Talk:key witness

Deletion discussion

The following information has failed Wiktionary's deletion process.

It should not be re-entered without careful consideration.

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Isn't this just key + witness? Chuck Entz (talk) 18:51, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Delete. As an attorney, I can tell you that there is no special legal significance afforded to the term "key" with respect to a witness or to evidence. A witness whose testimony is so vital that a legally sufficient case can not be made without them is a material witness, and in some cases designation as a material witness permits the court to hold that witness in custody so as to compel their testimony. bd2412 T 19:56, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Reaction. Hi BD2412. Thanks for your clarification. These two entries were created by me and I wasn't 100% sure whether this is correct or not. So I'm glad to see that this has now been checked by an attorney. The reason to create this article actually is this entry (created by me as well). The German word "Hauptzeuge" is not a legal term in German law but a common term used in media reports on court cases. Hence the word has been tagged as "Rechtssprache" (used in legal language context but not necessarily a legal term). Looking for a translation of the term into English I found the following translations: key witness, prime witness, principal witness, chief witness for the crown. Both "key witness" and "principal witness" were tagged with the word "law". I decided to use these two terms because I thought that the Category:en:Law isn't solely restricted to legal terms but comprises the vast field of law.

While it turns out now that material witness is the correct legal term in US-American law it remains unclear to me what kind of term key witness actually is.

In Europe this term is widely used in legal context. There are other terms with the same or nearly the same meaning as well. I looked up the translations of "Hauptzeuge" in translations from the European Parlament and they are using terms like these here: main witness, chief witness, central witness, key witness and so on.

Having entered the term "Hauptzeuge" into this program for translated quotes from various text sources I found the term "key witness" several times on the website "europarl.europa.eu" .

Furthermore, the term "key witness" is used in the UK in official documents as this statement from the Kent Police clearly shows: 8.4. It should be noted that only very basic statements should fall within this bracket. Detailed key witness statements are not appropriate to be taken using this method..

Having said that, however, I do agree that the articles should be deleted if it turns out that these two entries are incorrect terms or inappropriate (SOP) for the goals of this dictionary.--91.61.98.16 17:14, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

In that case, it may be worth keeping this entry as a literal target for translations. Material witness does not mean quite the same thing, as it only refers to a witness in a criminal case whose testimony is necessary to establish the crime. bd2412 T 20:13, 30 June 2013 (UTC)

Delete DCDuring TALK 20:01, 29 June 2013 (UTC)

Delete, straightforward, I have no other comments. 20:43, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Deleted. bd2412 T 16:31, 4 December 2013 (UTC)