The right to have access to a lawyer within the criminal proceedings in the European Union

Abstract

In the present study we have examined the provisions of the European legal instrument governing the right of access to a lawyer within the criminal proceedings in a Member State of the European Union, especially in situations where against the person concerned it was imposed a measure of deprivation of liberty and the right to have access to consular authorities, the right to inform a third person and the right of access to a lawyer in execution proceedings of a European Arrest Warrant. With the actual examination of these provisions, we referred also to the provisions of law, emphasizing the differences of the existing regulation and the need to transpose the European legal instrument into the national law by a separate legislative act and not by completing the special law, as it is intended at the moment. The innovations consist of examining the European legal instrument focusing on the right to have access to all the criminal proceedings, with reference to relevant national legislation, including the procedure of executing a European arrest warrant. The paper can be useful to academics, practitioners in the field and to the Romanian legislator from the perspective of transposing this European legal instrument into the national law.

Keywords

• suspected or accused person
• the right to defense
• the right to communicate with consular authorities
• lawyer.