Dictionary Definition
technicality n : a detail that is considered
insignificant [syn: trifle, triviality]
User Contributed Dictionary
English
Pronunciation
- /%tEknI"k
Extensive Definition
The term legal technicality is
a casual or colloquial phrase referring
to a technical aspect of law. The phrase is not a term of art
in the law; it has no exact
meaning, nor does it have a legal definition. The words "legal
technicality" are often used in a pejorative sense to denote
technical aspects of law which result in a legal decision or
verdict unfavorable to the party using
the phrase.
Some legal technicalities
govern legal procedure, enable or restrict access to courts, and/or
enable or limit the discretion of a court in handing down judgment.
These are aspects of procedural
law. Other legal technicalities deal with aspects of substantive
law, that is, aspects of the law which articulate specific
criteria that a court uses to assess a party's compliance with or
violation of, for example, one or more criminal
laws or civil
laws.
United States
In the United States, Constitutional guarantees such as those included in the Fourth and Fifth amendments to protect an accused from unreasonable search and seizure or from self-incrimination are sometimes referred to as "technicalities" by critics of court decisions based on them, even though they are foundations of the American legal system rather than obscure fine points. A commonly cited example would be attempted prosecution of a crime that was discovered by illegally obtained evidence. Such cases may be dismissed based on lack of evidence as the illegally obtained evidence would not be allowed to be the basis of the prosecution's case (called the "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine). Other procedural "technicalities" arise from common law as well, for example, the standard procedural defenses of laches and estoppel applicable within civil law.Some examples of technical
aspects of legal procedure are:
- Time constraints, including Statutes of limitations
- Statute of frauds
- Miranda Warning
- Rules of evidence
- Various immunities, such as Sovereign immunity, Diplomatic immunity
- Rules of appellate procedure
External links
Notes
Synonyms, Antonyms and Related Words
a little thing, area, bag, complexity, complexness, complication, convolution, crabbedness, cup of tea,
entanglement,
field, forte, hardly anything, inessential, insignificancy, intricacy, intricateness, involution, involvement, jargon word,
line, long suit, main
interest, manner,
marginal matter, matter of indifference, mere nothing, metier, minor matter, naught, nihility, no great matter,
nothing, nothing in
particular, nothing to signify, nullity, paltry affair, perplexity, pet subject, peu
de chose, pursuit,
ramification, rien
du tout, scarcely anything, specialism, speciality, specialization, specialty, strong point,
style, subtlety, tanglement, technical term,
thing, thing of naught,
type, vocation, way, weakness