Media Rehabilitation: Critical Review of the publication of Acquittal Verdict

According to the Article 12 of the country’s Criminal Code of Conduct, any individual who has been wrongly charged and convicted by the Judiciary and then has been acquitted, is entitled to right of rehabilitation (publication of the acquittal verdict in one of mass circulating newspapers). This article is meant to restore the damaged reputation and this procedure also generates income for the Press, But there are some shortcomings with this piece of law which makes it ineffective and courts are usually reluctant to issue such verdict. The limited scope of publicity, means of publication, nature of the verdict, the party that applies for publication and relations with restoration of social rights, are some of the loopholes of the said Article. The deficiency of the law originates from issues such as how a publication could be considered as mass circulation, orientation of the verdict, legal persons, meaning of notification and lack of guarantee for publication and defects of law concerning the requesting authority, reputation, rights of third parties, apology by the guilty party, source of income and classification of crimes. This paper examines the ineffectiveness of this article of the law with a specific attention to financial problems of the judiciary and the high cost of publication as well as proposing a more efficient alternative law to replace the existing one