DENMARK Law and Practice Contributed by: Thomas Norvold, Søren Locher, Anne Mie Lund and Pawel Weigel, Fabritius Tengnagel & Heine
7.4 Rules That Govern Admission of Evidence The parties involved in a court case are responsible for submitting evidence in support of their claims, which will form the basis for the court’s assessment of the case. However, if a party’s claim, arguments or statements about the case are unclear or incomplete, the court may seek to remedy this by posing questions to the party. The court may encourage a party to state their position on both factual and legal issues that appear to be relevant to the case. The court may request a party to submit documents, provide inspections or expert assessments, or otherwise present evidence when the factual circumstances of the case would remain uncertain without such evidence. Evidence that is considered to be irrelevant to the case cannot be presented. The stage of preparation of the case is normally con- cluded eight weeks before the final hearing in the district court. A party must notify the court and the opposing party if it wishes to: • expand the claims made during the case prepara- tion stage; • introduce arguments that were not presented dur- ing the preparation stage; or • present evidence that was not indicated during the preparation stage. Even if the opposing party has given consent, the court may oppose the expansion of claims, the introduction of new arguments or the presentation of new evidence if complying with the request is likely to necessitate a postponement of the main hearing. Even if the opposing party has not given consent, the court may grant permission for the expansion of claims, the introduction of new arguments or the presentation of new evidence in the following circum- stances: • there are special reasons that make it excusable that the request was not made earlier;
• the opposing party has sufficient opportunity to safeguard their interests without delaying the main hearing; or • refusal of permission would result in a dispropor-
tionate loss for the party. 7.5 Expert Testimony
In Danish civil court cases, expert testimony is nor- mally provided by court-appointed experts who are not related to the parties and have no conflicts of interest. Such expert testimonies are given significant evidential weight by the court. The appointment of a court-appointed expert witness is made upon the parties’ request to the court. The request should include information about the subject matter of the inspection and expert assessment and the purpose of the proceeding. The court-appointed expert witness will answer the questions asked by the parties, both in writing, after an inspection and assessment of the relevant object. The court may reject questions that are beyond the expert’s professional competence or the court’s deci- sion on conducting an inspection and expert assess- ment, or that are considered irrelevant to the case. The court may also reject questions that, in an improper manner, attempt to guide the expert in a specific direc- tion or assume that the expert should make deter- minations on issues that are within the scope of the court’s assessment (eg, the assessment of evidence and legal assessments). In civil cases, if both parties jointly request it, the court may permit them to submit statements as a supple- ment to, or in place of, expert testimonies provided by court-appointed experts. These statements can come from experts that the parties themselves hire and should address specific technical, economic, or similar issues Statements on specific technical, economic or simi- lar matters that a party has obtained from experts before initiating the case may be presented as evi- dence, unless the content of the statement, the cir- cumstances of its creation or other factors provide a basis for denying a party to present such evidence. If a party has presented such a statement, the oppos-
270 CHAMBERS.COM
Powered by FlippingBook