ПРЕДСТАВНИЦТВО ПОТЕРПІЛОГО У КРИМІНАЛЬНОМУ ПРОВАДЖЕННІ: ПОНЯТТЯ, ЗМІСТ, ПРОБЛЕМИ... ТА ШЛЯХИ ЇХ ВИРІШЕННЯ

Abstract

Due to the significant burden on the bodies of pre-trial investigation and the prosecutor’s office, criminal proceedings serious or especially serious offences with victims are not always investigated effectively. As a result, the rights and legitimate interests of the victims not being protected. However, it is a generally accepted convention that the priority for investigators and prosecutors is the proving a criminal suspect’s or accused’s guilt. Restoration of violated rights of victims is a secondary task assigned to the persons who have suffered physical, material and moral damage by committing a criminal offence. Therefore, the issues of providing professional legal assistance to victims in criminal proceedings are important today. The purpose of the article is to define the concept and reveal the content of representation by the victim’s lawyer in criminal proceedings, to outline the circle of problems that arise in this case and to make proposals for solution. The study reported that based on the analysis of legislation and the practice of its application a theoretical definition of representation of the victim in criminal proceedings are formulated. The purpose and tasks of this activity are determined, and its characteristics are outlined. The problems of legal regulation that reduce the effectiveness representation of the victim in criminal proceedings are identified. The proposals to improve the legislation are made. Representation of the victim in criminal proceedings is defined as a type of lawyer’s activity, which consists in providing the victim of a criminal offense with professional legal assistance to ensure his rights and legitimate interests at the stages of pre-trial investigation and court proceedings, as well as during procedural actions that can be carried out before the start of pre-trial proceedings investigation. The insufficiently high efficiency of the institution of representation of the victim in criminal proceedings is caused by the shortcomings of legal regulation, which must be corrected, among other things, by: normalizing the mandatory immediate involvement of a lawyer for the representation of the victim (including with public funds) in proceedings regarding especially serious offences and crimes of any severity, if the consequences are the death of a person or damage to health, which has signs of serious bodily injury, or bodily injury of medium severity; establishment of the duty of the investigator to immediately explain to the victim his rights and obligations; granting the victim and his representative equal rights with the parties to the criminal proceedings regarding the possibility of involving an expert to conduct an examination and the initiative of temporary access to things and documents.