Originally I wanted to publish a new article, describing another in the chronological sequence of stories in our struggle with windmills, greatly inflated by our famous trio of righteous, ideologically supported "high ethical and moral values" of Radio ГA / ГA and well-oiled money of American taxpayers #UTP ("US tax payers") through funds and grants #USAGM ("US Global Media"). But after a few sentences of feverish writing I realised that, like me once, you too might be unpopular in this area, and you might not even know about the existence of the possibility of viewing files, as a basic prerequisite of the right to a fair trial. And at the same time, this is one of the institutes guaranteed to us by the "Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms" and to which I will actively refer in future posts.
There are many links on the Internet in paragraph form, devoted in detail to the rights and obligations when viewing files. I happened to find here a rather nicely and comprehensively described example this one. Although these are details of administrative proceedings, there is no significant difference in the parts relating to court proceedings (see here). Therefore, I prefer to focus only on the technical side of the matter and on the practical experiences we have experienced from the point of view of our "locality".
Ugh, I'm starting to use the terminology of a tribe I never wanted to hear about.
So let's get down to the nitty-gritty of the peeping.
To begin with, it is necessary to contact by email via the address podatelna@osoud.pha10.justice.cz the lady at the filing office and ask her to allow viewing of the files according to the number assigned to you.
At first, in my senior indiscretion, I thought that if I gave the lady a date and time that I wanted to attend the viewing, everything is done from my side and our court system would take care of the rest. In response, I learned almost immediately how terribly wrong I was. Not me, but the lady at the court is the one who will determine when you have to appear for inspection and that it will not be in less than 2 working days, you will be instructed soon. So you have no choice but to accept this rule and scold yourself according to the familiar "who the hell is here for whom?".
According to the date of your "admission", approved by the lady at the filing office, you will ask your superior for time off, or simply run away from work. In this context, it is important to realize that this is not an operation for one or two cigarettes, but an activity that you can spend several hours on. In any case, it depends on the thickness of the file, which in our case was several hundred pages for each claim.
So if you have an approved date and the work leave, you can go to the court to inspect the files. Knowing the already mentioned "who is here for whom", I recommend that you keep the date agreed upon by the lady from the office. Otherwise, it may happen that you will be blamed for coming at 9:30 instead of 9:00. An answer in the style of "so what?", or "according to what law do I have to be here at 9:00 a.m.?" will usually disarm her so much that she will stop showing favor to you for your bad luck and you will be able to get down to work immediately.
For the success of this event, to which you have decided to devote your precious time, it is good to carefully equip yourself technically. A high-quality camera in your mobile phone and suitable software for quickly taking "handheld" photos should be the basis. There is no point in talking about sufficient data storage capacity in your mobile phone or "cloud".
Before you start taking pictures, it is important to check that the file is correctly marked with a file mark and that it has a properly maintained inventory, which is a kind of table with information about the documents and the dates they were entered into the file. In the file you should find all pleadings, protocols, records, written decisions, exhibits, written responses of the opposing party, all together with all attachments. You will also find the judge's notes here, which can tell a lot about where her mind is going. In other words, if there are more notes in the part of the file belonging to the opposing party, it is irrefutable evidence that you are pulling the short end of the rope, and the next event will probably catapult you into the role of an extra.
It is especially appropriate to focus on the sequence in the numbering of the files' pages. Otherwise, you will end up in a situation, similar to ours, where pages will be renumbered differently, numbers will be crossed out, and gaps in the numerical sequence logically lead to the suspicion that "something" will be added here later. In our case, we found out from the photos taken from several viewing dates that our file literally "lived" with its content!
After taking the photos, you sign a protocol with the "supervisor" so that it is clear to all parties who and when was familiar with the contents of the file. It is a good idea to go over the photographed documents in peace somewhere outside the court and, in case of confusion, repeat the whole operation "for extraordinary success" several more times.
The chapter itself is an operation to take over the audio recording of the court proceedings.
That is, if you are lucky enough to have a recording device in the room, which was not the case in our case at least once. As mentioned earlier in one of the earlier articles - namely, in case of ambiguities between the written record (or protocol) and the audio recording, the audio one always takes precedence. Those hours spent listening to meetings and transcribing them! This requires really strong nerves and boundless stamina.
However, before you go to court to take over the audio or video medium (or CD or DVD), you proceed in the same way as when requesting access to the file. Again, only after confirming the date, go to the court, this time however go to its information department. As has already been mentioned here several times - don't forget the rule "who is here for whom", and therefore if you are taught to greet politely at home, the lady clerk will probably give you a narrow window in bulletproof glass, protecting her from bullets, germs and everything possible and impossible (that is, mainly in front of you) and she probably won't respond to your greeting. Don't despair. Instead, boldly explain your request to her.
And now comes the most important thing to know, which could easily ruin your plan to take over the carrier. Especially think about this if you decided to stop for it during your lunch break, before work, or just by car in the blue zone in Míčánky and "for a blinker".
It is that unfortunate 50 CZK stamp provided by the court as a "no name" audio or video carrier, and if you do not have the stamp after your request, you will be in huge trouble. However, there is another option - providing any other empty CD carrier.
Forget the idea of asking for "cash" in advance, and even if you add something on top, you won't walk away with this bribe from the incorruptible lady. And that's right! You're in court, aren't you?
Perhaps you have now come up with such a silly idea that in the 21st century there are other options for paying for services for burning content to a data carrier, such as cashless payment by card or another similar method. Unfortunately, this evolution hasn't arrived here yet, so you'll be left to run around the court looking for some "pinball". This ignorance will especially not pay off if you don't have the appropriate cash in the local currency. I know what I am talking about. This happened to my sister, a Slovak currency citizen, who, apart from the "ójro", didn't even have the famous crone here at the time.
I thought it was just the incapacity of the circuit court in question. I fared no better on a similar request in the Municipal Court at the Court of Appeal. Here, I was at least instructed by the local "supervisor" that this is a valuable item, and therefore I can't pay it by card. She didn't reply to my argument that it was strange to me, as I had recently paid the same stamp at the post office with a card, probably thanks to the gasp from my quick reaction.
And so every time I stood at these glass windows and I asked and asked and asked for something like this in these courts, I remembered this story of ours.
My silent witnesses were always those two cashless payment terminals in front of each of them. So pointless. Probably like their attendants from the other side of the glass.