Tessa Gombeer

The Autonomy of Defense and Defense Counsel

The role of defense counsel during criminal proceedings is generally understood as being to provide legal assistance and personal support to clients and help in observing the rules of criminal procedure. Recently, however, safeguards of this legal assistance have been under increasing pressure. This raises the important question whether the true autonomy of defense counsel is being threatened by these developments. International, european and Belgian legislative initiatives will be discussed in considering this question, but also the jurisprudence of the courts of Luxembourg (european Court of Justice) and strasbourg (european Court of Human Rights). This discussion will offer an analysis of the norms relating to the independence of defense counsel that can be inferred from relevant case law.