Aplicación de juicios por jurados en casos de delitos como peculado, cohecho, concusión, enriquecimiento ilícito y lavado de activos y otros relacionados con corrupción política.

Abstract

This investigation pretends to establish the viability for a new legal mechanism to be implemented in Ecuador, this in answer to the corruption cases that affected the country in recent times. Judges, by law, are entitled to absolute jurisdictional power in Ecuadorian courts. They deliver a guilty or not guilty verdict and then they establish the penalty for the defendant. This power is sometimes misused, corrupted and abused, especially when a political figure is being accused of any wrongdoing. Because of this, is time that the citizens take part, as juries, in the crimes that affect all of us as a country and be able to decide a corrupt official fate, leaving the judges only the power to sentence the criminal. This investigation analyses the benefits, the constitutional reforms that have to be approved in order to implement the jury system, the way the juries will be chosen, etc. This, focused only in crimes against the economy of the State can be the beginning of a new criminal law in Ecuador, and then other crimes that affect the country may follow this path.