Translated material
Judicial system: media digest (July 11-17, 2013)
system
Head of the Agora human rights center, member of the Human Rights Council under the President of the Russian Federation Pavel Chikov described the Russian judicial system
“The period when the court was objective, independent, impartial was the first 20 years after the judicial reform of 1864. And then, the case of Vera Zasulich greatly clipped the wings of that reform. Neither before it, nor after it, nor in the 90s did we have an independent court. Therefore, it cannot be said that it has changed much in recent years. It’s just that our court and law have bad genetics.”
Commentary on the consequences of repressive proceedings
“The fall into lawlessness turned out to be much more traumatic for Russian society than previously thought <...> In Russia, before our eyes, groups of people are emerging who prefer to administer their own justice - a priori illegal and unjust.”
changes
Against the backdrop of the merger of two higher courts, the Supreme Court (SC) and the Supreme Arbitration Court (SAC), a discussion is arising about the need to reform the judicial system as a whole
Members of the expert council under business ombudsman Boris Titov actually prepared a draft of judicial reform. It is expected that the relevant bills will be prepared in the fall of 2013 and will be included in the annual report of the Ombudsman, which will be published in February 2014.
The government's plenipotentiary representative in the country's highest courts, Mikhail Barshchevsky, “considers the problem of “staffing of judges” to be important. This problem, in his opinion, cannot be solved unless the rule is legitimized that only someone who has at least five years of practice as a lawyer can be a judge. And most importantly, according to him, as the higher authorities are united, the existing norms should be changed in such a way as to “inspire people’s trust in the judicial system.”
In this regard, the retired deputy chairman of the Constitutional Court, Tamara Morshchakova, proposed introducing “the election of judges and the “removal of judges from office by way of impeachment”, <...> a review of the powers of court chairmen in order to eliminate the informal influence of chairmen on judicial decisions, and the creation of an “institute of investigative judges" to ensure control over the investigation. This is an expansion of the competence of the jury and the introduction of the “institute of sheffens.”
“In the State Duma, under the leadership of Chairman Sergei Naryshkin, a working group has been created, which includes deputies, representatives of the judicial system and the scientific community; in the future, our working group will include colleagues from the Prosecutor General’s Office and the Ministry of Justice. Within the framework of this group, the Chairman of the State Duma has set the task of working to improve the legislation regulating the issues of the judicial system and the work of courts, Vladimir Pligin (member of the United Russia faction, chairman of the State Duma Committee on Constitutional Legislation) told Gazeta.Ru.
The Supreme Court introduced amendments to the legislation on candidates for judges to the State Duma
“Based on the text of the amendments, bachelors will not be allowed to take the exam - only a citizen with at least a specialist or master’s degree can become a judge. A candidate for the position of judge in a constituent entity of the Russian Federation will be able to be nominated for this position only on the basis of a recommendation from the qualification board of judges of the same region.”
“According to the Supreme Court bill, introduced recently to the State Duma, the rules for taking exams will also change. They can only be taken in the region where the candidate plans to work in the future. <...> At the same time, the Supreme Court considers it necessary to examine, on an equal basis with newcomers, those judges who have been retired for more than three years in a row and want to work again. Only candidates or doctors of law who have been awarded the title “Honored Lawyer of the Russian Federation” will be exempt from testing.”
Judge of the Constitutional Court Sergei Kazantsev issued a dissenting opinion in connection with the decision of the Constitutional Court allowing the situation of the defendants to be made more difficult
“Judge of the Constitutional Court (CC) Sergei Kazantsev expressed a dissenting opinion on a high-profile case on the right of the court to return criminal cases to the prosecutor to aggravate the charges. The judge does not agree with the ruling of the Constitutional Court, which allowed a “turn for the worse” to protect the rights of victims. Retired Constitutional Court judge Anatoly Kononov believes that this decision “crosses out the previous liberal position of its first composition.”
practice
Lawyer Sergei Magnitsky posthumously found guilty of tax evasion
“During the debate between the parties, a representative of the prosecutor’s office stated that the trial against the deceased auditor is taking place at the request of his relatives, who have repeatedly spoken out about the need to rehabilitate the defendant. “Magnitsky has been completely exposed, there are no grounds for rehabilitation,” the prosecutor said. At the same time, the relatives of the deceased auditor have repeatedly stated that they did not take the initiative to resume the investigation of the case against him. According to the representative of Magnitsky’s widow, Dmitry Kharitonov, the process in the Tverskoy court is illegal and is only an attempt to justify the death of a Hermitage Capital employee in a detention center.”
Commentary by Vladimir Lukin, Commissioner for Human Rights in the Russian Federation:
“"I am against people being judged posthumously. There are elements of ancient, pagan consciousness in this <...> Then let's arrange a trial of Ivan the Terrible or, conversely, of Kurbsky, who allegedly betrayed his Motherland. All these are games that I don’t understand well “I believe that they are talking about some strange twist in people’s minds,” the ombudsman said.”
Read also: