In 2019, RSIL consolidated its decades of expertise and know-how in criminal justice reform and capacity building in Pakistan into a single dedicated research unit – the Centre for Criminal Justice Reform and Capacity Building or C3. The Centre amalgamates RSIL’s capacities in research and analysis, policy formulation, legislative drafting, governance and administrative strengthening, statistical analysis, technological innovation, and capacity building to provide contextualized evidence-based solutions to criminal justice challenges in Pakistan.
Cognizant of the need to understand crime and the State’s response to it through a multi-sectoral and multi-disciplinary lens, the Centre routinely engages with a range of experts and civil society organizations in the fields of criminology, psychology, gender, and human rights. The Centre also works in close collaboration with RSIL’s Centre for Human Rights and ensures that all its proposals, interventions, and activities accord with and promote fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution of Pakistan as well as the State’s international human rights obligations.
The Centre benefits from excellent partnerships with key law enforcement, prosecution, and judicial institutions in Pakistan and abroad. In this regard, numerous MoUs and partnership agreements have been entered into to allow for the Centre’s research and expertise to be directly accessible by partners and stakeholders. This platform has allowed several joint initiatives to be undertaken and has led to the building of critical capacity in areas such as:
- Counter-Terrorism Investigations
- Electronic Surveillance & Interception
- Intelligence gathering and analysis
- Evidence Collection and Preservation
- Forensics
- Crime Scene Management
- Arrest, Remand, and Interrogation Techniques
- Investigations and Trial Procedure
- Counter-Terrorism Financing
- Anti-Money Laundering
- Smuggling of Migrants and Human Trafficking
- Probation and Parole
- Case File Management
- Police-Prosecution Cooperation
- Case management
- Trial Advocacy
- Circumstantial Evidence
- Decision-making for Discharge of Terrorism Cases
- International Law for Judges in Pakistan
- Human Rights in Pakistan
- Counter-Terrorism Laws
- Preventive Detention
- Non-Custodial Sentencing: Probation & Community Service
- Counter-Terrorism Financing
- Anti-Money Laundering
- Judgement Writing
Capacity building
Over the past several years RSIL has trained thousands of law enforcement personnel, probation officers, prosecutors, and judges in all four provinces of Pakistan. By adopting a continuous improvement process, RSIL’s capacity building initiatives have evolved to become the preferred option for numerous criminal justice sector educational and training institutes.
RSIL’s commitment to bringing innovation into the classroom has led to the development of a dedicated training platform – GatherSense – allowing for tablet based and online trainings. GatherSense has demonstrably improved participants’ interaction, focus, and retention. Modern trainings are designed to improve the knowledge and skills of participants in a range of areas yet progress on these fronts is difficult to gauge. GatherSense is designed to track participants progress against a set of pre-defined skills that can vary from training to training allowing us to pinpoint weaknesses, suggest remedial action, and improve our training curricula in real time. E.g. For a training to prosecutors on ‘Presenting Circumstantial Evidence at Trial’, we can separately track their progress towards their a) substantive legal knowledge of circumstantial evidence, b) knowledge of trial procedure, c) reasoning and analysis, and d) advocacy skills. This allows us to provide individualized feedback to participants and to improve our trainings going forward.
C3 works with a number of criminal justice advisors who are serving in various capacities in Pakistan. This includes serving members of the Pakistan Police Service, Provincial Judiciary, and Prosecution Departments across Pakistan. All Criminal Justice Advisors at C3 serve in an honorary capacity.
C3 aims to facilitate its Criminal Justice Advisors by supporting their research and documenting their experience in criminal justice sector reform. In this regard, members of our in-house research team are attached to each Advisor and work in close coordination with them on various issues of reform. This process allows C3 to benefit from the vast practical experience of these professionals while at the same time assisting them in their own research interests.
Currently Criminal Justice Advisors at C3:
Mr. Kamran Adil,
Senior Criminal Justice Advisor
Partners
- ABA-ROLI
- UNODC
- ICRC
- British High Commission
- Federal Judicial Academy
- Sindh Judicial Academy
- Punjab Judicial Academy
- Financial Monitoring Unit
- National Police Bureau
- National Counter-Terrorism Authority
- Islamabad Police
- Sindh Police Department
- KP Police Department
- Police College, Sihala
- KP Probation Department
- Balochistan Prosecution Department
- KP Prosecution Department
- Sindh Prosecution Department
National Observatory on Crime & Criminal Justice:
C3 is working towards the establishment of a National Observatory on Crime & Criminal Justice in collaboration with various criminal justice sector actors. The Observatory will serve to gather, verify, and analyze crime, judicial, sentencing, probation, and prison statistics with a view to providing decision makers with evidence on which to base policies and interventions. Importantly, an endeavor of this nature will unify criminal justice sector actors’ responses to crime, recidivism, reform, and rehabilitation.
C3 is currently seeking support from donors