Remote Hearings in Criminal Procedures and Prisoners’ Fundamental Rights: Is Videoconferencing the New Metal Cage?

Abstract The increasing use of remote hearings in criminal procedures produced a prolific debate about their impact on the procedural rights of suspects, defendants, and accused, as well as the need for a new normative framework on fair trial in remote hearings. The article claims that there is a gap in the debate, regarding two aspects of the matter, namely the existence of a tendency towards the systematic and widespread use of remote hearings in cases involving prisoners for managerial purposes and the fact that the systematic and widespread use of remote hearings involving prisoners produce a restrictive impact on prison regimes and, consequently, on prisoners’ fundamental rights. It also proposes the establishment of basic rules for the development of a normative framework on the use of remote hearings in criminal procedures involving prisoners, based on the principle of normalisation and related standards developed within the International Human Rights Law.