this post was submitted on 29 Aug 2023
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You are free to go, I guess... (startrek.website)
submitted 2 years ago by The_Picard_Maneuver@startrek.website to c/memes@lemmy.ml
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[–] agressivelyPassive@feddit.de 28 points 2 years ago (3 children)

Ok, serious question: what is the course here? Can you be forced to swear?

[–] malle_yeno@pawb.social 32 points 2 years ago

Generally speaking, you will be asked to swear or affirm that you are going to tell the truth, and that you understand the consequences of not telling the truth. Whether you do a whole ceremony about it or not, it doesn't really matter -- but the court will want to know that you are competent to testify truthfully and that you know that you're not allowed to testify to things you know aren't true.

If you're asking "can you be forced to testify?", the answer is "Yes but it depends." If you're competent to testify and the officers of the court deem your testimony important, they can subpoena your testimony. If you have a reason to contest it, you can -- but "I don't want to" isn't good enough.

[–] nx2@feddit.de 8 points 2 years ago (1 children)
[–] agressivelyPassive@feddit.de 9 points 2 years ago

Not really. This is about ability, not willingness.

[–] Sharpiemarker@feddit.de 6 points 2 years ago (1 children)

You don't get to testify, I assume.

[–] newIdentity@sh.itjust.works 0 points 2 years ago (1 children)

But what if you don't want to testify in the first place?

In Germany you're forced to testify anyways.

[–] Tetsuo@jlai.lu 0 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Just curious but how could you be forced to testify?

Do you mean you are forced to come to the stand and in court ?

[–] newIdentity@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Its illegal to not tell everything you know in court. If you say nothing, you might get sued. And if you say you don't know anything, you're fucked when another witness says you knew it.

There are only three exceptions:

  1. You might get yourself in trouble, in that case you don't have to answer the question
  2. It's a case against a family member in which case you also don't have to testify.
  3. It would go against your professional secrecy

But you have to testify against a friend.

I just looked it up and it's exactly the same in the US. So you also can be force to testify in Murica