The act of minor significance and genuine remorse in the criminal code

Abstract

This paper discusses the relationship between the institute of the act of minor significance and genuine remorse, i.e. the possibility of deeming consequential criminal offenses followed by the offender's genuine remorse as a fulfilled condition for the application of the institute of act of minor significance since the consequences of the criminal offense are considered insignificant. In such a context, the analysis primarily focused on the conditions for the application of the act of minor significance. It has been concluded that the application of the institute in question is justified only in the case of the so-called minor criminal offenses. After that, the analysis focused on the institute of genuine remorse from both the substantive-law and procedural-law aspects, which basically represents the application of the principle of opportunism prosecution. Next, the paper points to the existing similarities regarding the regulation of this institute between the solutions in the respective Serbian and German legislations. The conclusion is that the competition between the substantive-law and procedural-law institutes which serve the same purpose - the alleviation of criminal justice, particularly in view of the nature of their functional relationship, should always be resolved in favour of the substantive criminal law provisions application. However, if there is a criminal-political justification for it, as in the case of the acts of minor significance, then, following the examples of other European criminal laws, a repeal of the respective institute of criminal law is worth considering, as well as a better affirmation of the corresponding and so-called diversion procedural law mechanisms.

Keywords

• criminal code of Serbia
• the act of minor significance
• genuine remorse
• principle of opportunism