Show trial
When people get accused, there will be a trial. Trial is there to see if the person is guilty, and if this is the case, what the punishment should be. A show trial is different: the question whether the perosn is guilzty (called a verdict) has been made before. The trial is held so that accusations and the verdict can be presented to the public, serving as an example and a warning to other would-be dissidents or transgressors.[1]
Show trials tend to be retributive rather than corrective, and they are also conducted for propagandistic purposes.[2] When aimed at individuals on the basis of protected classes or characteristics, show trials are examples of political persecution. The term was first recorded in 1928.[3]
A similar concept is "kangaroo court".
Show Trial Media
People's Court trial of Adolf Reichwein, Nazi Germany, 1944
Prosecutor General Andrey Vyshinsky (centre) reading the 1937 indictment against Karl Radek during the 2nd Moscow trial
Captain Witold Pilecki, former prisoner at Auschwitz during a show trial conducted by communist authorities in Poland in 1948
References
- ↑ OED (2014): "show trial".
- ↑ "SHOW TRIAL | definition in the Cambridge English Dictionary". dictionary.cambridge.org. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- ↑ "Definition of SHOW TRIAL". www.merriam-webster.com. Retrieved 19 June 2019.