The role of the Constitutional Court in formation and development of modern criminal procedure legislation of Russia

In adversary proceedings the court is obliged to provide with a fair and unhampered disposition of a case granting both parties equal opportunities to defend their positions. The court cannot take the execution of extra function of a party, which represents the prosecution, upon itself because it breaks the constitutional principle of adversary proceedings and it can lead to a situation when a party, which represents the defence, is in a worse position. Consequently, for the first time the Constitutional Court formulated the matter of the principle of adversary proceedings, ratifying its decrees and confirming its position on this issue. Starting from these theses of the Constitutional Court the principle of adversary proceedings was formulated in the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation (Article 15). Relying on the position of the Constitutional Court and regulations of the Criminal Procedure Code the author draws a conclusion that adversary proceedings as a principle of a criminal trial are only peculiar to trial and cannot be a principle of pre-trial. Besides, the Constitutional Court accepted some fundamental decrees to develop constitutional regulations about providing of qualified legal aid; legislators apprehended these decreeswhen the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation was adopted. It is considered that the state, defining the function of legal proceedings, equality of the parties before the court and adversary proceedings, guarantees qualified legal aid (guaranteeing the right to defence) to an accused and a suspect, securing the right of appealing decisions made during pre-trial and decisions taken by the court of the first instance, etc. The author expressed his opinion that the Constitutional Court is one of the co-authors of the project of the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation.

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