Legal Remedies of the Injured Party in the Criminal Proceedings of the Republic of Srpska

Abstract

Until the reform of criminal prosecution laws in Bosnia and Herzegovina from 2003 from the decisions of the Public Prosecutor not to take or drop criminal prosecution, which he was dissatisfied with, the injured party could be protected by taking over the prosecution. The reform accepted the prosecutorial investigation. The concept of the injured party as a subsidiary prosecutor was abandoned and we received a complaint as a new legal remedy against the public prosecutor’s orders not to implement and suspend the investigation. Amendments to the Law on Criminal Proceedings of the Republic of Srpska from 2021, the position of the injured party in criminal proceedings has been significantly changed and improved. The institute of the injured party was restored as a prosecutor, although in a very limited variant. The complaint against the order of non-investigation and suspension of the investigation is regulated in more detail, and some new significantly different solutions have been accepted. Three-fold decision-making was accepted by introducing objections as an intermediate stage and a new legal remedy. An objective deadline for filing a complaint was also prescribed, and the decision-making was transferred to the Chief Prosecutor. The possibility of submitting a complaint has been expanded even when the prosecutor drops the confirmed indictment. The injured party received two new types of complaints that he can file due to the duration of the proceedings. Despite the best intentions of the legislator in regulating the new position of the injured party in criminal proceedings, serious failures were made. Consideration of this issue should contribute to a better understanding of the position of the injured party in the criminal proceedings of the Republic of Srpska and the legal means at his disposal, their more regular application, as well as new legal solutions that will better suit our conditions, practical needs and theoretical settings, which will eliminate the observed omissions