INITIATION STAGE OF CRIMINAL PROCEEDINGS: SHOULD IT BE OR NOT IN RUSSIA’S CRIMINAL PROCEDURE?

Abstract

The article analyzes the positions of scientists and practitioners proposing to reform the stage of initiating criminal proceedings or abandon it. The author argues for the need and conditions to preserve this stage in Russia’s criminal procedure. Purpose: to identify the key arguments of supporters and opponents of maintaining the procedural stage of initiating criminal proceedings, evaluate and systematize them. Methods: general theoretical methods of formal and dialectical logic; specific scientific methods: legal-dogmatic, comparative legal, method of description, method of interpretation, method of interpretation of legal norms. Results: the article reveals the tendencies in the formation of diametrically opposite scientific judgments on the existence of the initiation stage of criminal proceedings. Foreign experience of abandoning this stage is analyzed. An «intermediate» solution is proposed to maintain the stage with a possible expansion of the discretion of the law enforcer.

Keywords

• criminal procedure
• initiation of a criminal case
• pre-trial proceedings in criminal cases
• verification of a crime report
• preliminary investigation