All articles starting with T
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Trial by combat
Trial by combat (wager of battle, judicial duel): a medieval legal procedure deciding guilt or right by armed fight between parties or champions. Introduced to England by the Normans in 1066; abolished there in 1819 after Ashford v Thornton.
Trial by Fire (2018 film)
Trial by Fire (2018) is Edward Zwick's biographical drama starring Jack O'Connell and Laura Dern, based on David Grann's 2009 New Yorker article about Cameron Todd Willingham's contested Texas arson conviction and 2004 execution.
Trial by Media
Trial by Media: 2020 Netflix true crime docuseries (6 episodes, TV-MA) from George Clooney, Steven Brill, and Jeffrey Toobin examining six trials, including Jenny Jones, Diallo, and Blagojevich, where media coverage shaped verdicts.
Trial by ordeal
Trial by ordeal: medieval judicial procedure (judicium Dei) deciding guilt by fire, water, or combat tests; Germanic in origin, church-administered, abolished by the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215, replaced by jury trial in England.
Trial for the 2022–2023 Brazilian coup plot
Trial for the 2022–2023 Brazilian coup plot (AP 2668): Supreme Federal Court prosecution of Jair Bolsonaro and co-defendants; 4–1 conviction on 11 September 2025, 27-year-3-month sentence, Fux dissent, five nuclei of defendants.
Trial in absentia
Trial in absentia is a criminal proceeding held without the defendant, common in civil law systems. Safeguards include notice, counsel, and retrial; the ICC allows only in absentia charge confirmation, first used in the 2025 Kony case.
Trial of Alex Murdaugh
Trial of Alex Murdaugh: 2023 Walterboro, South Carolina double-murder trial for the killings of Maggie and Paul Murdaugh; convictions on kennel-video and cellphone evidence, two life sentences, reversed May 2026 with retrial set for 2027.
Trial of Arne Cheyenne Johnson
Trial of Arne Cheyenne Johnson, the 1981 Connecticut "Devil Made Me Do It" murder trial, the only U.S. murder case where demonic possession was proposed as a defense; Judge Robert Callahan barred it, and Johnson was convicted of manslaughter.
Trial of Bahadur Shah Zafar
The Trial of Bahadur Shah Zafar (مقدمہ بہادر شاہ ظفر) was an 1858 British military trial in Delhi of the last Mughal emperor, who was exiled to Rangoon.
Trial of Bill Cosby
Trial of Bill Cosby: the Pennsylvania criminal prosecution of William H. Cosby Jr. for the aggravated indecent assault of Andrea Constand, covering the 2017 mistrial, 2018 retrial conviction and 3-to-10-year sentence, and the 2021 vacatur barring retrial.
Trial of Charles Taylor
The Trial of Charles Taylor ended on April 26, 2012, when the Special Court for Sierra Leone convicted the former Liberian president on all 11 counts of war crimes.
Trial of Clay Shaw
The 1969 New Orleans trial of businessman Clay Shaw, charged by DA Jim Garrison with conspiring to assassinate President Kennedy; the only such trial ever held, ending in acquittal after 55 minutes of jury deliberation.
Trial of Daniel Sickles
The 1859 Washington, D.C. murder trial of Congressman Daniel Sickles for killing Philip Barton Key, his wife's lover; first successful temporary-insanity acquittal in U.S. history.
Trial of George Zimmerman
The 2013 Florida second-degree murder trial of George Zimmerman for shooting Trayvon Martin; six-woman jury acquitted him July 13, 2013 after a self-defense case; racially divided reaction and later DOJ closure.
Trial of Hein
Trial of Hein (Der Heimatlose) is Kai Stänicke's 2026 German debut drama, 122 minutes, in which a man returning after 14 years to a North Sea island village must prove his identity at a village trial; it won the Teddy Jury Award at the 2026 Berlinale.
Trial of Hissène Habré
The trial of Hissène Habré was the prosecution of Chad's former president before the Extraordinary African Chambers in Senegal, ending in conviction and life imprisonment in 2016.
Trial of Jeffrey Donaldson
The trial of Jeffrey Donaldson was a criminal prosecution at Newry Crown Court in Northern Ireland concerning sexual offenses against two complainants. Donaldson, a former leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, denied.
Trial of labor
A trial of labor is a planned attempt to deliver vaginally after a previous cesarean, undertaken with monitoring and staffing for prompt cesarean; success is called VBAC.
Trial of Laurent Gbagbo
The trial of Laurent Gbagbo was an International Criminal Court proceeding in which the former Ivorian president and Charles Blé Goudé faced crimes against humanity charges, ending in acquittal.
Trial of Michael Jackson
The 2005 criminal trial of Michael Jackson (People v. Jackson) in Santa Maria, California, on child molestation and conspiracy charges; acquitted on all 10 counts June 13, 2005, after a 3.5-month trial before Judge Rodney Melville.
Trial of Oscar Pistorius
Trial of Oscar Pistorius: 2014 Pretoria High Court prosecution of the Paralympic sprinter for killing Reeva Steenkamp; culpable homicide verdict upgraded to murder (dolus eventualis) on appeal; 13 years 5 months; paroled January 2024.
Trial of Saddam Hussein
Trial of Saddam Hussein: 2005-2006 prosecution of Iraq's former president before the Iraqi High Tribunal for the 1982 Dujail massacre; conviction for crimes against humanity on November 5, 2006, death sentence, and execution on December 30, 2006.
Trial of Satanta and Big Tree
The Trial of Satanta and Big Tree was an 1871 Texas court case in which two Kiowa leaders were convicted of murder for the Warren Wagon Train raid.
Trial of Sean Combs
Trial of Sean Combs (Diddy): 2025 federal SDNY case before Judge Arun Subramanian; convicted on two Mann Act prostitution-transportation counts, acquitted of racketeering and sex trafficking; sentenced to 50 months and a $500,000 fine, now on appeal.
Trial of Sean Dunn
Trial of Sean Dunn, formally United States v. Dunn (D.D.C. 1:25-cr-252), the 2025 'sandwich guy' case: a jury acquitted the former DOJ paralegal of misdemeanor assault under 18 U.S.C. 111 after a grand jury rejected a felony indictment.
Trial of Sheikh Hasina
Trial of Sheikh Hasina: ICT-1 Dhaka trial in absentia of the deposed Bangladeshi prime minister, with former home minister Asaduzzaman Khan Kamal and ex-IGP Chowdhury Abdullah Al-Mamun, for crimes against humanity in the 2024 July uprising; verdict 17 November 2025, death sentences for Hasina and Kamal, five years for Mamun.
Trial of Socrates
The trial of Socrates was the 399 BCE criminal proceeding in democratic Athens where the philosopher was convicted of impiety and corrupting the youth and executed by drinking hemlock.
Trial of Soldier F
Trial of Soldier F: Belfast Crown Court prosecution of an anonymous ex-Parachute Regiment lance corporal for two Bloody Sunday murders and five attempted murders (30 January 1972, Derry); acquitted on all counts by Judge Lynch KC on 23 October 2025.
Trial of the century
"Trial of the century" is a recurring media label for America's most sensational trials, from Scopes (1925) and Lindbergh-Hauptmann (1935) to the 1995 O.J. Simpson acquittal, watched by nearly 150 million, and later trials of Michael Jackson, Depp v. Heard, and Trump.
Trial of the Juntas
The Trial of the Juntas (Juicio a las Juntas) was Argentina's 1985 prosecution of nine former military commanders for human rights crimes committed during the 1976–1983 dictatorship.