The Evidence of Good and Bad Character of an Accused Person (eBook)

Academic Paper from the year 2021 in the subject Law - Civil Action / Lawsuit Law, grade: 5.0, University of Lagos (Law), course: Law, language: English, abstract: This paper sets out to analyze the application of good and bad character evidence to criminal proceedings within the corpus of the Evidence Act, 2011.

The term "character" has been defined by several legal writers and Judges for the purpose of determining its scope in the light of the law of evidence. The general consensus from the several definitions is that “character” is the general reputation as opposed to his disposition. Under the Nigerian Evidence Act 2011, the same definition was given pursuant to section 77 which defines the expression “character” to mean reputation as distinguished from disposition. It goes on to state that except as mentioned in sections 78 to 82, evidence may be given only of the general reputation, and not of the particular acts by which reputation or disposition is shown.

Unlike in civil proceedings, the Evidence Act creates a distinction between bad and good character for the purpose of determining the admissibility of character evidence in criminal proceedings.