A New Element in the Extradition Procedure

The aim of the article is to justify a new element in the procedure for the extradition of a person for criminal prosecution or sentence execution. This element is the checking for compliance with internationally recognized standards of the conditions of the possible detention before trial, incarceration, as well as during transfer, in the country this person is extradited to. The source basis of the study were materials of the European Court of Human Rights, courts of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, the Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia, the Main Directorate of International Legal Cooperation of the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation, materials of checks of confinement conditions in Russian penitentiary institutions. Materials of checks of confinement conditions in specific penitentiary institutions have been supplemented with materials of checks of conditions for transferring prisoners in the Russian Federation. The study is based on the application of the method of participatory observation expressed in the collection of factual material during direct participation in the work of the Main Directorate of International Legal Cooperation of the General Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation in organizing checks by foreign experts of the confinement conditions of prisoners when deciding on extradition. Methods of observation, interviewing, experiment, analysis, comparison, and others were also used. The analysis of the available materials and the author's own practice showed that foreign partners began to actively use information about unsatisfactory confinement conditions in prisons in specific cases as a basis for refusal to extradite people to Russia. When deciding on the extradition of persons detained at the request of the Russian side for criminal prosecution, the practice of foreign partners has introduced the organization of regular checks of the alleged confinement conditions in the Russian Federation on specific criminal cases in relation to specific persons. In order to overcome the emerging problems, on a contractual basis, foreign authoritative specialists are organizing inspections of the conditions in various penitentiary institutions. The results of such inspections in specific penitentiary institutions are of direct importance in matters of extradition in specific cases. On the basis of this material, the need was justified to include an additional element in the theoretical and legislative model of extradition, which no one has yet mentioned in the legal literature - checking the conditions of the possible detention of the extradited person before trial and incarceration. In order to overcome the negative trends, a set of measures at three different levels has been proposed to bring the conditions of the person extradited during the transfer to Russia in line with internationally recognized standards.

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