Police as the Principal Prosecutor Before the Misdemeanour Court – Conflict of Powers with Other Authorities Including the Public Prosecutor

The article deals with the powers of the Police as a public prosecutor before the court in misdemeanor cases. An analysis is given of the possible collision of the powers of the Police as a public prosecutor with other bodies that, within the scope of their activities revealed offences and applied for punishment, including in the course of their investigations. The article concludes that it is necessary to interpret the current legislation in the direction of its practical application and reduce the contentious cases of collisions between different public accusers in the law of offenses. The paper challenges the direction of interpretation that equates participation in the case with the personal appearance of the accuser at the trial or hearing as unsupported by the current legislation and in conflict with functional interpretation. “Participation in the case” and “court appearance” are not synonymous terms. The term “appearance” is included in the term “participation in the case” and is an element of it, but does not fill it in its entirety. Participation in the case should be interpreted more broadly — as appearance in court, but it can also be exercised in any way from which the desire to execute the powers of a public prosecutor is evident by the authority in question, e.g. filing a letter informing of the intention to participate in the case as a public prosecutor, filing a formal motion, filing an evidentiary motion or filing an appeal. In view of the fact that the current position causes difficulties in the practical application of the law, it has been proposed de lege ferenda to amend Article 17 (5) of the Code of Criminal Procedure by giving it a new wording according to which participation in the case by the authority that filed the request for punishment is allowed only until the case is called and excludes the Police from participating in the case at that time.