MINORS AS VICTIMS OF CRIME AND CRIMINAL-LAW PROTECTION MECHANISMS

(Analysis of the Provisions of the Criminal Code of Serbia, International Legal Standards, the Practice of the Constitutional Court of Serbia and Proposals for Improving Protection)

Abstract

In this paper the author first examines, from a terminological perspective, the relationship between the concepts of ‘victim’ of a criminal offense, the ‘passive subject’ used in substantive criminal law and the ‘injured party’ characteristic of Serbian criminal procedural law. Within the unified legal order of the Republic of Serbia, three concepts that are essentially similar coexist. It is interesting to note that the Criminal Code, inconsistently with its authentic term ‘passive subject’, uses the term ‘victim’ in several provisions. Therefore, a separate section of the paper is devoted to discussing whether any benefit would be gained from defining the concept of victim in the Criminal Code and the Criminal Procedure Code, which some countries in the region have already done.

The central part of the paper is devoted to a discussion of the position of minors as passive subjects in the substantive criminal law of the Republic of Serbia. When prescribing more severe, qualified forms of certain criminal offenses, the legislator has required the existence of specific characteristics of the passive subject, which has been done with the aim of improving the position of certain persons, particularly minors. In this part of the discussion, the author offers a large number of de lege ferenda proposals that could contribute to improving the criminal-law position of minors. Separate sections are devoted to international standards, as well as to an overview, selected by the author, of the adopted constitutional complaints filed by minors as injured parties/victims of criminal offenses before the Constitutional Court of Serbia.