concept of a mega-trial, the Steering Committee agrees that it refers to a trial with such complex evidence or a number of accused such that one or both of these characteristics result in exceptionally long proceedings. The extraordinary length of these proceedings is an essential component of the mega-trial. A short or medium-length trial, even if it had a large number of accused or considerable amount of evidence, would not be called a “ mega-trial.”

The concept of a mega-trial is not limited to jury trials (the “ Air India ” case being a good example of that).