ABSTRACT While the evasion of criminal consequences by elite perpetrators of sexual trafficking is frequently mischaracterized as an anomaly or institutional malfunction, this article theorizes such outcomes as the predictable result of systemic legal design. Utilizing the Jeffrey Epstein matter as a qualitative diagnostic case study, the research maps the “impunity architecture” that systematically insulates extreme wealth from penal accountability. The analysis demonstrates how operational control over exploitation – achieved through privatized logistics and managed vulnerability – deliberately degrades physical evidence. This intentional evidentiary reduction maximizes prosecutorial discretion, directly incentivizing the execution of secret, pre-charge non-prosecution agreements. This precise procedural timing legally excludes survivors from judicial participation under current victim rights frameworks. Concurrently, private governance tools, such as non-disclosure agreements, preserve the offender’s social legitimacy, which actively deters subsequent reporting. Rather than an exception, elite impunity emerges as the patterned deployment of lawful administrative tools. To neutralize the procedural advantages afforded to highly resourced defendants, this article proposes specific structural redesigns: mandatory judicial review for pre-charge settlements, detaching victim consultation rights from prosecutorial timelines, and implementing cross-jurisdictional reporting protocols. Ultimately, restoring accountability requires dismantling the statutory rules that prioritize administrative closure over transparent justice.

To address concerns about a legal system frequently viewed as overly punitive and racially unjust, progressive chief prosecutors have sought to reduce or eliminate the prosecution of low-level drug offenses. Yet, no empirical research has examined whether jurisdictions led by progressive prosecutors treat such offenses less punitively or exhibit smaller racial/ethnic disparities than jurisdictions led by traditional prosecutors. Using case-level data, we find that low- and high-level drug offenses receive less punitive outcomes in progressive jurisdictions, which are more likely to impose non-felony convictions and alternatives to incarceration. Additionally, disparities disadvantaging racial minorities were more common in traditional than in progressive jurisdictions. Decomposition models suggest these differences stem from prosecutorial discretion rather than case characteristics. These findings highlight the potential of progressive prosecution to promote more equitable, less punitive justice.

Recognition of living law: Article 2 of Law Number 1 of 2023 concerning the Criminal Code marks a paradigm shift in Indonesian criminal law from the principle of formal legality to material legality. However, this change has not been accompanied by an update to criminal procedural law. In fact, Criminal Procedure Code (KUHAP) remains oriented towards legal positivism and does not provide a procedural mechanism to integrate existing social norms into criminal justice practices. This situation creates tension between legal pluralism, legal certainty, and demands for substantive justice in the criminal justice system. This study aims to analyse: (1) the position of the Criminal Procedure Code in accommodating living law in the criminal justice process; (2) the role of the Prosecutor's Office as dominus litis in integrating living law through prosecution policy; and (3) the reconstruction model of prosecution policy in the perspective of ius constituendum in order to realize the integration between formal legality and material legality. The study uses a normative legal research method with a statutory, conceptual, and comparative approach, and is analysed using the theory of justice, the Pancasila theory of justice, and Gustav Radbruch’s theory of legal values. The results of the study indicate that: (1) the Criminal Procedure Code functions as a procedural law based on formal legality so that it has not been able to operationalize the recognition of living law procedurally; (2) the Prosecutor's Office has in fact accommodated living law through prosecutorial discretion and restorative justice, but does not yet have systemic procedural legitimacy; and (3) reconstruction of prosecution policy is needed through a facilitation model by prosecutors, judicial verification, court decisions, and state execution in order to balance legal certainty, substantive justice, and social benefits in the Indonesian criminal justice system.

In 2012, over 12,000 previously untested sexual assault kits (SAKs) were discovered in Memphis, Tennessee, prompting a significant effort to test the kits and seek justice for survivors. While prior research has explored the experiences of survivors and the process of testing these kits, less attention has been given to what occurs after testing, specifically, prosecutorial decision-making. This study investigates case-level variables associated with the likelihood of a case being accepted for prosecution following kit testing. Prosecutorial discretion is influenced by a range of legal and evidentiary factors, and understanding these variables is crucial for identifying systemic gaps. Using data from Memphis's SAK backlog, the present study analyzes patterns related to case acceptance. The Memphis Model is discussed and visualized through a diagram that details the coordinated tracking of SAKs and the collaborative investigative and prosecutorial processes used to assess case strength. Findings indicate that victim injury is a significant predictor of prosecutorial acceptance, particularly in cases that do not encounter legal or practical barriers such as expired statutes of limitation or deceased suspects. Implications for prosecutorial practices and victim advocacy are discussed.

