Caroline Fournet

From 2012 to 2016, I was co-investigator on the multi-disciplinary research programme ‘Corpses of Genocide and Mass Violence’, funded by an ERC Starting Grant and led by social anthropologist Elisabeth Anstett and Holocaust historian Jean-Marc Dreyfus. We co-founded the academic journal Human Remains and Violence: An Interdisciplinary Journal ( www.manchesteropenhive.com/view/journals/hrv/hrv-overview.xml ) My research on international criminal law and procedure thus gradually adopted an empirical approach, using content analysis, to explore the relevance and significance of mass graves and of corpses of victims of atrocities in international criminal justice and in transitional justice.

The aim of my research is to empirically explore the ‘forensic turn’ in the (international) criminal law of evidence and analyse the use of forensic sciences (archaeology, anthropology, pathology) in the investigation and prosecution of mass violence crimes.

Mass violence crimes constitute fact-finding conundrums: ‘providing hard scientific evidence’ (see EAAF website, https://eaaf.typepad.com/strengthening_field/) and understanding how to use such evidence remains a pressing matter. My research on forensic evidence is empirical and inter-disciplinary with the aim of being exhaustive. I t is based on the systematic collection, coding, checking and analysis of all the relevant atrocity cases (transcripts, decisions and judgments) adjudicated at the international and domestic levels. This ambitious project is conducted collaboratively from a duality of perspectives: forensic and legal.

Relevant Publications
C. Fournet (2020), ‘Forensic evidence in atrocity trials: A risky sampling strategy?’, Special issue: Garrido, C. (ed.), Forensic Medicine in contexts of mass violence, (2020) 69 Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine, article 101852. Available at: www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1752928X19300757

This article critically reviews the use of forensic evidence at the International Criminal Court (ICC). All the ICC cases for which charges were confirmed at the pre-trial stage and for which trial has already started were analysed. To guarantee an empirical study as exhaustive as possible, all the publicly available transcripts and judgments have been explored and the following keywords have been used to search these documents: expert, scientific, forensic(s), anthropology, anthropologist, pathology, pathologist, psychiatry, psychiatrist, physician, doctor, medicine, medical, clinical, DNA, exhumation(s), autopsy(ies), identification(s), corpse(s), body(ies), human remains, mass grave(s).

C.Fournet (forthcoming), ‘Medical Evidence at the International Criminal Court – Dosage and Contraindications’, in Fournet, C. and Matwijkiw, A., Biolaw and International Criminal Law: Towards Interdisciplinary Synergies, Leiden: Brill/Martinus Nijhoff Publishers

This book chapter critically reviews the use of medical evidence at the International Criminal Court (ICC). A ll the ICC cases for which charges were confirmed at the pre-trial stage and for which trial has already started have been analyzed. To ensure grounded findings, all the publicly available transcripts and judgments have been reviewed and the following keywords have been used to search these documents: expert(s), doctor(s), physician(s), scientific, medicine, medical, clinical, biology(ist-s), gynaecology(ist-s), psychiatry(ist-s), torture, rape(s), sexual, violence.