Who helps the injured ends up in the viewfinder? A dangerous trend in policing

Criminal proceedings are intended to protect the injured party. This is the basic idea of ​​the modern rule of law. But there can be a gap between what the law says and what people sometimes experience in practice. The worrisome phenomenon of recent years is not only formalism, delays or authorities' reluctance to deal with the essence of the matter. A much more dangerous phenomenon appears more and more often: the attempt to weaken or completely break the relationship between the victim and the person who helps him defend his rights.

The right to a proxy and the right to have a fiduciary present are not a superior standard. It is not a privilege or a favor of the state. They are legally guaranteed institutes created precisely so that the victim does not stand alone against the state machinery. For the average citizen, contact with the police is a stressful situation. In the room sit professionals equipped with powers, knowledge of the law, access to databases and information systems. On the other side sits a person who is trying to get his rights protected. That is why the law allows him to bring a person he trusts.

But it is here that sometimes something starts to happen that should worry everyone who cares about the rule of law.

Instead of being concerned with the deed itself, the focus begins to shift to the proxy. Suddenly the circumstances of the crime are not important, but questions like: who does this person represent? Where does he perform? How many people are accompanying? In which writings does it appear? What kind of complaints does he make? Which policemen is he against? How many people turn to him?

The moment such questions become the subject of systematic interest, it ceases to be an investigation of fact. It starts to be about monitoring the person.

This is a line beyond which a democratic state should never cross.

Even more serious is the situation when the information is not obtained directly, but through persons represented by the agent. Victims are summoned and questioned. The police are interested in their relationship with the agent, his activities, the extent of his assistance. Formally, it can always be argued that it is the verification of a certain fact. In reality, however, an atmosphere is created in which the victim begins to wonder whether he should have invited someone at all.

And this is where the real danger lies.

Repressive forces do not have to directly intimidate anyone. They don't have to threaten. They don't have to issue a single illegal decision. You just have to create an environment where people start saying to themselves, "Maybe it's better if I come without a proxy next time." Such an effect is as dangerous from the point of view of rights protection as an outright ban.

In legal theory, this is called the chilling effect. A person formally has the right, but circumstances discourage him from using it. The law thus remains on paper, while in reality it gradually disappears.

Particularly alarming is the situation when similar actions take place in an environment where objections of bias have already been raised, where procedural procedures have long been questioned and where superior authorities have already stated the illegality of some decisions. At such a time, every police agency should exercise the utmost restraint. But instead, the opposite sometimes follows - more outreach, more subpoenas, and more information gathering.

The result is predictable. The victim no longer feels protected. He begins to feel that he is being watched. The agent ceases to be an assistant in the protection of rights and becomes an object of interest. And there is an insecurity between these two people. Exactly the uncertainty that the trustee and trustee institutes were meant to remove.

Some may argue that an honest person has nothing to fear after all. However, this argument is dangerous and has been repeatedly abused historically. The purpose of procedural rights is not to protect only innocent or popular persons. The purpose of procedural rights is to protect everyone from the arbitrariness of state power. Once we begin to tolerate the monitoring of those who help others exercise their rights, we open the door to a model in which legal aid becomes a risky activity.

And that is a path at the end of which is not justice, but fear.

The rule of law is not known by how it treats the powerful. He is known by the way he treats an ordinary person who comes to the police with a confidant by his side. If this person begins to question whether his confidant or proxy is the real target of the police authority's interest, then something has gone wrong.

Very fundamentally.

Because at that point it's not just a single file anymore. It's not just about a particular police officer. It is not even a specific proceeding. It is the very trust of citizens that the state respects their right to defend themselves. And once that trust begins to erode, the rule of law loses one of its most important foundations.

A society in which the injured party is afraid to come forward with a fiduciary and in which people are afraid to use an attorney is not a society with very strong rights. It is a society in which rights begin to turn into an empty declaration. And this is exactly what citizens, lawyers, prosecutors and courts should be extremely sensitive against. Because freedom is not lost suddenly. They often disappear in small steps that may seem innocent at first glance. One of them may be the moment when the state's attention shifts from protecting the victim to those who help him defend his rights.

Source:

1. Czech Republic. 1993.Resolution of the Presidium of the Czech National Council No. 2/1993 Coll., on the promulgation of the Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms. Prague: Collection of Laws. Available from:Chamber of Deputies – Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms

2. Czech Republic. 1961.Act No. 141/1961 Coll., on criminal court proceedings (penal code), § 50–51a – representative of the victim. Prague: Collection of Laws. Available from:Criminal Code - § 50 representative of the injured party

3. Czech Republic. 2013.Act No. 45/2013 Coll., on victims of crimes, in particular § 21 – the right to be accompanied by a confidant. Prague: Collection of Laws. Available from:Victims of Crime Act

4. The Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic. 1996.Finding sp. stamp II. ÚS 98/95 of 5 June 1996 – On the basic right to legal aid according to Article 37, paragraph 2 of the Charter (on the right to a lawyer when providing an explanation).Available from:II. US 98/95

5. Ministry of the Interior of the Czech Republic. 2013.Victims of Crime Act - Protection from Secondary Harm and Victims' Rights. Prague: Ministry of the Interior of the Czech Republic. Available from:Crime Victims Act - Basic Information