The article examines the problems of ensuring legality during the inspection of a body in connection with exhumation, which is a type of investigative (detective) action carried out on the basis of a prosecutor’s ruling. The author emphasises that this issue is becoming particularly relevant in the context of increasing demands on the quality of procedural prosecutor’s supervision during pre-trial investigations. A body inspection involving exhumation is one of the most sensitive and complex investigative (detective) actions, as it entails interference with a person’s posthumous inviolability, affects the ethical, religious, and cultural beliefs of the relatives of the deceased, and may also generate significant public resonance. Under such conditions, the question of the prosecutor’s adherence to high standards of legality, justification, and proportionality when deciding to conduct this procedure becomes especially important. At the same time, an analysis of judicial practice reveals a number of systemic problems related to improper preparation of prosecutorial rulings, insufficient justification for the necessity of exhumation, disregard for expert conclusions, or premature initiation of this investigative (detective) action. Such shortcomings create risks that the obtained evidence may be deemed inadmissible, which can significantly affect the outcome of court proceedings and the overall effectiveness of criminal justice. Moreover, current legislation does not contain clear criteria defining the limits of prosecutorial discretion when deciding on exhumation, nor does it provide mechanisms for considering the position of the relatives of the deceased, which gives rise to additional legal and ethical conflicts. In these circumstances, scientific reflection on the role of the prosecutor as a guarantor of legality and human rights during exhumation, as well as the development of practical recommendations for improving the quality of procedural decisions, becomes particularly important. The article analyses the forms of exercising prosecutorial supervisory powers when deciding on exhumation and during its execution, summarises judicial practice regarding appeals against prosecutorial refusals to conduct this investigative action, identifies typical problems in reasoning, and formulates proposals for improving prosecutorial practice in substantiating rulings to conduct a body inspection in connection with exhumation.

This article examines a high value gold transaction dispute that illustrates how fragmented judicial reasoning, prosecutorial discretion, and corporate governance failures can converge to produce a miscarriage of justice in complex economic-crime cases. Using a socio-legal case study approach, the analysis reconstructs a transaction in which a buyer paid IDR 1.2 trillion for 4,000 kilograms of gold but received only 2,400 kilograms, a shortfall acknowledged by the selling corporation in civil proceedings. Early criminal cases convicted corporate insiders for fraud, recognizing the buyer as a victim. However, subsequent corruption proceedings reversed this position, alleging without evidentiary support that the buyer unlawfully obtained excess gold and caused state financial loss. Criminal courts accepted this narrative despite auditor testimony confirming the absence of state loss and despite inconsistencies with civil judgments. The findings reveal four systemic weaknesses: disregard of documentary evidence, role inversion from victim to offender, contradictory civil–criminal outcomes, and liability shifting driven by corporate governance failures. These dynamics align with broader patterns of wrongful convictions in economic-crime contexts. The study underscores the need for stronger evidentiary standards, improved inter-court coordination, enhanced forensic capacity, and clearer boundaries between commercial disputes and corruption enforcement

Despite increasing attention to prosecutors' role in shaping criminal justice outcomes, there is limited empirical research on what prosecutors do. While most theories of prosecutorial discretion emphasize overarching goals related to justice and safety, our paper shifts the focus toward the practical realities of the job, particularly in the lower courts. We propose a case management model of prosecutorial discretion, grounded in analyses of misdemeanor cases handled by the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office. Importantly, our dataset includes hearing-level prosecutor identifiers and decisions. By adapting established benchmarking methods, we identify credible counterfactuals and analyze how prosecutor actions influence case and defendant outcomes. We find that prosecutors vary in their case management skills, which are an important driver of conviction. Defendants fare better under prosecutors who secure fewer convictions, indicating negative consequences of conviction, but prosecutors who secure fewer convictions tend to be less effective in their day-to-day case management tasks. This highlights a fundamental tension in a prosecutor's work: prosecutors meeting office standards demonstrate worse outcomes in terms of future criminal justice contacts. Our findings underscore the need to rethink what makes an effective prosecutor in order to achieve policy goals such as public safety, rehabilitation, and efficient resource use.

Case-processing of low-level offenses is an important yet understudied aspect of criminal justice. These offenses can have significant consequences for justice-involved individuals, often serving as entry points into the criminal-legal system. As “gatekeepers” to the justice system, prosecutors play an integral role in this process. As such, it is important to understand prosecutorial discretion within this context. The current study examines prosecutorial decision-making among a unique category of low-level offenses, vice crimes. Specifically, this study examines prosecutors’ decisions to dismiss charges in prostitution cases, highlighting the influence of the sellers’ race and gender. Results suggest significant differences exist in dismissal decisions for White, Black, Asian, and Latina women charged with prostitution, highlighting the relative disadvantage experienced between racial/ethnic minority women.

