Croatian judges reduced the number of backlog cases from 1.7 million to 570,000 in 25 years, he says, adding that a Croatian judge rules on 300 civil suits per year as against 66 by a judge in Helsinki.
The second instance court in Helsinki has 60 judges in the civil department and 60 advisors and together they decide on 4,000 cases per year, while Zagreb's County Court has 40 judges who decide on 16,000 cases a year, Sessa says.
The question is, can the judges pay sufficient attention to every problem? Sometimes, because of speed, mistakes are made, which is why proceedings take longer than they should, he adds. "It's not all about speed, but if we want speed, we must do something to reduce the influx of court cases."
Sessa says alternative approaches should be found to that problem and that one should strive for a more stable society as comparative analyses show that wealthier societies have more stable judicial systems because of a smaller influx of cases. He says Croatian civil court judges have to decide on 300 and criminal judges on 150 cases a year, far more than in other European Union countries.
Aside from the caseload, which prevents judges from ruling on cases at the speed citizens demand, another problem is the delay in adopting laws that would improve the position of judges, Sessa says.
One of the biggest problems is society's lack of understanding for the role and position of judges because people often don't see that judges mean well and only wish to introduce solutions that will improve the system and then protect citizens' interests and rights, he explains.
He recalls that in the past "one in three citizens had some sort of court dispute," saying judges are actually the victims here because they want a precise system, while facing "absolute distrust", and their decisions are "unnecessarily" checked ten times over.
Asked how many cases were returned from higher to lower courts for retrial, Sessa said only three to five percent.