Pathology of Media Trial in Iran's Legal System with a Look at Comparative Studies

The activity of the media, as one of the pillars of democracy in democratic societies, as it provides citizens with access to information, may also may lead to violation their rights and freedoms. Therefore, dealing with media claims must have both features of proceedings and at the same time pay attention to the media's duty to transmit information and monitor the government. The current research seeks to answer the question of what flaws the Iranian judicial system has in dealing with media claims. In this regard, this research has examined existing structural deficiencies by employing the descriptive-analytical method. These shortcomings include the public nature of trials and the dominance of a criminal perspective in them; a perspective that ignores the media's duty to provide a free flow of information and treats them as criminals. Also, the presence of juries and the supervision of the trade union, which were supposed to help guarantee the rights of the accused in these claims, have gradually been forgotten and have themselves been transformed into tools for imposing further restrictions on the media. A review of comparative studies indicates that the removal of these pitfalls depends on the revision of the procedure of media trials in such a way that expert judges with knowledge of the functioning of the media handle these claims; the opinion of the jury, as an institution that must arbitrate between freedom and power, is effective in the trial; and the role of the government, as a body that suffers from free expression, is minimized in the trial.