Date of publishing:
25.3.2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.21104/CL.2026.1.04
The Český lid provides open access to all of its content under licenseCreative Commons Attribution NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International.
Abstract:
Although the focus is very much on the dead during murder trials, the dead themselves are downplayed in various respects. Relegated to the category of the deceased, and reduced to objects for scrutiny by forensic pathologists, police photographers, detectives and the court, the dead are dehumanised. Moreover, the verdict and the sentencing that takes place in the course of the trial, stemming as they do from impersonal legal deliberations, may seem detached from the dead. Next, the horror of the murders may seem to overwhelm all else, including the dead individuals concerned. Under such circumstances, do the dead have any agency during and after a murder trial? Are the dead active “absent presences” (Maddrell, 2013) in the world of the living, influencing some of their ideas, emotions, actions and responses? As these issues are explored in this paper, the writer draws on her own experience of attending a murder trial.
Keywords
murder; trial; ritual; narrative; absent presences; agency
Article Text
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