The prosecution authority, as part of the state’s law enforcement system, plays a strategic role in ensuring legal certainty, justice, and public order while upholding moral values and human dignity. In this context, the application of restorative justice has emerged as an alternative approach to resolving criminal cases, including assault offenses. This study examines the implementation of termination of prosecution based on restorative justice in an assault case handled by the Palembang District Attorney’s Office. The research adopts a normative juridical method, focusing on statutory regulations and prosecutorial guidelines governing restorative justice. The findings indicate that the termination of prosecution was influenced by several key factors: the suspect committed the offense for the first time, the offense carried a maximum statutory penalty of no more than five years’ imprisonment, and the value of losses or evidence did not exceed IDR 2,500,000. Additionally, the case demonstrated successful reconciliation between the perpetrator and the victim, supported by community approval. The study concludes that the application of restorative justice in this case reflects prosecutorial discretion aimed at achieving substantive justice, social harmony, and efficiency in criminal law enforcement.Keywords: termination of prosecution; restorative justice; assault cases; prosecutorial discretion

Prosecutors are routinely accused of somehow failing the public whom they serve. Controversy arises when the prosecutor is seen to be too harsh, too lenient, too politically active, not politically active enough, and so on. What unites the voices in this conversation is some set of presupposed beliefs about the proper constraints on prosecutorial discretion. Yet, there is no clear normative framework which offers a general explanation of how and why prosecutorial discretion should be constrained. This article devises such a framework, arguing that prosecutorial discretion is fundamentally connected to the concept of justice, and that the prosecutor should be bound to do justice rather than simply serve the law. Questions about how to constrain prosecutorial discretion must therefore be answered by reference to some conception of justice, and prosecutors must be evaluated based on this, not simply based on whether they have complied with legal rules.

The Police-Prosecutor Charging Decision

This study examines how power dynamics shape decision-making practices in criminal case processing within the Indonesian justice system. Using a qualitative descriptive analytical socio-legal approach, the research is based exclusively on documentary materials, including primary legal sources, institutional policies, monitoring reports, and peer-reviewed academic literature (prioritizing 2020–2025 publications). Data were analyzed through a combination of doctrinal analysis and thematic qualitative content analysis to identify recurring patterns across the stages of investigation, prosecution, adjudication, and sentencing. The findings indicate that criminal case processing operates as a layered “decision chain” in which power is exercised through procedural authority, control over information, and discretionary space. Evidentiary thresholds emerge as a critical leverage point that can legitimize early coercive measures and lock in case trajectories, particularly when evidence-quality safeguards are limited. The analysis also highlights how inter-agency fragmentation may turn decision-making into jurisdictional politics, encouraging defensive and administratively driven practices that weaken accountability. While prosecutorial discretion and restorative justice policies offer corrective potential against punitive default responses, they may reproduce unequal outcomes without transparent standards and effective oversight. Finally, the transition to online hearings reconfigures power by making technological access and platform control new structural advantages, raising concerns for due process and equality of arms. The study contributes an integrated socio-legal account of procedural power and offers reform-oriented implications for strengthening evidence integrity, auditable discretion, and fair digital proceedings.

Abstract Despite increasing attention to prosecutors' role in shaping criminal justice outcomes, there is limited empirical research on what prosecutors do. While most theories of prosecutorial discretion emphasize overarching goals related to justice and safety, our paper shifts the focus toward the practical realities of the job, particularly in the lower courts. We propose a case management model of prosecutorial discretion, grounded in analyses of misdemeanor cases handled by the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office. Importantly, our dataset includes hearing‐level prosecutor identifiers and decisions. By adapting established benchmarking methods, we identify credible counterfactuals and analyze how prosecutor actions influence case and defendant outcomes. We find that prosecutors vary in their case management skills, which are an important driver of conviction. Defendants fare better under prosecutors who secure fewer convictions, indicating negative consequences of conviction, but prosecutors who secure fewer convictions tend to be less effective in their day‐to‐day case management tasks. This highlights a fundamental tension in a prosecutor's work: prosecutors meeting office standards demonstrate worse outcomes in terms of future criminal justice contacts. Our findings underscore the need to rethink what makes an effective prosecutor in order to achieve policy goals such as public safety, rehabilitation, and efficient resource use.

This study examines the strategic challenges faced by environmental rights defenders in Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand, including the abuse of the law through the practice of Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPPs) used by corporations or authorities to silence public criticism of environmental damage. Although all three countries have legal instruments for protection, their implementation is still limited and does not comprehensively cover aspects of procedural law. This study uses a normative legal approach with a comparative legal method to analyze the form of anti-SLAPP legal protection and its potential integration into the criminal procedural system. The results show that Indonesia and the Philippines still limit legal protection to environmental issues, while Thailand has more advanced normative provisions but has not been effective in preventing SLAPPs at the early stages of the legal process. A legal mechanism is needed that allows for the termination of SLAPP cases at the investigation or prosecution stage through clear legal indicators and strengthening prosecutorial discretion based on the principle of public interest. The novelty of this study lies in the proposed integration of Anti-SLAPP principles into criminal procedural law as a preventive measure against the criminalization of environmental activists and as a recognition of ecological justice, where protection of public participation and freedom of expression is an integral part of social justice in the context of environmental protection.

