Assessor

assessor

One with special knowledge of a subject who is appointed or elected to assist a judge or magistrate in deciding a legal matter. In the U.S., the term also designates an official who evaluates property for the purposes of taxation. Assessors were appointed in the late 19th century throughout Europe to try to limit the influence of the jury system, which had been introduced in the wake of the French Revolution. Assessors thus represented a return to the civil-law traditions of Europe. In Britain and the U.S., assessors came to be used in labour and maritime courts as well as in some other civil jurisdictions.

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assessor

1. a person who evaluates the merits, importance, etc., of something, esp (in Britain) work prepared as part of a course of study

2. a person with technical expertise called in to advise a court on specialist matters

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Assessor 

a judicial official in ancient Rome, in medieval Europe, and in some bourgeois states such as Germany. In Russia, Peter I created the post of assessor on the staffs of the Senate, the Synod, the courts, and the other Collegiums. This post was gradually abolished in the second half of the 19th century. (It was retained longest in the provincial governments.) The rank corresponding to this post—col-legial assessor, the eighth civilian rank in the Table of Ranks—existed until the overthrow of tsarism in 1917.