Facts
The complainant [X.] was sentenced by the High Court of the Canton of Bern to a partially suspended prison sentence of 30 months for rape, sexual acts with children and sexual coercion. He appealed against this judgment and the rejection of his request for revision by the Court of Cassation of the High Court to the Federal Court, which was dismissed. Subsequently, the complainant filed a second request for revision, which was rejected by the High Court of the Canton of Bern. The complainant again appealed against this rejection to the Federal Court.
The complainant claimed that the lower court had violated his right to be heard and to a fair trial by wrongly rejecting the revision and not considering the new evidence, ten letters from the victim [Y.] . He requested that the contested decision be set aside and the case be referred back to the lower court so that it would approve the request for revision.
Considerations
The Federal Court examined the complaint and came to the conclusion that the lower court had rightly rejected the revision. The lower court was entitled to waive the requested witness hearings, as the complainant, his former wife and Dr. med. [A.] could not provide any information on how the letters were to be interpreted. The complainant's right to be heard was guaranteed by the opportunity to make a written statement.
The Federal Court found that the lower court did not have to answer the legal question of whether the new evidence had the relevance required for revision in favor of the complainant. The lower court was entitled to assume, without arbitrariness, that the new evidence was not…