Well, the confusing thing is that, according to the WOIAF, there is both a royal justice system and the right of pit and gallows. So there’s a question about where the dividing line is between royal authority and the privileges of the nobility.
To quote an earlier post of mine:
“Well, let’s take Henry II’s judicial reforms as a jumping-off point: he’s perhaps best known for the Assizes of Clarendon (which in addition to asserting exclusive royal jurisdiction over criminal cases and royal jurisdiction over land disputes, also created some of the first grand juries) where he established the justices in eyre – six judges from Westminster who divided England between them and would travel in a circuit from county to county, covering their entire circuit every two years. He also established permanent judiciaries in the capitol which would eventually be known as the Court of Common Pleas and the Court of King’s Bench. And this was pretty much how things went from about 1166 to 1285-1360, where the system of local justices of the peace began to replace the justices in eyre in terms of who does the majority of judicial work.
So if we were talking about providing a judiciary for Westeros, I think you’d probably start with a system of itinerant justices who could cover a good deal of territory between them, and you’d probably stagger the numbers by the size of the territory involved: Iron Islands are pretty small geographically so you could get away with one, Stormlands and Crownlands could probably be covered by two justices each, Westerlands and Vale maybe three or four each given the difficulty of mountain travel, the North and Dorne would probably need 5-6 given the long distances but also the lower population density, and the Reach would probably need 10 or more given the size and high population.”
So the first step is to set up itinerant royal justices so that you have a mechanism by which royal judicial authority is transmitted to the provinces outside of the direct overlordship of the King, and to establish in law that these courts have jurisdiction over certain crimes.
Note that Henry II targeted criminal cases – murder always gets people het up, and given the tendency of private wars between nobles to end in murder, it’s a good excuse to get the lords under warrant – and land disputes, because in a society where land disputes are going to be the majority of legal matters, that makes the royal courts very attractive.
The second step is to establish firmly in law what is already precedent: that the king and his ministers have appelate jurisdiction over judicial disputes between lords, with an eye to extending this into appelate jurisdiction over the judicial decisions of lords. This can also be important for royal authority down the line, because it allows you to overrule local lords and gets the ordinary subject to see the king as an interposing power they can appeal to.
The third step, as suggested by the second, is to maneuver yourself into a situation where A. the king gets a veto over local judicial decisions through appelate jurisdiction over all judicial decisions, and B. local lords are held legally accountable for violating the royal justice code in either action or decision. Perverting the course of justice, embracery, obstruction of justice, misprision of felony, mis- and malfeasance in public office, compounding a felony – there is a long list of old crimes from the Common Law that could be used as a cudgel against lords trying to maintain their tradional privileges.
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