Has it ever happened to you that law enforcement agencies ignore your statement or report that a criminal offense has been committed against you? It is good if you do not find yourself in such a situation, because the practice of refusing to open criminal proceedings is widespread.
The Code of Criminal Procedure of Ukraine does not establish any grounds for refusing to submit applications to the ERDR. Moreover, it is noted that a person authorized to accept and register applications and notifications of criminal offenses, is obliged to accept and register such a statement or notification, refusal – is not allowed. The investigator and prosecutor must immediately (no later than 24 hours after the submission of the application, notification) enter the relevant information into the ERDR and initiate an investigation.
In turn, law enforcement officials refuse to register the application or notification and do not motivate their refusal at all or refer to the Law “On Citizens’ Appeals”. In turn, the Law “On Citizens’ Appeals” regulates the issue of practical implementation by citizens of Ukraine of the right to make proposals to public authorities to improve their activities, expose shortcomings in work, challenge the actions of officials, state and public bodies. Therefore, if a person applies to the National Police with a statement or notification of the commission of a criminal offense in his opinion, the consideration of such as an appeal under the Law “On Citizens’ Appeals” is inadmissible.
As an argument, the workload of law enforcement agencies is also given, which results in the acceptance of only those statements that refer to actions that contain signs of a crime. However, it is not clear how the workload of law enforcement agencies affects the task assigned to them to protect a person from criminal offenses. And whether a citizen who has no legal education can know for sure which circumstances of the event that happened to him will be important to establish the signs of a crime, and which will not.
And although the CPC does provide for the inclusion in the ERDR of information on the basis of allegations and reports of criminal offenses, and not on any other act, it should be borne in mind that at the stage of filing a criminal offense is only the initiation of criminal proceedings and, one way or another , the commission of a crime against the applicant will only be probable. Information and evidence to confirm or deny that a crime was committed against a person will be collected later – as part of the initiated criminal proceedings. Therefore, even if the results of the analysis of the information provided by the person in the statement or report indicate the absence of signs of a crime, such information should be entered into the ERDR with the subsequent closure of criminal proceedings.
The CPC classifies the inaction of an investigator or prosecutor in the form of failure to enter information about a criminal offense in the ERDR as one that can be challenged in pre-trial proceedings. Therefore, the applicant has the right to file a complaint against the inaction of the investigator or prosecutor to the local court at the place of receipt of the refusal, which will be further considered by the investigating judge. At the same time, you should be careful, because a ten-day period is set for filing a complaint, which begins to be calculated from the moment of non-acceptance of the application for committing a criminal offense.
The examination of your complaint by the investigating judge may result in a decision to accept a statement / notification of a criminal offense against you and to register such a statement / notification with the ERDR. Such a decision cannot be appealed.
If your complaint has not been properly substantiated, there is a possibility that the court may rule to dismiss the complaint. You can appeal the latter to the appellate court.
You should be careful when writing a complaint, because in court practice there are different approaches to assessing the legality of inaction / refusal to submit an application or notification to the ERDR. Some investigating judges believe that investigators and prosecutors should automatically enter information about a criminal offense without assessing the relevant statement or notification that the information contained therein gives grounds to state certain signs of a crime. Others take the position that only those statements or notifications are submitted to the ERDR, which contain information indicating the commission of a criminal offense. Therefore, not knowing in advance what approach the investigating judge will take to whom your complaint will be distributed, it is better to substantiate in the latter that your statement or message indicated that a criminal offense under the relevant article was committed against you. (part of the article) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.
If you have any questions or need advice, the team of Neofelis Love Group JSC is happy to help.
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