Dobro małoletniego pokrzywdzonego a realizacja prawa do obrony – rozważania na kanwie sądowej praktyki ustanawiania obrońcy w fazie in rem w celu przesłuchania małoletniego pokrzywdzonego

Abstract

The article presents the practice, followed by common courts and noticed by the Supreme Court, of appointing a defence counsel at in rem proceedings for a person who is not yet charged and absent from criminal proceedings as well as for de facto suspect, ordered to allow such a counsel to participate in the interrogation of a minor victim in accordance to Article 185a of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The Polish Code of Criminal Procedure provides for the absence of a defence counsel during the first interrogation as one of the grounds for repeating the interrogation of a minor victim. The author analyses the practice described above in the context of the doctrinal construction of the defence counsel in Polish criminal procedural law, as well as the institution of a non-party’s attorney and also tries to place it in the context of international regulations, including the standards of the right to defence arising from Directive 2013/48/UE and set out in the case law of the European Court of Human Rights.