information:extraction, stylistic:style_transfer, quality:corruption, information:classification, structural:scholar_edition
Trial

The inquisitorial process consisted of a series of hearings, in which both the denouncers and the defendant gave separate testimony. A defense counsel, a so-called lawyer, a member of the tribunal itself, was assigned to the defendant; his role was simply to advise the accused and to encourage them to speak the truth. He was obliged to renounce the defense at the moment when he realized his client's guilt.

The prosecution was directed by the fiscal. Interrogation of the defendant was done in the presence of the notario del secreto, who meticulously wrote down the words of the accused. The archives of the Inquisition, in comparison to those of other judicial systems of the era, are striking in the completeness of their documentation.

To defend themselves, the accused had two main choices: abonos (to find favourable and character witnesses) or tachas (to demonstrate that the witnesses of accusers — whose identity he did not know — were not trustworthy, and were his personal enemies.

The structure of the trials was similar to modern trials and, according to apologists, advanced for the time with regard to fairness. The Inquisition, "professional and efficient", was dependent on the political power of the King. The lack of separation of powers allows assuming questionable fairness for certain scenarios. The fairness of the Inquisitorial tribunals is alleged by apologists to be among the best in early modern Europe when it came to the trial of laymen. There are also testimonies by former prisoners that, if believed, suggest that said fairness was less than ideal when national or political interests were involved.

The historian Walter Ullmann thinks very different:

To obtain a confession or information relevant to an investigation, the Inquisition used torture, as prescribed in the instrucciones. It is impossible to determine with any degree of accuracy the number of cases in which it was employed during the Inquisition's existence.

Torture would be applied if the alleged heresy was "half proven" and could be repeated, according to Article XV of Torquemada instructions. Henry Lea estimates that between 1575 and 1610 the court of Toledo tortured approximately a third of those processed for Protestant heresy. Nearly all of the accused in several cases tried by the Lima tribunal between 1635 and 1639 appear to have been tortured; the Valladolid tribunal report for 1624 reveals that in eleven cases involving Jews and one involving a Protestant used torture; in 1655, all nine cases involving Jews employed torture.

The recently opened Vatican Archives suggest lower numbers. "In truth," says Thomas Madden, " the Inquisition brought order, justice, and compassion to combat rampant secular and popular persecutions of heretics." And concludes: "The Spanish people loved their Inquisition. That is why it lasted for so long." In other periods, the proportions of torture varied remarkably.