Ensuring state, public, and personal interests in criminal proceedings under martial law or a state of emergency

Abstract

The full-scale invasion of the russian federation on the territory of Ukraine led to the need to change and amend the Criminal Procedural Code of Ukraine, specifically its Section IX-1. The purpose of this study was to analyse the development of criminal procedural legislation on the regulation of criminal proceedings under martial law through the lens of state, public, and personal interests of participants in criminal proceedings; analysis of legislative regulation of special procedures for apprehension and detention both in Ukrainian legislation and in the legislation of other countries. This study uses a set of special methods inherent in the study of the phenomena of legal science, namely historical legal, formal legal, comparative legal, and system-structural. It was found that both the title and the text of Section IX-1 of the Criminal Procedural Code of Ukraine have no indication of the specific features of criminal proceedings during other, except for military, special situations in the state that threaten its national security. It was substantiated that when regulating criminal proceedings under martial law, the emphasis on the priority of the interests of the participants in the criminal proceedings shifts towards the benefit of the interests of the state and society. Attention was drawn to the substantial expansion of the prosecutor's powers. The lack of a systematic approach to introducing changes and amendments to the criminal procedural legislation was proved. The procedural form of restriction of the right to freedom and personal inviolability during martial law has undergone substantial changes. An analysis of the criminal procedural legislation of Great Britain, Spain, France, and the United States suggests that these states respond to national security threats by introducing special procedures in the investigation of crimes that caused such threats. These special procedures relate to the period for detaining a person without notifying them of their charge, without bringing them to court. The conducted study allows forming a conceptual approach to the regulation of criminal proceedings, thereby ensuring a reasonable balance of state, public, and personal interests