The President has signed Law No.5490 on liability for contempt of the High Anti-Corruption Court.
The law classifies higher specialized courts as bodies authorized to hear cases on administrative offenses.
From now on, the HACC has the authority to hear cases under Art. 185-3 of the Code of Ukraine on Administrative Offenses. Now, a fine is envisaged for misconduct, from UAH 850 to UAH 2,550. The appellate chambers of higher specialized courts are to deal with appeals against decisions of the first instance.
Why is it important?
To date, the HACC did not have the right to prosecute for disrespectful conduct of parties to the judicial proceedings. For the Anti-Corruption Court, such a problem was acute and affected its efficiency. The HACC applied to the bar self-government bodies to bring to disciplinary liability those lawyers who violated ethical and procedural standards of conduct. However, these complaints were never granted.
Representatives of the public concluded that the effectiveness of the HACC depended not only on the quality, training, and integrity of judges, but also on the effective and procedurally appropriate conduct of the defense and prosecution. TI Ukraine noted this in its study of the HACC.
During the monitoring of the Anti-Corruption Court, TI Ukraine also repeatedly recorded inappropriate behavior of the representatives of the defense. According to experts, this significantly affected the number of sentences.
The organization expects that due to legislative changes, the HACC will be more efficient, focusing on sentencing and important court decisions, and not wasting time on issues that are not directly related to the proceedings.
