Page 28 - Judge Manual 2017

E.9 International Jury Panels

The requirements for a panel hearing are outlined in Appendix N1.4(b). In most
cases, you need three judges from different MNA's, two of whom must be IJs.
The only difference in the hearing is that you tell the parties that you are a panel
of the International Jury and if they are dissatisfied with the decision they are
entitled to a hearing with a full jury, except concerning the facts found.
In practice, this means that the International Jury will review the procedures
used in the original hearing. They would then focus on whether the conclusion
and decision matched the facts. This new hearing is not a reopening under RRS
66; although the International Jury could decide that the panel might have made
an error, and then decide to reopen the hearing.

E 10 Off-site Protest Committee Members

Appendix N outlines the requirements for International Juries and Appendix M
gives recommendations on how to conduct hearings. Even though neither
requires all members of a protest committee to be physically present at
hearings, this should be the normal situation. However, in some exceptional
cases, the protest committee could still act adopting a Remote Hearing (see
below), even without having all the members physically together.
For example, it would make sense to proceed without the physical presence of
one or all the members in the following situations:

• if something has to be decided before the event, e.g. about the eligibility
or classification of a sailor;

• if something has to be decided after the event finished, e.g. a
complicated measurement protest that will require several days to the
technical committee;

• in oceanic races;
• when a full jury, or a panel, has fewer than five members, because of
illness or emergency, and no qualified replacements can be reasonably
found, despite a diligent attempt (see also RRS N1.5)

E 11 Off-site parties and witnesses

RRS 63.3 grants a party the right to be present throughout the hearing,
specifying that if a party does not come, the Protest Committee can
nevertheless proceed with the hearing in the absence of the party.
Even though the best practice is to have all the parties and witnesses physically
present during a hearing, there are some exceptional cases where the Protest
Committee could offer them to attend the hearing by adopting a Remote
Hearing, for example:

• if something has to be decided before the event, e.g. about the eligibility
or classification of a sailor;

• if something has to be decided after the event finished, e.g. a
complicated measurement protest that will require several days to the
technical committee;