Appeal Process and Judicial Review in Iran

Appeal Process and Judicial Review in Iran

The structure designed in the Iranian Code of Civil Procedure for judicial review is in line with rules prevalent among civil law systems. There is a two-step mechanism, which concerns substantive matters, reinforced with final review of the Supreme Court.

 

Principle of Two Step Judicial Process

The review mechanism in Iran is based on the principle of two step judicial process. it means almost all cases coming before the courts must at least be adjudicated twice. There is also a third step, namely the supreme court review, but this review is not substantive and is only concerned with formal deficiencies.

 

Trial Courts and Appellate Courts

For civil matters, the courts are organized in two levels of hierarchy: courts of first instance or trial courts, and courts of second instance or appellate courts. Both courts are engaged with substantive matters; however, the process in the trial court is longer, more adversarial and more detailed, while the appellate court is more focused on one or two grounds, even though they are legally bound to review the case ultimately and beyond the grounds expressed by the appealing party.

 

ALL Cases are Appealable

Article 330 of the Code of Civil Procedure (CCP) makes an impression which is not practically right. According to this article, all the judgments issued by the courts of first instance are final, unless those excepted by the following articles. But when you read the article 331, it transpires that virtually all the judgments issued by the courts of first instance are disputable. The first paragraph of this article includes all the financial disputes valued at more than three million Rials. The second one includes all non-financial disputes.

 

Exceptions to the Principle of Two Step Judicial Process

However, the note under the article 330 enumerates two situations where the usually appealable judgments turn into final. First, when the judgment issued is based on the confession of a party, as a sole evidence or the most important one, and the next is, when the parties to the dispute have already agreed to the finality of the judgment in writing. Nonetheless, even these judgments are disputable as to the competence of the court, means either jurisdiction issues, or the competence of judge (independence issues).

 

Appealable Orders

As you may already know, the last decision of a court that closes a case is not always a judgment. The other possibility is issuing an order to that effect. Article 332 indicates that when a case is appealable, there is no difference if it eventuates in a judgment or order and the case is appealable anyway, provided that the order fall in one of the following categories:

1. The order of cancellation of or dismissing the suit, issued by the judge;
2. The order of dismissing the claim, or incapacity of the case to be heard;
3. The order of disposal of claim;
4. The order of incapacity of one of the parties.

 

Appellate Deadlines

Article 336 provides two separate deadlines for registering a notice of appeal. The parties settled in Iran have to give this notice 20 days after the entry of judgment, means when the party has been served. For those parties settled overseas this period is two months. You can submit the notice to the office of the court of judgment or the appellate court.

 

Grounds of Appeal

Article 348 introduces five grounds upon which an appellate court may reverse an inferior court’s judgment:

1. Invalidity of evidences upon which the judgment is founded;
2. Non-qualification on the part of witnesses;
3. Carelessness to the presented proofs;
4. Incompetence of the court or the judge (jurisdiction and independence);
5. Contradiction to the legal rules and regulations.

 

Review by the Supreme Court

Supreme court review is limited to the compliance issues, i.e., if the inferior courts observed the law or simply ignore it. Therefore, relevant facts are out of the mandate of the supreme court. However, article 375 provides that if invalidity of evidences be proved in the court, the judgment will be revoked. Then, the case shall be sent back to the same court or a to another division in the same district. But in the face of lack of jurisdiction, the supreme court has no choice but to send the case to the competent court in another district.

 

Procedure after Revocation by the Supreme Court

Article 401 provides that if the judgment has been revoked because of insufficient investigations, the case shall be sent back to the court which has issued the judgment. According to the article 402, the supreme court must enumerate the deficiencies in a detailed manner when revoking a judgment due to insufficient investigations. Paragraph 1 of the article 405 forces the inferior court to fulfill her duty as to complete investigation according to the supreme court’s opinion and then issue a new decision. The case is the same when an order has been revoked. (paragraph 2 of the article 405).

 

A New Trial or Appellate Court

If a judgment be revoked while the investigations are complete and jurisdiction law has been observed, then the case shall be sent to another division in the same district, or to the nearer district if there is no other division in that district (paragraph 3 of the article 401)..

 

Supreme Court Scope of Jurisdiction

Article 367 articulates that supreme court shall hear a number of petitions against the decisions of the courts of first instance. These petitions are against judgments or orders of the trial courts which turn into final decisions due to the expiration of appellate deadline. Article 368 pronounces the same rules for the decisions of the appellate courts, minus the financial disputes as mentioned in the paragraph 1 of the article 367/A.

 

Cases to be Heard in Supreme Court

According to the article 367/A, only these judgments are referrable to the supreme court:

1. If the case is valued more than twenty million Rials;
2. If the case is concerning very nature of marriage, annulment of the marriage, divorce, parentage, personal incapacity, trust.

According to the article 367/B, only these orders are referrable to the supreme court, provided that the earlier criteria for the judgments are already met by the case:

1. The order of cancellation of or dismissing the suit, issued by the court;
2. The order of disposal of claim;
3. The order of incapacity of one of the parties.

 

Parties are Dismissed until Further Notice

According to the article 393, parties to the dispute may be summoned by the supreme court, but in principle such summons is not part of the process.