Judicial Reform Law of 17 August 1998

This law sits at the head of the modern Haitian judicial-reform sequence: the 2007 laws creating the CSPJ and setting the statute of the judiciary both cite it in their preambles as prior law. It reforms the organization and functioning of the courts, building on the law of 18 September 1985 on judicial organization and the law of 30 March 1984 reorganising the Ministry of Justice, and is grounded in the constitutional articles on the judicial power (59, 59-1, 60-1, 111, 111-1, 173, 173-2, 175, 176, 177, 207, 263-1, 269, 269-1 of the Constitution of 29 March 1987). Reading it alongside the 2007 package shows what nine years of reform effort changed and what it left in place. Published in Le Moniteur, 153rd year, No. 61, Monday 17 August 1998.