Criteria and factors for a reasonable term of pre-trial criminal proceedings

The article is devoted to the circumstances influencing the reasonableness of the term of pre-trial criminal proceedings listed by the Russian legislator in Art. 6¹ of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, on the basis of which the subjects of the criminal process must determine whether the requirements of this article are met during the preliminary investigation or not. The relevance of this article is determined by the fact that the tools provided by the Russian legislator to determine the reasonable term of criminal proceedings are almost completely unsuitable for use for their intended purpose. The problem identified has become the most acute in view of the ever increasing number of violations of federal legislation by the preliminary investigation departments, as evidenced by the basic statistical data on the activities of the prosecutor's office for 2014-2016. So, within the stage of initiating a criminal case by a preliminary investigation of the Russian Federation, procedural deadlines became the rule: in 2015 - 8569516 decisions were passed to refuse criminal proceedings, of which 575204 decisions were taken 2 times, and 465140 - 3 and more times, and of these 8569516 decisions to refuse to initiate criminal cases 2346476 decisions were again canceled, including those that were already canceled 3 or more times (their number was 366669). The refusal of the modern Russian legislator to comprehensively, completely, objectively investigate in optimal terms all the circumstances of the crime committed on the basis of the correct application of the law (the requirement formulated in Art. 20 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic) led to the need for a normative settlement of the optimization of the terms of criminal proceedings. However, as the theoretical analysis and law-enforcement practice testifies, the requirements of Art. 6¹ of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation are of little use for the goal-setting and solution of the tasks of modern criminal justice in Russia. One of the main reasons for this problem is the absence of delimitation and ranking criteria for determining a reasonable time and factors affecting the length of time in Parts 3, 3.1, 3.3 of Art. 6¹ of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, which in itself excludes the possibility of effective application of this rule of law. The current situation calls for the development of new legislative solutions to ensure the observance of a reasonable period of pre-trial criminal proceedings. In the course of scientific work, the authors developed new circumstances that determine the reasonableness of the term of criminal proceedings, provides definitions of the concepts of criteria and factors for a reasonable period, reveals their content, taking into account that the wording of Art. 6¹ of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation has been completely revised. this rule of law. The current situation calls for the development of new legislative solutions to ensure the observance of a reasonable period of pre-trial criminal proceedings. In the course of scientific work, the authors developed new circumstances that determine the reasonableness of the term of criminal proceedings, provides definitions of the concepts of criteria and factors for a reasonable period, reveals their content, taking into account that the wording of Art. 6¹ of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation has been completely revised.

Keywords

Authors

References