"Troika" instead of jury. Such serious crimes as forcible seizure of power, state treason and terrorism should not be considered by a court with the participation of jury. This decision was made by the State Duma, supporting the draft Federal Law “On Amending Certain Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation on Combating Terrorism” developed by the chairman of the Security Committee, Vladimir Vasiliev. What could this turn out for justice - analyzed The New Times
Judging by the latest legislative initiatives, the people's deputies no longer trust their own voters. To talk about increasing the security of citizens as a whole, deputies systematically strengthen sanctions for various crimes and offenses, jeopardizing the safety of each individual citizen. Under the pretext of strengthening the fight against corruption, the secret of personal life is violated, for the sake of reducing the number of accidents, removal of innocence is introduced into the presumption, and to “increase the effectiveness of measures to prevent terrorism and strengthen the fight against this phenomenon” began the offensive on the jury. In some cases, they dared to bear the acquittal verdicts to members of illegal armed groups and seemed to have lost confidence. Moreover, not only Vasiliev and the deputies supported him, but also the entire party of United Russia.
Forensic counter -reform
According to the authors of the bill, the amendments, according to which serious and especially serious crimes will have to be considered by a collegium of 3 professional judges, and not 12 jurors, must be accepted in connection with the growing terrorist threat. The situation requires other “adequate measures” that will ensure the inevitability of punishment of guilty persons for crimes committed, deputies believe. Among these measures, for example, they include increased responsibility for covering terrorists and promoting their activities.
However, the most controversial seems to be the intention of legislators to make changes to the Code of Criminal Procedure, "aimed at clarifying the composition of the court in resolving certain categories of cases." Such an intricate phrase in the explanatory note to the bill covers its true goal: to begin the next stage of the judicial counter -reform related to the refusal of the democratization of Russian justice.
The right to consideration of particularly serious crimes with the participation of jury, guaranteed by the Constitution of the Russian Federation, really do not like law enforcement agencies, which are not easy to prove in the adversarial process their rightness. And especially in cases where evidence of guilt is collected in violation of procedural legislation. The jury in such a situation does not take the prosecution, while professional judges, according to impartial judicial statistics, conclude a conviction in 99 cases out of 100. By the way, according to the Judicial Department of the Russian Federation, in 2007, the share of cases considered with the participation of the jury, amounted to only 0.05% of the total number of criminal cases.
It is no coincidence that experts call the Investigative Committee under the Prosecutor General’s Prosecutor General as a real creator of this bill. For example, State Duma deputy Viktor Ilyukhin , who himself constantly opposed the introduction of a jury, today criticizes the initiative of his colleagues, believing that they unlawfully limit the rights of citizens, taking them the opportunity to demand a fair court with the participation of 12 jury. “The main thing here is to start, then you can not stop, but this institution is registered in that part of the Constitution, which is almost impossible to change,” Ilyukhin noted. However, in the conclusion of the Security Committee, restricting the rights of citizens is called a “forced measure”, and the position of deputies is “balanced”, since it implies the possibility of “differentiated use of the institution of jurors in the consideration of criminal cases of terrorist crimes”.
Many lawyers call such “differentiation” not only unconstitutional, but also politically incorrect. The teacher of the Department of Criminal Procedure Law of the Russian Academy of Justice, Ilya Novikov, is sure that "the removal of anti-state cases from among those that can be considered by the assessors will be the most serious blow to the Russian court of jury over one and a half decades of its existence." He also notes that “Vasiliev’s bill, unlike the Constitution, does not at all consider the jury as the right of the accused to defend - only as an instrument in the hands of a state that is more suitable for some purposes and less for others.”
To the signature of Medvedev
By the way, the initiative to limit the powers of the jury was already nominated in 2007, but then it was not supported, since the government issued an unambiguous conclusion that "to deprive the accused of choosing a court composition is a direct contradiction of the Constitution of the Russian Federation." Today, the government is silent, like the Communist Party of the Communist Party and the LDPR, which refused, contrary to the usual, from public speaking when considering the bill in the first reading.
Only the representative of the Fair Russia faction Elena Mizulina criticized the initiative of Vasiliev. “This bill is not about countering terrorism, but about the restriction of democracy, about maintaining corruption in the law enforcement system and in the justice system, on countering the overcoming of legal nihilism and the formation of the legal culture of Russian society,” said Mizulina, which has been the authorized representative of the State Duma in the Constitutional Court of Russia. However, the “United Russia” deputies did not want to hear the arguments of their opponents. The head of the Committee on Constitutional Legislation, Vladimir Pligin, stated "the need to ensure the life of all participants in the process, and above all the jury." And Vladimir Vasiliev himself expressed concern in connection with the practice of justifying terrorists by jury courts. He recalled that in Dagestan and Kabardinobalkaria in 2005-2008, "in connection with the verdict of jury under 26 processes, 12 acquittal sentences were issued."
The Duma, of course, adopted the law in the first reading, moreover, she decided to reduce the term of consideration of amendments in order to adopt this document as a whole before the end of the year. So opponents of such measures have to rely only on the fact that the law will not be signed by President Dmitry Medvedev, who has repeatedly declared the need to further humanize Russian justice.
Ilya Novikov, teacher of the Russian Academy of Justice:
The easiest way is to abolish the jury as such - seduced many rulers. But only the most desperate were decided on this measure - Lenin, Pilsudski and Hugo Chavez. More often, half measures were used, a partial reduction in the circle of accusations, jurisdiction. It was such a counter-reform that was carried out in Russia in 1879, after justification by the jurors of Vera Zasulich, who attacked the St. Petersburg General Governor Trepov. Then, as it is now, in one package with measures against terrorism at the same time, ordinary affairs were removed from the jurors of jurors, which were irritating a lot of excuses: living without registration, resistance to the authorities ...
From the statement of the Yabloko party dated 05.12.08
The main argument of the authors of the draft law is that the jury is too often issuing acquittal verdicts. Therefore, deputies from United Russia, instead of achieving a better, competent and responsible work from the prosecutor’s office and investigation authorities, decided to bury the institution of the jury for cases related to mass riots, state treason and espionage ... “Yabloko” believes that in order to achieve objectivity, impartiality and the validity of the consideration of cases, the state should not cut the powers of the jurors, and expand them, strengthen them, strengthen them, strengthen them, strengthen them, strengthen Guarantees of jury, to ensure their protection.
From the statement of the co -chairs of the Party "Just case"
The State Duma Committee on Security in its positive opinion directly writes that “the facts of the jurors of the jurors of acquittal verdicts have become more frequent,” and therefore the jury must be canceled. Justice generally interferes with many. If we measure the efficiency of work with the number and speed of convictions, then the special services worked as efficiently in the 37th year. The heads of special services should learn to work in the new conditions of democratic Russia, and not try to return to the Stalinist order.
