SayIt — Modern transcripts

Charles Taylor Trial

The transcripts of the trial of Charles Taylor, former President of Liberia. More…

About

Warning – the transcripts contain large volumes of graphic, harrowing testimony about war crimes. We encourage readers looking for a casual browse to try the Leveson Inquiry or Shakespeare Plays instead.

Charles Taylor was the 22nd President of Liberia, serving from 1997 until 2003.

In June 2003, whilst he was still president, he was indicted for war crimes and crimes against humanity by the Special Court for Sierra Leone. In August 2003 he resigned and moved to Nigeria in exile. In 2006 he was arrested and charged by the Special Court, which began a legal process which was to last seven years.

In April 2012 the Special Court ruled that he was guilty on 11 counts, and was sentenced to 50 years in prison.

The trial was enormously long and complex (as always, Wikipedia provides an excellent overview) and saw over 400,000 speeches or statements. We have taken the official transcripts from sc-sl.org, the website of the trial, and imported them unaltered into this SayIt website. We have done this to show how we feel serious documents should be published in future.

Pre-trial

Prosecution

Motion for Judgement of Acquittal

Pre-defence

Defence

Closing arguments

Verdict

Appeal