German Civil Court Judges rarely put a Witness under Oath

Section 154 German Penal Code (Strafgesetzbuch) is titled „Meineid“, which is the German word for perjury, i.e. lying under oath to certain German authorities, either in a German court of law (Gericht) or in another official proceeding.

However, in real life, prosecution for perjury is very rare in Germany. This is not because all Germans are perfectly honest and no one lies in German court rooms (trust me, there is plenty of lying), but because not many German judges demand a witness to swear an oath. Not even when the judge is rather sure that he or she was just lied to by the witness.

Why does German law (appear to) employ such a soft approach towards „lying witnesses“ in civil procedure? This post describes the method of hearing witnesses in a German civil lawsuit and explains why many civil law court judges in Germany are hesitant to put a witness under oath.

Witness Evidence in German Civil Litigation

First, you must remember that there is no jury in a German court of law (more here). The case is decided by a professional judge only. The German approach is that a witness shall be questioned by the judge (instead of by the parties) and shall tell „the story as the witness remembers it“. The witness shall coherently describe what he or she recalls, i.e. in a freely worded statement which is uninterrupted by constant questions by a party’s legal counsel. „Coherently“ („im Zusammenhang“) is the important buzzword here, see section 396 para. 1 German Code of Civil Procedure. This German civil procedure statute explicitly prohibits a rapid fire cross-examination style questioning of a witness.

The method of hearing witnesses in German civil litigation is therefore the exact opposite of the rather aggressive „question by question“ approach used in the United States. German civil procedure rules do not believe in pressuring or leading witnesses. Instead, the German judge asks the questions rather broadly and then lets the witness speak. A typical question by a German civil court judge would be: mehr lesen…