Prosecutorial discretion: a theoretical and experimental investigation

This paper aims to scrutinise the Malaysian juvenile justice system and the negative consequences of the lack of pre-trial alternative measures in dealing with children. Juvenile delinquency is a social problem that has attracted numerous discussions from different quarters. One of the primary issues in this area is how to respond to complex, multifaceted problems involving children in conflict with the law. Through doctrinal analysis and comparative frameworks with international standards and legal practice in England and New Zealand, this study highlights the positive impact of diversionary approaches on recidivism, rehabilitation, and restorative justice. Malaysia’s heavy reliance on formal adjudication is inconsistent with several international standards. This paper advocates amending the Child Act 2001 and the Criminal Procedure Code to implement pre-trial diversion, with police and prosecutorial discretion to encourage restorative justice alternatives in minor and non-violent cases. This change would align Malaysia’s system with international norms, improve children's rights, and advance the justice system toward greater rehabilitation and restoration.

Abstract The new EU environmental crime directive must be implemented within Member States by May 2026, and has many strengths compared to the Directive it replaced. But problem areas are identified. The definitions of crimes, the provisions on sentencing options, sentencing practice, prosecutorial discretion and the need for transparent detailed data on environmental prosecutions all need addressing if the Directive is to secure its potential. But by focusing so much on the criminal law, the Directive fails to acknowledge that a sophisticated and effective sanctioning system integrates criminal, administrative and civil responses, even when the responsibility of different bodies within a Member State.

ABSTRACT This study examines the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and social unrest following the murder of George Floyd on prosecutorial decision-making, with a specific focus on case charging practices and potential racial and sex-based disparities. Using a sample of 1,595 arrests from a suburban jurisdiction in a large, urban, Midwestern county, this study employs logistic regression models to test for variations in charging decisions. Results indicate that cases were less likely to be charged during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a roughly 30% reduction in the odds of charging; however, periods of social unrest were not found to significantly impact case charging practices. Analyses also revealed sex and racial disparities, in which males were more likely to be charged than females, and Black defendants had a slightly lower likelihood of being charged during the pandemic. The findings suggest a need for policy reforms to address prosecutorial discretion and to mitigate disparities, particularly during periods of crisis. These include increasing resources to manage court backlogs and implementing bias-reduction training for prosecutors.

This study aims to clarify the concept and justification for the cessation of corruption cases, together with an explanation of the categories of corruption cases eligible for termination. This paper addresses corruption cases that may be concluded, namely those having negligible financial harm to the state. This research constitutes a normative legal analysis employing a conceptual framework. The author finds that it is justifiable to discontinue the prosecution of corruption cases in Indonesia where the financial losses to the state are minimal. An economic analysis of law suggests that it is ineffective to insist on or fail to differentiate between corruption cases involving minor financial losses to the state, as one of the aims of enforcing criminal law against corruption is to recuperate state financial losses. The subsequent concern is the lack of a specified threshold for minimal financial losses to the state in Indonesian criminal law regarding corruption. Upon examining the budgetary cap for enforcing criminal law related to corruption, the author posits that the optimal threshold for minor financial detriments to the state is a maximum of Rp. 200,000,000 (two hundred million rupiah). The notion of ceasing the prosecution of corruption cases involving minimal financial detriment to the state can be implemented by incorporating a provision for discontinuation of prosecution, one of which is predicated on prosecutorial discretion. This is similarly implemented in France, the Netherlands, and Germany, achievable by changing Article 140 Paragraph (2) of the Criminal Procedure Code on the cessation of prosecution

This study examines the constitutionality and legal boundaries of the Attorney General’s discretion to terminate investigations in the interest of state revenue. The issue arises from the tension between fiscal policy objectives and the constitutional principles of legality, due process, and equality before the law. Using a normative juridical method with statutory, conceptual, and case approaches, the research analyzes the legal framework under Law No. 16 of 2004 as amended by Law No. 11 of 2021, the Criminal Procedure Code, and relevant jurisprudence. The findings indicate that while the Attorney General’s discretionary power to halt investigations can be justified to protect state finances, its implementation currently lacks clear statutory parameters, judicial oversight, and public transparency. This gap creates potential conflicts with constitutional guarantees and risks institutionalizing impunity. The study contributes novelty by constructing a constitutional framework for prosecutorial discretion that aligns fiscal interests with legal certainty and justice. It recommends legislative reform to establish explicit criteria, judicial review mechanisms, and accountability systems to ensure that the Attorney General’s discretion operates within the rule of law and upholds constitutional rights.