Knowledge, advisory and capacity building : information tool for criminal procedural rights in judicial cooperation. User manual

Abstract

The protection of fundamental rights for persons accused or suspected of a crime is one of the main aims of the EU policy in the area of justice. However, the effective protection of such rights throughout the EU is heavily affected by the highly varying legal frameworks which characterize Member States regulation on procedural rights in criminal proceedings. In this context, legal actors often struggle to identify which legislation and therefore which procedural rights are applicable to persons accused or suspected of a crime in specific cases, both due to linguistic barriers and the peculiarities of different national legal systems. This situation persists also after the introduction of the EU Directives derived from the Stockholm Programme, that aim at creating a certain level of harmonized rules on the matter. Firstly, such directives often provide only a very minimal level of protection, and tackle only specific phases of the criminal proceeding. Secondly, the application of such directives at the national level is often further reducing the impact of the EU acquis due to incorrect or incomplete implementation or to the persistence of different interpretations given to criminal procedural rights by national courts.